March 22, 2013 William Happer Princeton University CO2 has been demonized because it allegedly causes Catsrophic Global Warming Der Spiegel, Jan. 2013 Klimawandel: Forscher rtseln ber Stillstand bei Erderwrmung Mail Online, Monday, March 18 After a long pause, or slight decline from the dust bowl maximima of the 1930s, temperatures started to rise rapidly in the 1980s. Temperatures have been stable since about 1998, although CO2 levels have continued to rise. http://www.drroyspencer.com/latest-global-temperatures/ Satellite temperature measurements show little warming El Nino Normal La Nina The earth is almost always warming or cooling. A strong warming phase began about 200 years ago, long before CO 2 levels began to increase. From John Muir's notes about his first visit to Glacier Bay in October, 1879. Glacier Bay is undoubtedly young as yet. Vancouver's chart, made only a century ago, shows no trace of it, though found admirably faithful in general. It seems probable, therefore, that even then the entire bay was occupied by a glacier of which all those described above, great though they are, were only tributaries. John Muir, first President of The Sierra Club From Travels in Alaska, Chapter X http://soundwaves.usgs.gov/2001/07/glacierbaymap.gif Could much of the warming from 1950 to 2000 have been due to natural causes and not CO2 ? Solar activity? Cosmic rays? Pacific Decadal Oscillation? Atlantic Meridional Oscillation? Etc., etc. Lets review the basic physics! The Earth from Space Atmospheric Circulation A NASA Website MODTRAN Radiation Spectrum of Earth Examples of FTIR Data from a Satellite Saturation of the CO 2 Band At current CO 2 levels, the radiative forcing of CO 2 is not proportional to the concentration, [CO 2 ], but is approximately proportional to ln [CO 2 ]. This is the celebrated logarithmic response. MODTRAN Calculation of T versus C02 Warming from Doubling CO 2 (Climate Sensitivity) Direct Effect of CO 2 : about 1 C IPCC Most Probable: 3 C Most of the large discrepancy is due to supposed positive feedback from water vapor. Even the 1 C may be too big! 2349 cm -1 frequency too high for greenhouse warming 666 cm -1 (Satans number) greenhouse warming 1388 cm -1 no changing dipole moment, no absorption or emission Attenuation Coefficient (e-foldings / length) N is the number density of CO 2 molecules, and s eg is the cross section of the transition from a lower state g to an upper state e; G eg is the lineshape function. Line strength (in cm) n eg = frequency (in cm -1 ) of the transition, D eg = the electric dipole matrix element, E g = lower-state energy, T = absolute temperature, k = Boltzmanns constant, h = Plancks constant, c = speed of light, T = absolute temperature. Partition function A Lorentzian line shape m eg = collision broadening of line; n = emission/absorption frequency A Voigt line shape Normalized line shapes Hedy Lamarr Frequency-Hopping Patent (to defeat torpedo-jamming by Nazi ships) Lamarr-Anthiel system hopped over 88 frequencies (piano keyboard). US Patent 2,292,387 CO 2 can hop to any of several thousand vibration-rotation frequencies at each collision. Schwartzschild equation for radiant intensity from earth. Planck brightness Attenuation rate Optical depth to space Downwelling Flux at the Surface Planck Brightness Optical Depth from Surface to Altitude z 390 ppm CO 2 780 ppm CO 2 Using Voigt Profiles Increases The Radiative-Forcing Increment From Doubling CO 2 By A Factor ~1.4 But far wing absorption from Voigt profiles does not exist! Hartmann, Boulet and Robert, Collisional Effects on Molecular Spectra, Elsevier, 2008 Voigt Line Shapes Dont Work in Far Wings! Mail Online, Monday, March 18 Why has global warming paused? Qualitatively, more CO2 almost certainly causes some warming. Complicated physics makes it difficult to quantify the warming. Essentially all of the warming and coolings before 1900 were natural. Much of the warming of the past century was probably natural. The radiative forcing from more CO2 has probably been overestimated. One possible reason, poorly modelled far-wing lineshapes, has been discussed. Feedback from water vapor and clouds may have been over-estimated too. Contributions from long term natural cycles have probably been underestimated: The Sun Cosmic Rays Pacific Decadal Oscillation Atlantic Meridional Oscillation etc., etc. I am in revolt against the age-old lie that the majority is always right. Henrik Ibsen, An Enemy of the People Closing Thought