There is a law of thermodynamics that states that Q = U + W (Energy in = Energy out + Work). Converting a percentage of global warming into usable work (in the form of electric power) is one method by which to moderate the effects of global warming.

What a mess. It makes a bit more sense if in place of "global warming" we write "incoming sunlight". But it's still very unlikely to be true, because the useful work, if used, will be turned to heat in the process. Ten 100-watt computers in a room, no matter how elegant the thoughts that are thought on them, heat the room exactly as much as one 1,000-W electric heater.

So solar thermodynamic power stations, to reduce the Earth's heat burden, would have to convert and store, not use a fraction of the sunlight striking their collectors that is larger than the albedo reduction their construction caused. For example, if before the plant was built the land was 35 percent reflective, and afterwards, 5 percent, then the solar power station would have to salt away more than 30 percent of the gross insolation, more than 30/95 of what it captures. This is hard.

(Thought experiment. Imagine yourself in a pressurized cabin on the SOHO observatory, which is directly between the Earth and the sun, about 1 percent of the way from the former to the latter. Through a telescope, observe a sunny desert occasionally while a 100-GW solar power station is being constructed and put into service there. What do you see?)

--- G. R. L. Cowan, former hydrogen fan
Oxygen expands around B fire, car goes

Converting a percentage of global warming into usable work (in the form of electric power) is one method by which to moderate the effects of global warming.

That's all well and good, as far as it goes. The trouble is that thermal energy entering the environment as the result of conventional power generation is the least of our problems. Waste heat from power plants can be a local problem when it's discharged into a stream, but in terms of the global energy balance, it's a small drop in a large bucket. The waste heat emitted daily from all the world's conventional and nuclear power plants is less than one ten-thousandth of the energy received each day from the sun.

The real problem is--just as claimed by the GW "alarmists"--added CO2. The direct energy released by oxidation of one carbon atom to CO2 is tiny, compared to the indirect energy that that CO2 molecule will add, over time, to the earth's energy balance. Bouncing around in the atmosphere, it repeatedly absorbs and re-emits photons of infrared energy. The photons it absorbs come predominantly from the direction of the earth; the photons it re-emits are radiated in all directions with equal probablility. The effect is a radiation forcing equivalent to an increase in solar input. Every year, the incremental forcing from each CO2 molecule exceeds the energy released from its formation. And that added input continues year after year.

The result is that the avoided thermal energy from use of the type of energy resources discussed here is far less significant than the effect of avoided CO2 emissions.

On the other hand, fossil fuel supplied energy is essentially taking energy that was stored over a very long period and dumping it (and it's Carbon) into the current environment in a relatively short time period. As I see it, the Earth can recover from either of these changes up to a certain rate of change, but we don't know where that line is. Possibly more pertinent to the current discussions is that that 'rate limit' drastically varies for localized areas and ecosystems which leads to differing facts used in the debate.

Seriously though, moon distance would be just one factor in the above action. Possibly replacing a large layer of heat transmitting coal or oil with CO2 or even water could affect the rate this heat excapes the core.

Earth's internal heat is due to a billion tonnes of uranium per metre of depth in the upper continental crust, less at tens of km depth. In the upper crust, with a large contribution from thorium and a lesser one from 40-K, it works out to 250 gigawatts per vertical km.

--- G. R. L. Cowan, former hydrogen fan
Oxygen expands around B fire, car goes

--- G. R. L. Cowan, former hydrogen fan
Oxygen expands around boron fire, car goes

--- G. R. L. Cowan, former hydrogen fan
Oxygen expands around boron fire, car goes

--- G. R. L. Cowan, former hydrogen fan
Oxygen expands around boron fire, car goes

Easy, if you have some math. Annual CO2 emissions from burning fossil fuels = 27.1 billion tons. Only place for it to go is either into oceans, 8.1 bilion tons per year, or stay in atmosphere, 27.1 - 8.1 - 19 billion tons. Land on earth is actually loosing an additional 2.4 billion tons, adding to the problem. 19 billion tons / yr added to atmosphere = +2.1 ppmv CO2 in atmosphere.

Historically, from ice core data, over past 420,000 yrs CO2 in atmosphere tracks global temperature quite closely. 180 ppmv gives an ice age. 280 ppmv give an interglacial warming (as over past 11,000 yrs). 380 to 500 ppmv gives ??unknown?? but all physics claculations show it should be much warmer, perhaps catastrophically.

By Reid A. Bryson Ph.D., D.Sc., D.Engr.1

The Built-in Nonsense Detector

Hardly a day goes by without a news article in the paper containing a reference to someone's opinion about "Global Warming". A quick search of the internet uncovers literally hundreds of items about "Global Warming". Issues of atmospheric science journals will normally have at least one article on climatic change, usually meaning "Global Warming" or some aspect thereof. Whole generations of graduate students have been trained to believe that we know the main answers about climate change and only have to work out the details.

Why then do I bother you by introducing this section with such a ludicrous title?

I do it because, as one who has spent many decades studying the subject professionally, I find that there are enormous gaps in the understanding of those making the most strident claims about climatic change. In order to read the news rationally, the educated reader needs a few keys to quickly sort the patently absurd from the possibly correct. I propose to supply some of those keys to give the reader at least a rudimentary nonsense detector.

Some Common Fallacies

1. The atmospheric warming of the last century is unprecedented and unique. Wrong. There are literally thousands of papers in the scientific literature with data that shows that the climate has been changing one way or the other for millions of years.

2. It is a fact that the warming of the past century was anthropogenic in origin, i.e. man-made and due to carbon dioxide emission. Wrong. That is a theory for which there is no credible proof. There are a number of causes of climatic change, and until all causes other than carbon dioxide increase are ruled out, we cannot attribute the change to carbon dioxide alone.

3. The most important gas with a "greenhouse" effect is carbon dioxide. Wrong. Water vapor is at least 100 times as effective as carbon dioxide, so small variations in water vapor are more important than large changes in carbon dioxide.

4. One cannot argue with the computer models that predict the climate effects of a doubling of carbon dioxide or other "greenhouse gases". Wrong. To show this we must show that the computer models can at least duplicate the present-day climate. This they cannot do with what could be called accuracy by any stretch of the imagination. There are studies that show that the average error in modeling present precipitation is on the order of 100%, and the error in modeling present temperature is about the same size as the predicted change due to a doubling of carbon dioxide. For many areas, the precipitation error is 300-400 percent.

5. I am arguing that the carbon dioxide measurements are poorly done. Wrong. The measurements are well done, but the interpretation of them is often less than acceptably scientific.

6. It is the consensus of scientists in general that carbon-dioxide-induced warming of the climate is a fact. Probably wrong. I know of no vote having been taken, and know that if such a vote were taken of those who are most vocal about the matter, it would include a significant fraction of people who do not know enough about climate to have a significant opinion. Taking a vote is a risky way to discover scientific truth.

So What Can We Say about Global Warming?

We can say that the Earth has most probably warmed in the past century. We cannot say what part of that warming was due to mankind's addition of "greenhouse gases" until we consider the other possible factors, such as aerosols. The aerosol content of the atmosphere was measured during the past century, but to my knowledge this data was never used. We can say that the question of anthropogenic modification of the climate is an important question --- too important to ignore. However it has now become a media free-for-all and a political issue more than a scientific problem. What a change from 1968 when I gave a paper at a national scientific meeting2 and was laughed at for suggesting that people could possibly change the climate! ---------------------------------------------------------

1 Emeritus Professor of Meteorology, of Geography and of Environmental Studies. Senior Scientist, Center for Climatic Research, The Gaylord Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies (Founding Director), the University of Wisconsin, Madison.

2 AAAS Conference in Houston, TX, 1968, organized by SFS and published as "Global Effects of Environmental Pollution" (S F Singer, editor, published by Reidel Publishing Company, Dordrecht)”

Ref: Bryson, Reid A., 2004. Global Warming? Some common sense thoughts. This Week That Was March 20, 2004,

While it is well agreed that water vapour is a powerful greenhouse gas, it is also well agreed that water vapour levels in earth's atmosphere are a "result" of temperature, not a "cause" (or at least primary cause). Since atmospheric water vapour content (relative humidity) is directly controlled by temperature, then it follows that average water vapour content of earth's atmosphere will simply provide a powerful forcing/feedback to the effects of the real GHG's CO2, methane, NOx and CFC's.

Anyone?

So far, the only possibility I've seen is that "there may be no more energy being radiated by earth in the relevant frequency bands". Graphs I've seen so far don't support that, but IMHO it's the only hope we have left. I've been trying to find authoritative data on the subject, but none yet.

From my standpoint, I can accept that the climate is changing - and appears to be on a warming trend. I can also accept that what the human population is doing by pumping GHG's into the atmosphere is not helping the Earth maintain balance.

But, I also think that the Earth has been here a lot longer than humans have been burning fossil fuels, and the built-in 'immune system' of the Earth will be able to deal with whatever we throw at it.

Having said that, the result of this natural 'immune system' response, may be to kill off 99% of all mammals on Earth, something akin to the way our own systems kill a virus by use of a high fever. Which makes me think it is in our own best interest to do what we can to find the right 'cure' and at the least minimize our adding to the problem.

And, studies have shown, that promoting energy efficiency is good for business (as long as you're not the owner of a 40 yr-old coal plant with zero emissions controls), good for the environment, and good for our own pocketbook.

So, let's quit arguing about the problem, and concentrate on the solution - increased efficiency and use of 'ambient' energy (wind, solar, tidal, etc.) instead of 'stored' energy (fossil fuels) sounds like a good place to start to me.

What's the worst that can happen? In the US, we might be able to become energy independent, gain a useful mass transit system, and lower our electricity bills at home - which will come in handy during the next cold snap in January!

Thanks Harry - I enjoyed your article - and all the follow-up from all our colleagues!

...if I recall correctly, the world's whole installed base of solar tower power plants has blown over in a storm

It turns out I recalli incorrectly. In "Advances in solar thermal electricity technology". Solar Energy 76 (1-3): 19-31, D. Mills says the prototype at Manzanares, Spain experienced "severe structural instability", but it seems this only means the plastic glazing was torn up, and toughened glass used in its place would not have been.

--- G. R. L. Cowan, former hydrogen fan
Oxygen expands around boron fire, car goes

"While it is well agreed that water vapour is a powerful greenhouse gas, it is also well agreed that water vapour levels in earth's atmosphere are a "result" of temperature, not a "cause" (or at least primary cause)."

It is also well known that increasing temperatures also increase CO2 levels in the earth's atmosphere. The measured increases of atmospheric CO2 are mostly the result of increasing temperatures, with anthropogenic contributions adding 3% to that total. And for those who care to do the math, that 3% anthropogenic CO2 contribution amounts to less than 1/10 of 1% of the greenhouse effect potential.

But, hey folks, we (the global warming fraud exposers) are making progress if GW fanatics like Len finally admit that water vapor is "a powerful greenhouse gas"! Up to now most GW proponents have simply omitted that critical factoid from the discussion.

Once we can get PBS to show "The Great Global Warming Swindle", the tide will turn dramatically. (Okay, it's a stretch to expect our taxpayer-funded public TV network to promote ideas that run counter to leftist ideology, but one can hope! Maybe they can squeeze it in between the next showing of a Bill Moyers *expose* and "Frontline".)

BTW - Len, what is your source for stating "Annual CO2 emissions from burning fossil fuels = 27.1 billion tons"? You're only off by a factor of 30! Add to that the fact that most hydrocarbon-sourced CO2 is readily sequestered via natural mechanisms before it enters the upper atmosphere.

Cheers!

David Smith, former GW believer

The answer still lies in the free market. Products that offer alternatives need to be brought to market. There are many that save not only fuel / energy, but money as well. They exist in all walks of energy life but they don't get the press or the investment dollars they need. I believe it is more productive to promote (and support) these than to spend our time promoting awareness or conservation. Private money spent advertising an energy saving product is also selling awareness and conservation and no public R&D money was swindled for that cause.

It is only waiting for people to wake up and realize that they need to look elsewhere for energy saving techniques and renewables instead of the mainstream favorites. I find it amazing that everybody accepts "WHEN we get a big breakthrough" in their conversations without question, but always argues "with this new breakthrough technology" as being the words of a crackpot. This halts any fundraising until it is proven, which of course can't be done without the funds. It's both a catch-22 and a self fulfilling prophecy. I've personally been told, "If it was a concept with potential, we'd already be doing it so we're not even interested in hearing about it." If you want to help the energy crisis, you just have to rectify this problem for one startup company.

Melvin L. Zwillenberg, Ph.D. Mel Zwillenberg Associates, LLC

Melvin L. Zwillenberg, Ph.D. Mel Zwillenberg Associates, LLC

input work -> electricity -> output work

Debunking comments:

Thermodynamically impossible? Extraction of work from a moving fluid is a basic thermodynamic no-brainer, from steam turbines to wind or hydro turbines. Think again! It's not an isentropic (perfect) process, but on large scales, it is obviously done, and converts warmer fluids to cooler fluids.

Human arrogance to think that we affect the climate? It is arrogance to think that we can do whatever we want and NOT affect the global environment. I suppose if YOU had been in charge of the world, we'd still be pumping CFC's into the atmosphere and that nasty hole in the ozone layer would be something beyond our control? Fortunately, more constructive opinions prevailed, and THAT piece of environmental damage is on its way to repairing itself.

Water vapor has a greater greenhouse effect than CO2 - true, but CO2 is not in equilibrium while water vapor is. The "average" water molecule in the atmosphere resides there for one to two weeks due to the hydrological cycle. The average CO2 molecule is there for years to decades. Just looking at the CO2 levels for the past 650,000 years (regularly cycling between 120-280 ppm) until the beginning of the industrial revolution shows that humans have grown up in a self-controlling environment, in spite of solar radiation changes, volcanic eruptions, yadda yadda yadda. Now, in the past 200 years, we have managed to kick that atmospheric level up to 380ppm, and the growth rate is EXPONENTIAL. In a few short decades we'll pass 500ppm, and are most likely unstoppably on the way to 750-1000ppm. At 1000ppm, 20% of humans will feel permanently ill due to the gross effects of breathing CO2-laden air.

I can unequivically state one thing - we will NOT be helping the situation by continuing "business as usual", by dumping mined carbon (i.e. oil and coal) into the atmosphere via profligate combustion. Plants might love it, but a huge number of species, including our own, will be adversely effected, in a MAJOR way.

People need energy, there is no doubt - and a modern standard of living is energy intensive. It's time to use 21st century thinking and technologies to economically satisfy those energy demands while doing the least possible damage to the environment - we cannot exclude ourselves from the damage we cause, and we CAN include ourselves into strategies to mitigate harmful environmental changes.

It was only about 40 years ago that, as a species, we began to emit CO2 at a rate greater than the oceans could annually be counted upon to absorb, but measurements show the atmospheric levels began to rise when coal and then oil began to be used as the predominant fuels, and was coincident with the onset of human-driven deforestation.

After 18 years of research, the IPCC has concluded, to a high degree of confidence, that WE are the essential cause of the rapid climate changes which have been observed. We have less than a century before the atmosphere becomes inhospitable to us, from purely a breathability standpoint. At what point do we, as a species, realize that we are endangering ourselves with too much debate and not enough action? In the space of ten years, in my opinion, the talking will have to end, and the action, on a very large scale, will have to be in place and operational. The total conversion ( >90% )to non-combustion energy sources, will have to be complete in 30-40 years.

There will always be skeptics, with seemingly legitimate points that beg investigation, but we don't have decades to answer every ad nauseum argument. There is NO HARM in advancing forward in developing economical energy technologies, and moving away from combustion as our primary source of energy. Even "Big Energy" can benefit, if they think forward enough to invest in the move, as BP and GE have already begun to do. As a good start, AEP and other electric utilities are investing in CO2-capture & sequestration technologies for their fossil-fired power plants - knowing full well that it won't be long before they will be required to do so.

RWVesel

--- G. R. L. Cowan, former hydrogen fan
Oxygen expands around B fire, car goes

http://tinyurl.com/2gpdpb

Again, anyone stating that the warming of the last 30 years is due to human activity needs to explain the 30 years of cooling that happened from about 1940 to 1975 and lead to the fears of a oncoming ice age.

They should also explain the natural mechanism behind the 300 year trend of warming from 1700 to now, when there was negligible human input of CO2, and why whatever caused that warming is not the dominant driving factor of our current warming.

Graham: If do-able (pulverized minerals removing all excess CO2), then I promise from now on to stop worrying, and harassing other posters here and elsewhere. So, let's see.

6 Gt / yr carbon to be removed. Lets presume the perskovites required can be found in sufficient natural concentrations, and be milled fine enough that each 1 gram of carbon can be taken up by only 100 grams of the resulting material. That means 600 billion tons / year mined, processed and distributed so it is thoroughly exposed to air for a good time period. How does that compare to other projects of humans? let's see, annual cement production worldwide = about 2 billion tons http://www.theoildrum.com/story/2006/1/29/23825/7257 That's surprisingly close.... If my 100:1 material:Carbon ratio estimate is high by only 1000% then this MIGHT actually be a solution.

Why are you the only person promoting this? Call IPCC??

Maybe I'm the only person smart enough, or the only person the Gongors haven't got to. Exactly what you all find about their inducements to be so irresistible, I'm not quite sure.

They'll get you, don't think they won't.

The stoichiometric ratio for water-free MgSiO3 capturing CO2 is about 2.4 to 1. Gould speaks of it capturing carbon, which I suppose is one way of looking at it (but your HB pencils will be safe). Looked at that way, 8.36 grams of MgSiO3 captures 1 g C.

If you don't understand why it's not a good idea, the heuristic that it's just one guy's idea is not an adequate substitute for that understanding. Plus it may not be just one guy's idea. In that other discussion, one Oliver Sparrow, who isn't me, talks about the formation of the Himalayas dropping Earth's atmospheric [CO2].

--- G. R. L. Cowan, former hydrogen fan
Oxygen expands around boron fire, car goes

Unless it is that given typical mineral purity from mines and your "water free" caveat, I'd estimate your 8.36:1 ratio goes up to perhaps 2.5 times more than my stated 10:1 "workable" ratio.

President of Shell states 24 gigatons, but his figures are likely just a little out of date.

President of Shell, Panelists See Energy Security in Alternatives

[snip] September 21, 2006

AUSTIN, Texas—John Hofmeister, president of Shell Oil Company, told an audience at The University of Texas at Austin that the time for debate over the science of climate change is past.

Citing a “linkage” between greenhouse gases and climate change, Hofmeister called for a national strategy to reduce carbon dioxide emissions. “The nation needs a public policy,” he said. “We'll adjust.” ..... Geologically and industrially, Texas appears ideally situated to help reduce greenhouse gases through clean-coal technologies. Its industrial plants are responsible for about 1 gigaton of the 24 gigatons of CO2 emitted worldwide, said Duncan. [/snip]

Why wouldn't you want this to work, Len? What approach are you hoping is more workable? Other than not producing the CO2 in the first place, because desirable though that is to just about everyone who doesn't have a government job, enough of us do that it's going to take some time, and we need to deal with the many gigatonnes of CO2 that will be emitted in the mean time.

--- G. R. L. Cowan, former hydrogen fan
Oxygen expands around boron fire, car goes

My 10:1 ratio is simply an estimate based on the world economy being able to support a new mineral processing industry which processes only 80 billion tons of material per year for the purpose, eg. 40x more than worldwide cement processing, which is an approximately equivalent activity. (to capture 8 gT carbon/yr at a ratio of 10:1 will require 80 gT of the mineral/yr. Annual cement production worldwide is 2 gT if I recall correctly.)

Cement requires clinker calcination at a 'T' of, I seem to recall, 1,480 Celsius. This high temperature is the reason nuclear plants, if required to provide electricity for electric-furnace production of their own concrete, would have a several-week energy payback time. Pulverizing a tonne of mineral takes a lot less energy than heating it to that sort of temperature.

Also, producing the amount of concrete we produce wouild be significantly less expensive if we didn't have to distribute it in many small consignments, but rather just puffed it into the air at the production plants, or at one large production plant, maybe in Antarctica.

--- G. R. L. Cowan, former hydrogen fan
Oxygen expands around boron fire, car goes

Mechanically pulverizing serpentine is not sufficient. It's only the molecules at the surface boundary of the particles that are available for reaction to form the carbonate, and that's a minute fraction of the molecules in any particle large enough to be visible in a microscope. Under the right conditions, the carbonate molecules will separate from the surface and form separate microcrystals, but that requires acidic water and high temperature. I don't think it can happen with dry powdered serpentine blowing around in the wind. You need reaction chambers and concentrated sources of CO2.

The alternative is lots and lots of time, for the weak carbonic acid in rainwater to erode exposed rock surfaces and form carbonate minerals that are carried to the sea. That's what's hypothesized to have happened with the formation of the Himilayas, but it's a process that would have needed millions of years.

Again, anyone stating that the warming of the last 30 years is due to human activity needs to explain the 30 years of cooling that happened from about 1940 to 1975 and lead to the fears of a oncoming ice age.

Look, nobody is claiming that CO2 levels are the only thing that can affect global temperatures. The claim is simply that CO2 molecules in the atmosphere have a radiation-trapping effect that is quite straightforward and easy to calculate. Increased atmospheric CO2 levels are equivalent, in their effect, to increased solar input. That's indisputable. It doesn't take fancy computer models to calculate it, either. Arrhenius did it around the turn of the 19th century--although the values he used for the absorption profile of CO2 were crude, due to the limits of instrumentation of the day. At any rate, given the indisputable radiation forcing from increased atmospheric CO2, the problem for the GW skeptics is to explain why there shouldn't be an associated global warming.

They should also explain the natural mechanism behind the 300 year trend of warming from 1700 to now, when there was negligible human input of CO2, and why whatever caused that warming is not the dominant driving factor of our current warming.

For reference, the current inventory of standing biomass is estimated at 610 gigatonnes, vs. atmospheric carbon totaling 710 gigatonnes. ( NASA).

It is also well known that increasing temperatures also increase CO2 levels in the earth's atmosphere. The measured increases of atmospheric CO2 are mostly the result of increasing temperatures, with anthropogenic contributions adding 3% to that total. And for those who care to do the math, that 3% anthropogenic CO2 contribution amounts to less than 1/10 of 1% of the greenhouse effect potential.

The ocean is a huge thermal reservoir, and it takes decades to a century or so of higher land surface temperatures to make much difference in average ocean surface temperatures. What that means is that the increase in atmospheric CO2 levels as a result of human activity that we have seen will eventually be followed by further increases due to warming of the oceans. It's a positive feedback effect that has yet to kick in to any significant extent. But when (not if) it does, atmospheric CO2 levels could continue climbing--even if we were to stop burning fossil fuels altogether.

Unless you have some numbers or references to indicate a linkage between deforestration, CO2 increase and temperature climb over the 1750 - 1900 period, I find it harder to believe the warming is the result of deforestration rather than simple natural climate change as the earth moved (by some as yet unknown and proven mechanism) from a relatively cooler period to a warmer one.

As for aerosol particles, duh, does anyone think that just because the air is a little cleaner in London, New York and Los Angeles that aerosol particles have gone down? India and Brazil are now #3 and #4 greenhouse gas emittters because they are burning forests to clear land. China and India with their coal plant programs that have been ramping up significantly since the 1970's are emitting more aerosols than now than the US and Britain did from the 1940 to 1970 period. Do you have numbers Roger, or are you just throwing this stuff out there?

Roger, world population slightly more than doubled from 1750 to 1900. Since then it has quadrupled ... there was negligible increase in CO2 in the atmosphere from 1750 to 1900, as measured by scientists throughout the 1800's

Sounds reasonable as quoted. The possibility that aerosol particles of MgSiO3 or Mg3Si2O5(OH)4 might be too slow to eat their due CO2 has been on people's minds. I don't think the Himalayas have all that much surface area compared to that of the dust we will raise if we become really concerned, and it doesn't have to be dry dust. It could be dispersed over ocean surfaces so as to slowly settle into the top 100 metres, and soften the impact of other shoe Arnold mentions. He writes as if sea surface temperatures hadn't already risen in a plainly AGW-indicating way but I had the impression they had.

--- G. R. L. Cowan, former hydrogen fan
boron as energy carrier: real-car range, nuclear cachet

As to particulates, my understanding is that the ones that have a significant cooling effect are condensed sulfuric acid and sulfate particles from coal combustion. They're small enough to be carried to the stratosphere, where they increase the reflection of incoming sunlight. As you note, current particulate levels, globally, are at least as high now as they've ever been, mainly due to rising levels of coal use in China. However, there was a temporary peak in world coal emissions in the 1950s or 60s. I don't have the data handy, but it's really beside the point. The point is that the level of particulates that would tend to produce global cooling ramped up well before additions to atmospheric CO2 had time to accumulate, and create an offsetting warming effect.

Are there other things going on that affect the climate record for that period? I don't know, but it would be surprising if there weren't. As you say, climate is a very complex matter. However, the model you're using to challenge the "conventional wisdom" of global warming is a straw man.

You're arguing as if the GW alarmists were saying "we've noticed a pronounced global warming trend, and since we can't explain it any other way, it must be due to rising CO2 levels from burning fossil fuels". If that's what we were saying, you'd be quite right to challenge it. But it's not.

The immediate effects of atmospheric CO2 are not something mysterious that we have any need to guess about. The infrared absorption / emission properties of CO2 (and other atmospheric gases) have been measured in labs with high precision. Boltzman's radiation law is well known, and the Boltzman constant is known to at least nine decimal places, if I'm not mistaken. Calculating the radiation forcing effect from various levels of CO2 is straightforward. Again, I don't have the data at hand, but if I recall, the CO2 increase from the pre-industrial 280 ppm to the current 370 ppm corresponds to about a 1% increase in solar input.

What's not at all straightforward is to calculate, with any precision, the system response to the increased radiation forcing. The "zeroth approximation" is to assume no other changes. In that case, the response would be an increase of a few tenths of a degree in average global temperatures. But we know that any increase due to radiation forcing will be amplified by a dependent increase in atmospheric water vapor. The "gain factor" for this amplification is not known any precision. It's what the various global climate models are trying to zero in on.

The way things seem to be going, it appears that the gain factor may actually be larger than previously estimated. It's been masked by the "global dimming" effect from high levels of particulates from untreated coal combustion. If we stop burning coal, or switch over to so-called clean coal technologies, then the subsequent improvement in air quality could mean a even bigger global warming hit.

Whether that's really the case or not, I have no way of knowing. But it's a credible concern. It just punctuates the risk that we're running in this large, uncrontrolled experiment with our global life support system.

As you indicate, there are still levels of uncertainty, but now I understand where your beliefs are coming from. You do include qualifiers in your response, which is appropriate. You have also summarized my position very well. As to whether or not it turns out to be a "straw man" or not, we'll all know better in less than a dozen years.

I understand the precision of Boltzman's constant. I don't believe that it is the only thing going on, again as you suggest.

As I have indicated in this venue previously, there have been well documented significant fluctuations in climate over the last 2500 years, the mechanisms for which we don't understand. I am leery of making economically damaging policy decisions without understanding what's going on.

I fully support research into energy alternatives, and any move to lessen dependence on energy supplies from volatile regions. I don't support unilateral action that will cut the legs out from under the diminishing number of domestic (Canadian and American) manufacturers and wind up siphoning money into foreign markets without a higher level of certainty. If we can't explain naturally occurring climate fluctuations (that would be the ones that occurred before 1850 and the current increase in CO2), then we need to tread carefully.

Thanks again for your response

Gore's Congressional "testimony" represents the first time, to my knowledge, that anyone of his "massive stature" in the "movement" has spoken so publicly about the end point of the process. That, at least, is progress! However, we must remember that the US cannot dismantle coal-fired generators as fast as China and India are building them, unless we can do so in the dark.

The US investment required to achieve our 90% reduction would be on the order of $10 trillion (without NIMBY and BANANA) to $40 trillion (with regulations / lawsuits as usual). That represents ~2-8% of US GDP per year over the period. The required capital could be available if the US government reverted to performing only the functions enumerated for it in the US Constitution, thus reducing the US tax burden from ~19.4% to ~10-15%. (But, I hallucinate.)

In contemplating the challenge of reducing US carbon emissions by 90% by 2050, I was reminded of a quote frequently attributed to the late Senator Everett McKinley Dirksen (R, IL), which I have adapted to the current situation: "A trillion here, a trillion there; pretty soon you are talking about real money."

I do not believe the political will exists here, or anywhere else in the world, to do what must be done to achieve the carbon emissions reductions identified above. The underachievement of most of the signatories to the Kyoto Accords strengthens that belief. However, I am quite sure that the political will exists in the rest of the world to have the US "lead the way", even if everyone else goes the other way. If AGW is a problem, it is a global problem; and, it is amenable only to a global solution.

I vehemently disagree; but, I've never cheered for the lemmings. Kyoto was/is nonsensical. It certainly was/is not a "global solution". Achieving its "wishes" ("A goal without a plan is just a wish.") would not have accomplished the emissions reductions necessary to achieve concentration stabilization in the 500 ppm range. In fact, your own arguments above and in other threads suggest that global anthropogenic carbon emissions must be eliminated to avoid increasing atmospheric CO2 concentrations. The performance of Canada and the EU relative to even Kyoto's ineffectual reduction targets further confirms the lack of political will to accomplish the reductions necessary to stabilize atmospheric concentrations.

I did not say that I "desired" a global solution; rather, I said: " If AGW is a problem, it is a global problem; and, it is amenable only to a global solution." That means the solution has to include China and India, as well as the rest of the developing world. It also means that "signing on" and then "sitting back" won't cut it.

Kyoto was a blatant attempt to get the developed world "a little bit pregnant", with full knowledge that it would be very difficult to stop getting more pregnant as time went on. (One could argue that the "success" of Kyoto to date is similar to a spontaneous abortion.) Canada and the EU have been very quick to point out that "the check is in the mail", though it seems very slow in arriving; the UN has been equally quick to assure that "of course, I'll respect you in the morning". US citizens have long been sceptical when they hear: "I'm from the government and I'm here to help."

The "we" part who will benefit the most will be the "we" who change the financial equation and make low-carbon or carbon-free energy CHEAPER than burning refined or unrefined fossil-fuels. Your $10 - $40 Trillion estimates appear to come from nowhere.

Studies which I am privy to, indicate that the cost of electric power generated by means of carbon capture (pure O2 generated on site via cryogenic separation, and then used to create more or less "pure" CO2) would increase the cost of electricty 35-50% - not so terrible of a price to pay.

Current (Chicago Climate Exchange - CCX) "carbon credits" go for about $5 per metric tonne, from current offset programs, so coal prices would go up 20-30% if they included the cost of the requisite number of carbon credits. You estimate huge percentages of our GNP or GWP as costs, the rest of the world estimates on the order of 1% or so. I've already put in my 1% and more by buying and using a 50+mpg hybrid car, for the time being. How about you?

China and India will either follow "us" or lead "us" - so I suggest you shed your cement overshoes and help take the first steps on what is undoubtedly a long and somewhat expensive journey. Remember, too, that every dollar, Euro, rupee spent is multiplied as economic activity. Conversion to 21st century energy technologies will be of great economic benefit to "us", and will certainly help to save "us" from "ourselves" .

Regards, RWV

Conversion to nuclear, solar, biofuels, wind and wave power - we have a few decades to work with. Time for ad nauseum debate is quickly evaporating however.

RWV