BBC: 50 years on: The Keeling Curve legacy - ( CO2 -- Global Warming?)

BBC ^ | Sunday, 2 December 2007, 20:13 GMT | Helen Briggs Science reporter, BBC News

[chipengineer]

Also worth pointing out is that the energy forcing effect of CO2 (in W/m^2) is proportional to the logarithm of the concentration.

[Waco]

ALL The while ignoring the fact that all mammals exhale CO2 when they breathe. How clever Ethyl! Way to go!

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Goron's Crazy Loony Tune's Club Band

LOL!!!

[TheFreeperFormerlyKnownAs]

That graph is MANIPULATED to make the change appear extremely steep, .... That graph is a piece of political propaganda, not science.

'zactly

[dangus]

The current average global temperature is around 17 degrees, C, right?

[dangus]

your link is bad. Can you fix it?

[Old Professer]

Seems dust leads both the temp and CO2.

The nore dust, the less CO2 and the lower the temp.

Should we add more dust in the wind

[chessplayer]

“Though Mauna Loa is an active volcano, Keeling and collaborators made measurements on the incoming ocean breeze and above the thermal inversion layer to prevent local contamination. In addition, measurements at many other isolated sites have confirmed the long-term trend, though no sites have a record as long as Mauna Loa.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keeling_Curve

[cogitator]

1) Human activities are the cause.

There is little room for doubt about this fact. There are multiple types of data, and analyses of such data, that indicate it is an accurate statement.

[cogitator]

Brilliant. Put a measuring station on top of a volcano that spews millions of tons of co2 into the air, then blame it on humans burning "fossil" fuels.

Volcanoes don't product that much CO2, and degassing events that affect the ongoing monitoring are easily diagnosed based on meteorological factors and the actual record of the event.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

There is little room for doubt about this fact.

I think there is a huge amount of doubt about that statement!

[ClearCase_guy]

Look at Post #7, the last graph, showing levels of CO2 over time. It fluctuates in a consistent pattern that has nothing to do with human activity, as much of this graph covers time prior to man's industrialization.

Proof that the rise is not due to man? No.
Reasonable doubt? You bet.

[rightinthemiddle]

Good article: Marxism at the core of global warming movement:

http://www.tennessean.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071202/COLUMNIST0130/712020382/1007/OPINION

[cogitator]

It's always surprising to me that some people think there is doubt about the anthropogenic cause of the currently-observed rise in atmospheric CO2 concentrations (what the Keeling curve displays). I don't even include this in my profile because there are so many other good sources on the Web that address this subject. Below are five different links on this subject. If you think there's doubt after perusing these links... well, then you could never be convinced that it gets darker at night based on arguments that the Sun is not visible then.

The first one, from 1996, dates back to the heyday of Usenet, and contains an itemized list of various types of evidence. I have used some of these points in different FR discussions.

Why does atmospheric CO2 rise ?

"The CO2 rise is natural"

How do we know that recent CO2 increases are due to human activities?

How Do We Know that the Atmospheric Build-up of Greenhouse Gases Is Due to Human Activity?

Ice Bubbles Reveal Biggest Rise in CO2 for 800,000 Years

Reasonable doubt? You bet.

Maybe O.J. didn't murder Nicole and Ronald Goldman, either.

[qam1]

So, it's no good saying that man isn't causing the rise in the CO2 level in the atmosphere.

Actually one of the biggest problems for the AGW proponents is the rise in CO₂ is too linear

As you can see, The rise has been steady at about +1.5 ppmv per year (15 ppmv per decade)

However, if you look at the world's CO₂ output

the emissions have of course been increasing

So the question is why is the rise in CO₂ levels per year staying linear? As emissions increased you should see the rate of the increase (the Slope) in CO₂ levels per year in the atmosphere also increase.

For example, if pumping out 4000 million tons of CO₂ 1970 caused the rise of 1.5 ppmv atmospheric CO₂, then you would expect that in the year 2000 when we pumped out 7000 million tons of CO₂, the atmospheric level should have rose about 26 ppmv that year. But they didn't, it's been holding steady at +1.5ppmv

Here are the actual numbers on the change per year

From Baring Head in New Zealand where the results are nearly the same as Manua Kea they have a nice plot

as you can see there just isn't any trend or correlation between human emissions and rise in CO₂. If humans were responsible, the trend would be every year having a bigger rise than the previous one, but instead the rise goes up & down randomly with no tread at all

The reason is obvious, 4000 million tons or 7000 million tons put out by man are both insignificant compared to natural emissions and the rise in CO₂ has to be coming from somewhere else. Even 7000 million tons is barely a blip on the seasonal differences.

[Robert A Cook PE]

Well, the HI surveillance station is uphill and upwind of the lava flows down near the coast ...

What amazing is that the spring-summer and fall dips in CO2 from plant growth over the summer are so visible: Yes, CO2 is increasing.

Now, where have they actually showed that the 8 billion tons of carbon (25-odd billion tons of CO2) are accounting for the minor change in CO2 in the earth’s atmosphere each year?

[Robert A Cook PE]

I’m willing to concede CO2 is increasing from human activities, but absolutely have seen no evidence that increased CO2 is causing measurable temperature changes.

And, in fact, the evidence gets less each year that increased CO2 is affecting temperate.

[cogitator]

Now, where have they actually showed that the 8 billion tons of carbon (25-odd billion tons of CO2) are accounting for the minor change in CO2 in the earth’s atmosphere each year?

The summary of several different methods for accounting for natural and anthropogenic fluxes is shown below. (Methods differ for measuring fluxes on land and in the ocean, for example.) There are other versions of this type of diagram, from various sources and with minor alterations of the numbers. In essence, natural sources and sinks operating alone would add up to a net sink. So the reason for the increase is human activities. Evaluation of insignificance requires non-naive understanding of the interaction of dynamically-linked parameters.

The diagram below is half-size; if you really need to see it full-size, click on it.

[cogitator]

Sharp rise in CO2 levels recorded

"The research indicates that 2005 saw one of the largest increases on record - a rise of 2.6ppm."

7000/4000 x 1.5 = 2.6

You may have dropped a decimal point.

As you can see, The rise has been steady at about +1.5 ppmv per year.

Apparently this has changed recently.

"The chief carbon dioxide analyst for NOAA says the latest data confirms a worrying trend that recent years have, on average, recorded double the rate of increase from just 30 years ago."

[cogitator]

but absolutely have seen no evidence that increased CO2 is causing measurable temperature changes.

I started to make a snide remark, but stopped. The WG1 IPCC report is all about that evidence. It is, to phrase it legally, a cumulative body of evidence.

What type of data or evidential argument would influence you to accept that significantly changing the radiative adsorption/transmission properties of the atmosphere would likely affect the temperature at the surface of the Earth? Because that in essence is what is occurring. Increasing CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere must alter the radiative absorption/transmission properties of the atmosphere.