Has anybody actually read the research on greenhouse gases?

Question

Or is this a big sucker job put on by politicians? I believed that crap until I started doing some digging. The web and your local library are full of studies dating back to the 1800's on global warming. It's not a new thing. I've taken the time to read actual research results and it appears that our contribution to global warming is only .28%. Water vapor is responsible for 95% of global warming. Volcanoes, rotting vegetation, solar cycles, magnetic cycles, animals (including CO2 and "intestinal gas" from 6 billion people), and industry for the other 5%. Of that, our share is so small there may be nothing we can do to change anything. So, are we being taken for suckers again? Who gets the money out of this global warming thing? Give me something to believe in, no media crap.

Answer 1

Apparently you haven't.

1. Water vapor is responsible for 60% of the total greenhouse effect, not 95%. CO2 is responsible for 26%, and all other greenhouse gases combine for the rest.
http://atoc.colorado.edu/~dcn/ATOC7500/members/Reading/KiehlTrenberth.pdf

2. Volcanoes emit less than 0.1% of the CO2 annually that humans do.
http://www.springerlink.com/content/631t022372116213/

3. Total Solar Irradiance (TSI) has shown no long-term trend since satellite observation began in 1978.
http://www.acrim.com/ACRIM%20Composite%20Graphics.htm

4. If the Sun is causing the current warmth, then we're getting more energy, and the whole atmosphere should be getting warmer. If it's greenhouse, then we're getting the same amount of energy, but it's being distributed differently: more heat is trapped at the surface, and less heat is escaping to the stratosphere. So if it's the Sun, the stratosphere should be warming, but if it's greenhouse, the stratosphere should be cooling.

In fact, the stratosphere has been on a long-term cooling trend ever since we've been keeping radiosonde balloon records in the 1950's. Here's the data:
http://hadobs.metoffice.com/hadat/images/update_images/global_upper_air.png
http://hadobs.metoffice.com/hadat/hadat2/hadat2_monthly_global_mean.txt
http://cdiac.ornl.gov/trends/temp/sterin/sterin.html

5. If it's the Sun, we're getting more energy during the day, and daytime temperatures should be rising fastest. But if it's greenhouse, we're losing less heat at night, and nighttime temperatures should be rising fastest. So if it's the sun, the difference between day and night temperatures should be increasing, but if it's greenhouse, the day-night difference should be decreasing.

In fact, the daily temperature range has been decreasing throughout the 20th century. Here's the science:
http://ams.allenpress.com/perlserv/?request=get-abstract&doi=10.1175%2F1520-0450(1984)023%3C1489:DDTRIT%3E2.0.CO%3B2
http://ams.allenpress.com/perlserv/?request=get-abstract&doi=10.1175%2F1520-0477(1993)074%3C1007%3AANPORG%3E2.0.CO%3B2
http://www.bom.gov.au/bmrc/clfor/cfstaff/jma/2004GL019998.pdf

6. CO2 levels in the air were stable for 10,000 years prior to the industrial revolution, at about 280 parts per million by volume (ppmv). Since 1800, CO2 levels have risen 38%, to 384 ppmv, with no end in sight. Here's the modern data...
http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/
... and the ice core data ...
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/icecore/antarctica/law/law.html
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/icecore/antarctica/domec/domec_epica_data.html
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/icecore/antarctica/vostok/vostok_data.html
... and a graph showing how it fits together:
http://www.columbusnavigation.com/co2.html

7. We know that the excess CO2 in the air is caused by burning of fossil fuels, for two reasons. First, because the sharp rise in atmospheric CO2 started exactly when humans began burning coal in large quantities (see the graph linked above); and second, because when we do isotopic analysis of the CO2 we find increasing amounts of "old" carbon combined with "young" oxygen. Here are the peer-reviewed papers:
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1984JGR....8911731S
http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/mksg/teb/1999/00000051/00000002/art00005
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/256/5053/74

So what research have you been reading?

Answer 2

Thank you for a truly informed posting. Are we being taken for suckers? Well obviously not you or I my friend, but are the vast majority of people in this country being taken for a ride? Sure, for no other reason than that they are too complacent to look at the 'science' behind the global warming threat. Who gets the money out this? Do a search for governmentally funded environment sciences. Take a look at the allocated budget for these fields starting in the late 80's and compare it to the budget for every following year, right up until today. Better yet, do a search for 'environmental journalism', and see if you can find any mention of it prior to 1990.
The sad truth is that every climate model that predicts catastrophic change has been designed to do just that. If more people would simply take the time to research the actual science behind the apocalyptic claims, as you have, then mass media might eventually back off. I sadly don't expect this will be the case. Just you watch, in the next coming months or years, more and more dire warnings will emerge and more and more legislation will pass. It'll accomplish absolutely nothing as far as 'saving the environment', but a lot of people will have made an awful lot of money from it.

Answer 3

I'm just a teen too, and I say that it IS a "big sucker job put on by politicians."
I've seen a ton of stuff on the sun's contribution, a decrease in cloud cover, and geothermal heating, that could all have a significant part in the heating that we are experiencing.
And as to the second-to-last question, everyone who researches global warming, on either side, gets payed. It's a completely lame argument to say that someone's word can't be trusted because they are getting payed by "big oil" companies, when the other side is getting payed by environmental groups. Everyone gets payed for their work, otherwise there's no incentive.
Yep, I definitely think that many Americans are being "taken for suckers," and they really need to learn the facts, or we're really in for it.

(humorist_4_u: Although I don't agree with you that global warming is a problem, I still really like your answer. If people are afraid that global warming will hurt the earth, they really need to find other ways of trying to reduce it than giving control to the government, but I'd be called a hypocrite for saying that. Environmentalists WANT socialism. I call them watermelons: green on the outside, but communist red on the inside. If it were my question, you'd have the best answer.)

Answer 4

global warming is not new it has been going on since the last ice age.
and will last till the next ice age.

the money AL Gore and friends even the oil companies are buying up the companies that make solar and wind power equipment.
the rich will get richer selling you things that will save us
they will make many thing obsolete before they wear out
and force us to buy CO2 friendly products.

hydrogen will not work if you replaced all the cars today with hydrogen fuel cell cars the amount of water vapor they release will cause a increase in global warming
water vapor is many times worse as a greenhouse gas.
plus you would need 300 nuke power plants just to make the hydrogen. or 10,000 sq miles of solar panels or 4000 sq miles wind generators just to power all the cars.
300 nuke plants would release a large amount of water vapor from there cooling towers making global warming worse.
plus to make power for homes and industry replaceing oil for that use you would need 500 more nuke plants or 18000 sq miles of additional solar fields 6000 sq miles of wind plants.

all this will make someone rich but do nothing for global warming.
biofuels you would have to plant every sq ft of the US to replace oil then you would have no food.

a better way would be to plant all land that is not used for food crops with fast growing plants and harvest them, dry them, compress them. and bury them, in plastic lined dumps where they would not rot. this would take all the carbon in the plants out of the CO2 cycle.

Answer 5

Global warming is real. The green movement is crap. I might take them more seriously if they actually tried to think of solutions to climate change, rather than using it as a way to repackage other things they want. Take recycling. Recycling paper reduces demand for trees, which drives down profit margins of tree farms, which leads to less tree farms being used, which leads to those areas being used for something other than growing trees. Trees are a renewable resource. If you want more trees, waste more paper. There are other examples--public transportation, urban planning--of global warming being used to push already desired government programs, with no refrence to reality.
More practical solutions, like nuclear energy, are shunned. Look up John Martin the oceanographer on wikipedia. He had some pretty outside of the box ideas about reducing CO2 from the atmosphere. But these ideas are never brought up. That's because they can't be used to augment government controll. They don't lead to a more socialized world where the government rations out everything for the common good. But this is just a pious superstition that has no basis in the functioning of human nature. There is more to the global warming "debate" then if it is real. There are cost-benifit analysis that have to be considered. But you can't even have this discussion with most people, because pollution is somehow thought of as "Sin." (Even with Republicans this position is gaining hold, with Mike Huckabee calling climate change a "moral imperative.") But a clean environment is not an end in itself. The earth doesn't have rights or feel pain. We should only be concerned with the environment to the extent that it helps us. A clean environment, like everything else, has diminishing marginal utility. The more we put into protecting the environment, the more of otherthings we have to forgo (e.g. we could leave every tree in tact if we never wanted to print a medical text book again.)

Answer 6

Alot of it, certainly not all. I am a former scientist and science teacher, including environmental sciences and planetology as well as paleoclimatology.

You are failing to properly frame your assertion of the .28%. % of what, exactly? Tiny changes in the percentages of various greenhouse gasses can have profound effects that generate cascading events.

However, you are correct that there is little we can do about it. The current upward trend is irreversible in the short term and would make no difference. The permafrost will melt within decades or sooner, releasing billions of cubic meters of methane that will contribute more to global warming in a shorter time than we will ever be able to mitigate.

Geologically, this will be unprecedented, as far as we can tell. The effects will be dramatically more extensive than any currently being discussed. If the truth were known, there would be NO political discussion. It would be irrelevant. There is no doubt that there will be a dramatic and sudden rise in sea level. There will be a sinking of the coastal areas due to the extra weight of water over the land. Earthquakes will become more violent and frequent as faults adjust to the new pressure patterns and simultaneously have more water for lubrication. Productive coastal marine ecosystems will largely vanish for several centuries if not more.

This will happen in a time frame of perhaps 10 decades. Net coastal reformation will be at least 100 feet above current levels. Land now occupied by nearly 80% of the current human population will be under water, along with all of our toxins. Buried tanks of waste will rupture or float free. All coastlines on Earth will be toxic for an unknown number of centuries.

This is largely the direct result of human activities in the aggregate, not just our CO2 production. And it's not science fiction. Yes, some entities will get fabulously wealthy in the process. And the people associated with them will survive, at least for a few centuries. Most others on Earth will perish.

We have built an incredibly robust infrastructure and it would be very interesting to see how it responds.

So, sucker, there you have it. Kinda disheartening that the truth, in this case, doesn't set you free, huh?

Jim z, following, makes a valid point about the methane effect in previous warming episodes. Methane cycles out of the atmosphere fairly rapidly and is difficult to detect in the record of fossil gasses. If previous warming episodes occurred slowly, there may be none to detect at all. That isn't the same as saying it didn't happen. What is unprecedented here is the rapidity of the warming and the fact that a large number of causative factors are occurring in a compressed time frame.

Answer 7

No you're not being taken for suckers. Yes water vapor is the most abundant green house gas but it is also a continous cycle that changes very little. So the actual effect of water vapor on global warming is also very little. The one that does the most damage is CO2. Now bear with me. Plant take up CO2 and spit out oxygen, if there is too much land change ex. cutting the rainforest, then there isn't enough co2 being absorbed and exchanging it with oxygen. So keep cutting down the rainforest, burning fossil fuels, and producing enough waste to fill up half the world then see if things begin to change drastically. P.S. those at sea level should be careful.

Answer 8

At best, greenhouse gas emissions stay the same. This is not to say that bioethanol is worthless, it could still have an effect on gas prices if it was introduced as an alternative to the gasoline we use today. That doesn't do much for environmentalists, but gas prices are a problem and anything that could be a solution should be entertained.

Answer 9

There's a few issues here. There isn't much scientific controversy that humans have changed the CO2 content of the atmosphere and the earth has had some warming over the last 100 years.

The question is how much causation is there.

Answer 10

Bob - Right from one of the articles you pointed to for Californiainfidel to read:

"Water vapour is by far the most important contributor to the greenhouse effect. Pinning down its precise contribution is tricky, not least because the absorption spectra of different greenhouse gases overlap."

So you want us to believe an article that:

1.) Uses terrible grammer

2.) Contradicts itself.

And peoples comments about the CO2 levels rising, it could also be that are planet is still trying to get out of an Ice Age. You see Winters don't help. Since there aren't enough plants to suck up the CO2 we are creating even naturally during the winter. So the longer winters would create less CO2 absorption.

But of course I'm being silly obviously for thinking of these things, since I'm not a Climate Scientist. But from everything the AGWer's want us to believe Winters are a good thing, so we shouldn't want them to become shorter and less harsh.

But I have learned of a few who have legitimate concerns by posting my most recent question.

Sorry Californiainfidel, I didn't answer your question. The answer is not yet, but know that I know data has been recorded since the 1800's about our climate. I'm very curious to read it.