CERN: Global Warming Caused by Sun

snow hope · Post by **snow hope** » 04 Sep 2011, 19:59

Ludwig wrote: I don't see how you can persist in denying the evidence for MMGW on rational grounds.

With respect Ludwig, I think you need to do further research on the matter.

Ludwig wrote: the only arguments I hear against MMGW are "It's done nothing but rain this summer" and glib semantic tricks like "the sun is mostly responsible for the earth's climate".

Again, more research.....

Ludwig wrote: Conversely, I've never heard any alternative explanation as to why the summer ice sheet is nearly gone and the vast majority of the world's glaciers are retreating.

Both of these have occured before in recent century's and were not the result of Anthropogenic GW. They were the result of natural climate change, which had nothing to do with increasing CO2 or even increasing CO2 caused by mankind.

A good starting point would be to read this link, where there is a letter from the President of the Royal Society, London, to the Admiralty, 20th November, 1817, detailing marked changes to the arctic ice coverage......
http://www.john-daly.com/polar/arctic.htm

I hope you find this instructive.

Keela · Post by **Keela** » 04 Sep 2011, 20:11

snow hope wrote:
clv101 wrote:
snow hope wrote:The 'story' is complex, but the IPCC, state that mankind is 90% responsible for the majority of climate change over the last hundred odd years. There is an increasing amount of people (scientists and non-scientists) who are finding this very hard to accept!
They say based on the literature, it's very likely (90%) that mankind is responsible. That's a little different to what you wrote.
Not much.

Quite different!
The first attaches the 90% to the degree which to man is responsible for the climate change
The second is where the 90% is a probability that mankind is responsible

The 90% means a different thing in each case.

snow hope · Post by **snow hope** » 04 Sep 2011, 20:39

Okay, there is some difference, lets tease this out a bit further then.

Who would care to say how much man is responsible for global warming, according to the IPCC? I bet Chris knows?

Keela · Post by **Keela** » 05 Sep 2011, 08:07

It's a tricky question.

If climate is close to a tipping point (with all the things that brought it there being natural) and another manmade factor is added that brings the climate to the cruical tipping point, then how much is that last factor responsible?

Or to use an old saying as an example - If you are loading a camel with straw, is it the first straw or the last one that breaks it's back?

Or another thought exercise - I take migraines and I know there are a load of things that contribute to them. Migraines also work on a tipping point or threshold thing. I know there are days that I am more at risk of reaching that threshold and so I am particularly careful to avoid things such as cheese that usually have little to no effect.

So imagine if, on a specified day, I would get migraine with cheese and without I wouldn't: would the cheese be 100% responsible for the migraine? Or simply one factor amongst many? Tough call.

For me the decision is easy - Avoid cheese when other factors beyond my control are also causing me to approach a migraine!

So I haven't quite answered your question, but instead I'll ask you to think about how you would measure your "how much" - especially in relation to the tipping point concept.

biffvernon · Post by **biffvernon** » 05 Sep 2011, 08:12

Perhaps a better analogy: walking along a busy road but staying on the pavement is fine - take a step sideways, splat.

An Inspector Calls · Post by **An Inspector Calls** » 05 Sep 2011, 09:58

90 % likely . . . 90 % of . . . yes, there's a difference but, broadly, the impression is similar.

Why worry about the possibility of a tipping point? We now know, thanks to the re-establishment of the MWP (following its temporary cancellation by Mann et al) that it was warmer than present day during that period, and that subsequently the temperature dipped into the LIA. It was even warmer during the early holocene. So there can be no tipping point at temperatures similar to those at present when they are below the temperatures of the MWP. If there were such a tipping point, temperature would have 'run away' during the MWP.

Now we 'know' from the IPCC that the warming of the earth in the last 100 years, 0.75 degrees, is almost certainly due to CO2 emissions. And since the dependency of temperature on CO2 concentration is logarithmic, we can easily calculate, from the most basic physics, what the projected temperature rise might be for future emissions.

Over the last 100 years, the atmospheric concentration of CO2 has risen from 280 ppmv to 390 ppmv. What would happen if we caused the concentration to rise to 560 ppmv? We are not confident about the various constants we must use in the equation relating CO2 concentration to temperature rise, but by using logarithmic ratios we can cancel all these unknowns out. In other words, we can use the 'experiment' of the last 100 years as a proven model for the future.

So, the warming will be given by this simple ratio:
Warming for CO2 at 560 ppmv = (The warming caused between 290 and 280) * [log(560/280)/log(390/280)]

that is

Warming for CO2 at 560 =0.75*log(2)/log(390/280)
which is 1.6 degrees.
As we've already had 0.75 degrees to date, the warming for a rise from 390 to 580 ppmv is 0.8 C.

If that rise doesn't take us to temperatures above those seen in the MWP (or the early holocene), there'll be no 'reaching the tipping point'.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene

Post by **kenneal - lagger** » 05 Sep 2011, 15:43

The sun has been causing warming and cooling on its own for the entire history of the solar system. Yes, the sun caused the MWP and the LIA and it's about to cause another LIA in the next few years. The odds are that once we come out of the new LIA we will have another extremely warm period. If you add on top of that the warming caused by an increasing amount of CO2 in the atmosphere we will get some very uncomfortable temperatures to put up with.

If the sun goes into hibernation as it did in the LIA, and as it's thought to be about to do, we should get temperatures on a par with the Maunder Minimum. If we don't get those temperatures it will give us some idea of the amount of warming being caused by the CO2.

I am taking precautionary measures which will enable me to keep warm and grow my own food during the upcoming economic recession and/or collapse. These will also mitigate against PO and GW so I'll be a winner three times over.

An Inspector Calls · Post by **An Inspector Calls** » 05 Sep 2011, 19:28

If we go into another LIA you won't see any warming for centuries. And my house has half the heat load of yours.

biffvernon · Post by **biffvernon** » 05 Sep 2011, 21:35

An Inspector Calls wrote:And my house has half the heat load of yours.

Half the heat load of Ken's?

Post by **kenneal - lagger** » 06 Sep 2011, 01:33

An Inspector Calls wrote:If we go into another LIA you won't see any warming for centuries. And my house has half the heat load of yours.

Am I bovvered?

At least I don't need any mains electricity to keep mine warm.

An Inspector Calls · Post by **An Inspector Calls** » 06 Sep 2011, 08:27

kenneal wrote:
An Inspector Calls wrote:If we go into another LIA you won't see any warming for centuries. And my house has half the heat load of yours.
Am I bovvered?

At least I don't need any mains electricity to keep mine warm.

Probably. But mine only needs 3 kW, yours 6 kW. Tough.

Post by **kenneal - lagger** » 06 Sep 2011, 16:27

An Inspector Calls wrote:
kenneal wrote:
An Inspector Calls wrote:If we go into another LIA you won't see any warming for centuries. And my house has half the heat load of yours.
Am I bovvered?

At least I don't need any mains electricity to keep mine warm.
Probably. But mine only needs 3 kW, yours 6 kW. Tough.

It depends on where the 6kW is derived from. If the 6kW is derived sustainably from wood which is available from my land I do not have a problem. If your 3kw is the electrical input to your heat pump and is derived from mains electricity you have a problem as you are reliant on the mains and you would potentially need 12 kW of wood heat to replace it.

Also, I am taking measures to further insulate my house whereas you, apparently, don't believe super insulation is necessary.

An Inspector Calls · Post by **An Inspector Calls** » 06 Sep 2011, 17:09

I've always found mains electricity to be very sustainable, hardly ever disappears. And I've got better things to do with my time than chopping wood all day.

Anyway, mustn't keep you from your little chopper.

Post by **kenneal - lagger** » 06 Sep 2011, 18:05

An Inspector Calls wrote:I've always found mains electricity to be very sustainable, hardly ever disappears.

I hope for your sake and for many others that what you say is true and carries on into the future, but I'm not optimistic and neither are many others who read the contents of this site.

Post by **kenneal - lagger** » 06 Sep 2011, 18:18

Mains electricity can never be said to be sustainable when it wastes about 60% of the fuel use to generate it. It can never be sustainable as long as it uses fossil fuels as a generation source because fossil fuels won't last forever.

It is also debatable how sustainable fossil fuel derived electricity is on an individual basis as the cost is set to rise dramatically over the next few years as the BRICS countries continue their 10% growth. Even the government has been warning people over future fuel cost rises. The maths of this 10% growth is that those countries, which comprise at least a third of the world's population, will have to double their consumption of everything they have used in the past in the next seven years.

Can you imagine the effect that will have on all commodity prices? I'll happily go back to chopping my wood and growing my own food thank you. And thanks to my insulation program, I will be chopping ever less amounts of wood, even if the weather does get substantially colder.