Stunning NASA global warming image

 This is NASA's best estimate of temp change from 1880 to the present, which works out an average 1.4 degree F or .8 degree C increase over 136 years. Nothing much.
These are shown in the above charts in 5 year increments. The chart shown above is the first 5 year increment. Almost nothing happened until 1980, when warming was first being promoted.

Chicken or the egg?

 

TIME SERIES: 1884 TO 2015

Data source: NASA/GISS 
Credit: NASA Scientific Visualization Studio188418842015

The time series above shows the five-year average variation of global surface temperatures from 1884 to 2015. Dark blue indicates areas cooler than average. Dark red indicates areas warmer than average.

 Well it's the sea that's melting the ice, but hundreds of years is still way insignificant in geographical /geological terms. Much bigger fluctuations happens over millions of years. Pollution in general is a way bigger threat than greenhouse gasses, which are natural afterall. 

The thing that's is not deniable is that CO2 is going up dramatically. The effect of CO2 is the question, well posed in this piece

The greenhouse gasses keep the Earth 30° C warmer than it would otherwise be without them in the atmosphere, so instead of the average surface temperature being -15° C, it is 15° C. Carbon dioxide contributes 10% of the effect so that is 3° C. The pre-industrial level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere was 280 ppm. So roughly, if the heating effect was a linear relationship, each 100 ppm contributes 1° C. With the atmospheric concentration rising by 2 ppm annually, it would go up by 100 ppm every 50 years and we would all fry as per the IPCC predictions.

But the relationship isn’t linear, it is logarithmic. In 2006, Willis Eschenbach posted this graph on Climate Audit showing the logarithmic heating effect of carbon dioxide relative to atmospheric concentration:

 More NASA....the logarithmic effect of CO2....simply put more CO2 has less and less effect on temps.

NASA Climate Research: CO2 Global Warming Impact Cut By 67% Over Last 50 Years

NASA's climate research arm, GISS, recently updated its global temperature dataset.

Using the annual temperature anomaly data from GISS, in combination with annual CO2 data from NOAA, the temperature increase per atmospheric CO2 ppm increase can be calculated.

Now, if global warming is solely a function of increases in atmospheric CO2 levels, then calculating the degree increase per ppm added would be a convenient measure to monitor.

As this chart reveals, for the 50-year period ending 1963, for each ppm increase of CO2 there was an associated increase of +0.024°C; in contrast, for the 50-year period ending 2013, the impact on warming was 67% less per ppm.

This diminishing influence of a new CO2 molecule over time is actually a function of known climate physics - the logarithmic effect of carbon dioxide. Essentially, from lab testing it was determined that increasing levels of CO2 caused a diminishing returns effect, which is better described here. 

The logarithmic relationship between CO2 levels and global temperature was first presented way back in the 1930s by a scientist named Guy Callendar, and it is now widely accepted as science fact. 

And as the entire world knows by now, global warming is stuck in 'The Hiatus' that has resulted in temperatures barely budging over the last 16 years. This is despite the prodigious amounts of new CO2 emissions over that time span - recall, as the chart indicates, the influence of CO2 has declined.

What this means is that future CO2 emission impacts will likely continue to lessen, to the point where they become rather inconsequential, which the climate may already be approaching in a manner faster than expected.

Certainly, it would seem this fellow Callendar was really onto something. Plus, he discounted the speculative idea that higher levels of CO2 would create a positive feedback supposedly leading to ever higher temps. It appears he was wise to dismiss the shaky concept of "tipping point" positive feedbacks.

Not bad for a scientist without the "benefits" of super-computers, satellites, IPCC conferences, huge government funding of climate research and etc.

Additional temperature and climate charts.

GISS temperature dataset. NOAA CO2 dataset. For 2013 annual mean CO2 level, used estimate since actual 2013 mean level not published yet.

January 29, 2014 at 03:54 PM | Permalink ShareThis