'Educated' opinions on climate change part 2 40

[jmw]

On the subject of weather stations:

http://wattsupwiththat.wordpress.co...-station-150-meters-makes-all-the-difference/

An interesting example of the whole problem of what has happened to weather stations around the world.
Note that the surface stations looked at and found seriously wanting are in the USA and, in this example, in Australia.
One has to wonder just how good the temperature measurements are from elsewhere.

The sting in the tail of this article is that because of the shift in the weather station with its consequent 0.7degC shift in recorded temperatures:

As mentioned in the article, the Australian Bureau of Meteorology wisely chose to exclude this station from “climatic studies”.

However that doesn’t stop Dr. James Hansen of NASA GISS from using it, as it is in fact part of his GISTEMP database, see the plot below from GISS:

The great thing to remember about most temperature measurements is that what you measure is the temperature of the sensor. You just hope that it is at the same temperature as its surroundings, which is what you are interested in.

Of course, here we have an illustration that what the surface stations are measuring is the temperature of the surface station - we have to hope that it has some meaningful relationship with the local environment. As this article clearly shows, the potential is that "local" means less than the distance between the old location and the new or in this case, less than 150 metres.
This suggests that what is really needed is to saturate the surface of the earth with temperature sensors or, to saturate selected areas in such a manner that we can develop a meaningful understanding of how to interpret fewer more widely spaced sensors.



JMW

http://www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

[moltenmetal]

People here continuously confuse risk mitigation with the prevention of certain disaster. The AGW argument is about the former, whereas the latter is set up as a straw man for the purpose of discrediting the effort.

There are folks here who want solid proof of AGW before they'll asquiesce to spending a cent of their own money to do something about it. The climate is unlikely to give us the benefit of such proof until (long) after the fact. Arguing with folks like this is like wrestling with a pig: it's merely frustrating until you realize that the pig LIKES it- then it becomes infuriating.

AGW or no, we should and indeed MUST do something about the alarming rate at which we are squandering our finite, non-renewable reserves of fossil carbon.

There is yet another type of alarmism here: the conclusion that taking measures to stem AGW will ruin our economies and standard of living. If I were living in the US, I would be lobbying my government hard to do whatever is possible to reduce the export of substantial amounts of the nation's treasure, not to mention the blood of its soldiers, to maintain the flow of oil from those who won the geological lottery.

Increased oil prices have done far more good than all the debate on this issue. But the market does nothing to price atmospheric emissions, whereas we all pay for their consequences- whether AGW is one of them or not. Until this "problem of the commons" is solved, this debate will remain worthless hot air.

 

[GregLocock]

"AGW or no, we should and indeed MUST do something about the alarming rate at which we are squandering our finite, non-renewable reserves of fossil carbon."

But that is a totally different argument. Don't confuse the two.

Peak oil (et al) is a self evident absurdity. I can solve that one for you in a minute using known technology. Coal will last until HumBe is a long forgotten experiment. It is only a meaningful threat if AGW exists.

Back to the sensible arguments please.



Cheers

Greg Locock

SIGlease see FAQ731-376 for tips on how to make the best use of Eng-Tips.

 

[cranky108]

I see another divide in that there are two ideas on what must be done, nothing, and go back to living in caves. i don't suscribe to either.

From the facts it appeare to me that global change is not caused by man, it is more likely caused by the sun. (notice that the sun spots have decreased about 10 years ago).

If we undertake any solutions we need to consiter the least cost, and lower economic impact solutions.

Putting black solar panels in a nearly white desert dosen't really sound that good. (However on building may not be so bad).

Oil is another topic I don't want to approch right now, as my thoughts have nothing to do with climate change.

 

[ivymike]

um, what's the undesireable effect of putting black things in the white desert, even if we assume that solar heating is the primary source of global temperature change?

 

[LCruiser]

Putting black things in a white desert - particularly on the required scale, would seriously alter circulation patterns. Like all "Global Warming" solutions, the cure is likely worse than the disease.

 

[LCruiser]

Oops - forgot the link:

http://climatesci.org/2008/06/30/th...nge-within-the-climate-system-a-new-workshop/

 

[ivymike]

the linked page doesn't seem to have any direct commentary on the placement of solar panels in the desert. do you have a more precise link?

 

[LCruiser]

Nope. Ya gotta read between the lines. It's albedo.

 

[moltenmetal]

Greg: I agree with you about "peak oil". But as the easy, light, sweet reserves dry up, the remaining crap (ultimately leaving us with coal) gets tougher and tougher to use- read more CO2 per watt, and WAY more CO2 per litre of useful chemical feedstock liquid materials. Yes, we can utilize these poorer reserves with "existing technology", but it still sucks.

I'm torn about carbon sequestration- it too will ensure that we burn through our fossil reserves even faster. I also agree completely that the market is distorted for many of the fossil fuel alternatives, such that it's tough to determine whether they're a help or a hindrance. But until we start taxing carbon, the economics of energy will never make sense.

 

[ivymike]

in that case, I'm inclined to disagree with your suppositions.

("Putting black things in a white desert - particularly on the required scale, would seriously alter circulation patterns. Like all "Global Warming" solutions, the cure is likely worse than the disease").

 

[LCruiser]

Carbon is doled out to the biosphere, and sinks back at the bottom of the ocean. CO2 is the base of the food chain. To sequester it means we are wasting it.

 

[LCruiser]

ivymike -
So, are you disagreeing that a darker colored surface reflects less light, or that surface albedo affects atmospheric circulation?

 

[LCruiser]

Look at it this way:

Energy use in the US is
100,000,000,000,000,000 btu's per year
That's 3,300,000,000,000 joules per second (watts)
The typical solar cell puts out about 50 watts per square meter, so we need
66,000,000,000 square meters of solar cells to power the US.

That's a square 250 km on a side.

LA alone would need a square 65 km on a side. Where are you going to put it?

If albedo goes from 0.9 to 0.4, that's 50% of 350 w/m^2, or 175 w'm^2, or 3 and a half times the energy consumption of the US, which you have now released into the atmosphere.

 

[moltenmetal]

CO2 isn't the base of the food chain: sunlight is. CO2 is just a recycled feedstock like water and the various nutrients. Don't forget that life sequestered the very carbon that we're dumping back into the atmosphere in a geological nanosecond.

 

[LCruiser]

Sunlight comes from outside Earth. CO2 doesn't. Semantics I suppose.

The fact that life stored Carbon underground doesn't mean there will be plenty to go around if we start to sequester it.

 

[ivymike]

LCruiser, from this thread and others I'm keenly aware that you're quite an expert on hot air, so it's not without trepidation that I join you in weenie-waving.

Some things missing from your "arguments" so far:
* albedo of a "white" desert, versus that of black solar panels (white vs black doesn't tell the whole story, the answer is probably somewhere around 0.4ish for white desert and 0.1ish for solar panels)
* net effect of solar panels on local heating - just because 90% of light is absorbed doesn't mean that 90% of the energy is immediately re-radiated as heat - if the panels were 15% efficient then you'd have an effective albedo more like .23 (vs .4 for the baseline desert)
* waste heat offset by use of the solar panels - if you used a conventional powerplant to generate the same amount of electricity, the waste heat generated would be approximately equal to the amount of electrical power generated, which brings us to a state of roughly equivalent heat release into the atmosphere
* environmental (warming and otherwise) impact of burning fuels to generate the electricity - the solar panels don't contribute to your ozone non-attainment days, they don't emit CO2, and you don't have to scrub sulfur out of their exhaust

 

[LCruiser]

But how much do they cost per square meter?

 

[frv]

That was funny

 

[jmw]

You know, if we did stop reflecting a proportion of the received energy back into space then naturally enough the planet will retain more heat.
More heat means higher temperatures.
You know, this will be a difficult balancing act. The assumption is that this energy will replace fossil fuel energy but unless the underlying problem is dealt with, pretty soon those vast acreages of solar panels will be competing with food production and biofuels and all the while energy use will continue to increase.
Pretty soon we'll be back to fossil fuels and solar power and nuclear to power all the aircon units so people can live and work in the "deserts".

The real problem with doing anything about the climate is the same old problem with doing anything about anything. Pretty soon the law of unintended consequences kicks in with a vengeance.

Just about every time man tries to manipulate the environment or an ecosystem or even a national park, everything goes to hell in a big way.
The track record isn't good and when confronted with a task like confronting AGW you better believe this is the biggest c*** up of all times heading our way.

And while we are at it, we have scientists proposing artificial volcanoes to generate lots of extra sulphur into the atmosphere to combat global warming i.e. to reduce the amount of sunlight reaching the earth's surface.....


Gee! where do we sign up for the underground shelters compete with arms caches?

JMW

http://www.ViscoAnalyser.com