Carbon dioxide and its greenhouse effect

Global warming denialists claim that carbon dioxide (CO2) is nothing more than a beneficial trace gas that plants need to make food, and thus the increase in it over the past few decades is nothing to worry about. Let’s look at all the relevant facts:

CO2 makes up about 380 ppm (parts per million) in the atmosphere.
CO2 is essential for plants to do photosynthesis.
CO2 is opaque to infrared radiation, thus making it a greenhouse gas.
CO2 makes up most of the atmosphere of Venus, which has the worst greenhouse effect.
CO2 is 1.5 times heavier than air in general, thus it would tend to be lower in the atmosphere than the nitrogen and oxygen that makes up most of it.
In one cubic meter of Earth’s atmosphere at sea level, the number of molecules is about ten to the 23rd power. (That’s 1 followed by 23 zero’s !!!)
Let’s do some basic math. Ten to the 23rd power divided by a million (ten to the 6th power) is ten to the 17th power. So if CO2 is indeed 380 ppm, that means there are 38 times ten to the 18th power molecules of CO2 in one cubic meter of air, or 38,000,000,000,000,000,000.
The troposphere, the lowest layer of the atmosphere where most of its weather occures, has an average depth of about 17 km (10 miles) in the middle latitudes. A kilometer is 1000 meters. So when we multiply (38 times ten to the 18th power) by (17 times ten to the 3rd power), we get about 65 times ten to the 22nd power. Obviously, the actual amount of CO2 in a column of air 17 km tall, one meter wide and one meter long would be less, due to CO2 concentrating more in the lower levels as noted before, along with air itself becoming thinner as we go farther from the Earth's surface. But this is enough to show that CO2’s designation as a “trace gas” means in no way that it cannot have a profound influence on climate. It can because the actual number of CO2 molecules is so great. Only the inability of some people to grasp huge numbers makes them think that any gas that has less than 1% of the atmosphere is therefore insignificant. And it would take only one CO2 molecule blocking infrared radiation to raise the temperature of the atmosphere. Just one! So it stands to reason that ANY increase in CO2 also leads to an increase in atmospheric temperatures.
Another thing to consider is how serious the greenhouse effect of Earth’s atmosphere really is. Without it, Earth’s average temperature would be about -18 degrees Celsius (C ) , which is about 32 degrees C different from Earth’s actual average temperature (14 degrees C). Again, people who are not scientifically trained have difficulty grasping this, since they think of temperatures below “room temperture” (18 to 24 degrees C) as being cold. But in fact, it is quite warm compared to most of the universe. The cosmic microwave background (CMB ) radiation, a leftover remnant of the Big Bang, is about 2.7 degrees C (or Kelvin) above absolute zero, which is itself about −273 degrees C. Thus an object recieving radiation from no other source would still have a temperature of -270.45 degrees C. The Earth recieves radiation from the Sun that by itself adds about 252 degrees C to its temperature. That’s a LOT of heat! The greenhouse effect adds only about 1/8th more heat to Earth. But that is still enough to make the difference between a frigid, lifeless planet and one with oceans filled with life.
Still another thing to consider is that it can take only one degree difference in average temperature over several decades to turn a glacier into iceless land or open water. When water ice reaches its melting point, it ALL turns into liquid, thus the loss of a glacier at a certain location would mean a profound difference there. Imagine what the melting and disappearance of an entire polar ice cap would be! It might take decades or even centuries for the polar ice caps to melt as a result of global warming, but unless it is reversed, the melting is inevitable!

Re: Carbon dioxide and its greenhouse effect

OPINION - The Global Warming Controversy

I’ve been hearing a lot recently about the global warming controversy - various scientists accusing others of being paid shills, various scenarios that might or might not be true, various reasons why we should/shouldn’t worry about it. All of these things are missing the whole point.

When I see a controversy being stirred up like this one, I always know there is a third party at work with an unstated vested interest. I don’t really even care who it is or what their interest is, because it doesn’t matter. They are distracting us from the real issue on the fifth dynamic, which is very, very simple.

Are we, as mankind or as individuals, in-exchange with that dynamic and surviving? Or are we in criminal exchange with that dynamic and therefore succumbing? What tone level do we operate in, in relationship to that dynamic? Let’s take a look at one example.

To grow our food so that our bodies can survive, we kill off everything in the ecosystem except for the one (mono) crop that we want to grow there. Picture corn fields, strawberry fields, citrus orchards, etc. That’s farming, right? That’s how it’s always been done, that’s the “best” way to do it. It must be, because _______ (fill in your blank here).

But in actuality, because nature works best with diversity, cooperation, interaction and balance on multiple levels, when we kill off every other life form in the system to grow just one, this is, in essence, declaring genocidal war on nature and on that ecosystem.

Which means we have to bring in the howitzers in order to grow our corn. We need tractors, planes full of pesticides, constant inputs of energy in the form of fertilizers, weed killers, labor, etc. Because life has the urge to survive, and our game has become not letting it. The result is soil that is so depleted of the bacteria, microorganisms, minerals and other life forms that actually allow anything to grow, that even weeds can barely grow in it. So then, that land has been made almost useless to the majority of life forms on the planet, including us, and it will take years for it to recover enough to grow anything truly nutritious. That is our version of “control” used in order to grow food.

What tone level would you say that is? Is that “good control?” Or “bad control?”
Now, envision a permaculture garden, which, because there is an understanding of how nature operates, a respect for non human life forms, and an agreement and understanding that allowng or even helping them to flourish will also allow us personally to flourish, produces 3 to 10 times the yield as the above corn field, with a variety of foods that are packed with vitamins and minerals to the degree that you can actually feel the effects when you eat a salad from that garden. In addition, the garden is full of other life forms, from microorganisms to birds to bees and butterflies to small animals and maybe even weeds (often edible and much more nutritious than, say, corn). Get this, 3 to 10 times the yield, with less labor (which makes sense if you are working with nature instead of against it), even with these other life forms crowding in there, benefiting from the ecosystem! There truly is enough for everybody. It is a vicious lie to suggest that there is not.
We really do not have to steal from every other life form, and destroy every other life form in the ecosystem, in order to feed ourselves.

I’ve been told that, well, maybe that’s true, but it would be so expensive to switch over to that method, it isn’t practical, blah, blah. My response is: So you’re telling me that it’s not survival to survive on the living things dynamic? You’re telling me that we have to be criminals because we can’t survive if we aren’t? You’re telling me that we have to destroy every other life form wherever we grow our food in order to keep our bodies alive? If you think about it, that doesn’t really make a whole lot of sense, does it? One could extrapolate those ideas within the context of the exploding population graph and ask, how long can this go on? And what sort of problems are we leaving our children (and our future selves, in new bodies) to deal with by not being willing to change our operating basis now because it is inconvenient?

One usually does experience some form of discomfort when moving from criminal exchange to being in-exchange, or moving from lower conditions to higher conditions   But wow, once you get there, life is just so much better!! It is always worth it.

We do not have to destroy ecosystems because the only way we can grow things is monocropping in straight rows. That way of doing things is a very stupid and unimaginative idea that somebody came up with and a lot of other people are just going along with – without really thinking about it or examining it very closely. That’s usually how we got into the various fixes we find ourselves in on Planet Earth, right?

Yes, the organic market is growing and that is a very survival trend, but do you know how they grow most organic veggies? Yep, in the same straight rows, killing off all other life forms, and as a result, they have way more pest problems, they have to bring in all kinds of energy from outside the system (like organic fertilizer), because the same imbalances exist, and the way crops are grown removes more life, more microorganisms, and more long-term survival ability from the ecosystem than it replaces. Thus, commercial agriculture the way we do it now is always in criminal exchange with the environment, whether organic or not. Of course, organic does not dump chemicals into the soils, water supply and air at least, so it is definitely less criminal, a step in the right direction. But still no cigar if we actually want to move into exchange conditions 3 and 4, which is how permaculture operates.

On a permaculture farm, we are not removing more resources than what are being replaced. The way nature works, is that she uses external energies like sunlight and rain, to create life energy. When this system is understood and worked with, one can create huge amounts of production and energy simply from sunlight and water. A correctly managed permaculture farm will produce more energy than it uses, exchange condition 4 (gives back more than expected). It is truly amazing how much energy that life can produce from sunlight and water (as well as the theta component of life, which is the X factor I’m not even going to discuss, beyond speculating - which scenario do you think spirit prefers? The genocidal version, or the permaculture version?). Spirit is the element that allows ecosystems to produce more than they consume, when one understands how the system works.

Commercial agriculture is just one example of a low toned, criminal exchange interaction with the non-human living world. It is pretty out of comm and individuated, when you really look at it. One could look at other aspects of our culture and see similar things.

So regardless of what one believes about global warming or about Al Gore, his suggestions to change our light bulbs, eat local, organic foods, consume less, use less energy that we are not replacing, etc, move us gradiently toward being less criminal - and that is a good thing!

If we as individuals took responsibility for ensuring this was happening within our zones of control (at work, at play, at home, etc), then we would not have to worry so much about whether the “Suppressive Person one world government” was going to use global warming as an excuse to put us under martial law. Come on, they will use anything as an excuse to put us under martial law, that is their game.

Where we risk going off the rails is in losing sight of the actual condition of our non-human life mates on this planet and how we have impacted that. This can be observed for oneself to a large degree, by applying “Look, Don’t Listen” and going out and looking at the soil in your own neighborhood, and what will grow in it, comparing really vibrant, live soil to dead soil and how plants do in each, eating the food from each and comparing the effects, doing a visual inspection of the water and air in your area, watching nature and how she operates (which is a whole lot of fun).  I am not posting to debate but posting and honor your separate viewpoints.   © 2009 ~~KES

Re: Carbon dioxide and its greenhouse effect

That was an excellent essay, KES, as brilliant as anything I've ever written!

Re: Carbon dioxide and its greenhouse effect

Hi all,

Here in the UK I think there is a much more general acceptance of global warming/climate change science than in the US, so much so that many people are already making quite radical changes to their lifestyles.

I try to be very honest about our knowledge and stick very much to what can be demonstrated scientifically, much as Dale, as follows:

fact 1: global warming- the global average temperature is increasing. The word average is crucial as there will still be wide variations in different areas, hence some areas will at times have lower than “normal” temperatures. The failure to understand that it is the global average that is rising allows people to dismiss the whole idea of global warming when they get the odd cold day in their locality.

fact 2: climate change- the earth system is dynamic and climate change is and always has been an ongoing penomena subject to many overlayed cyclic variations. This is demonstrated by various earth recordings (glacial, geological etc) as well as more recent (150 years) scientific data.

fact 3: the percentage of CO2 in the atmosphere is increasing and has been for the last 150 years or so. This has been (and is being) recorded through scientific measurement.

fact 4: human beings have been burning increasing amounts of fossil fuels during a similar time span.

fact 5: burning fossil fuels releases stored carbon as carbon dioxide.

fact 6: carbon dioxide is a “greenhouse gas”.

theory 1: (a premise yet to be proven) the increase in the percentage of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is the result of humans burning increasing quantities of fossil fuels.

theory 2: (a premise yet to be proven) the increase in the percentage of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is causing global warming.

Another problem arises because it is not benerally understood that science depends upon and advances through theory which may never be proven. This is why scientists involved in the United Nations International Panel on Climate Change express the likelihood of a human cause for current global warming as a percentage or probability.

I tend to go with Kes, I'm not especially concerned whether we will ever “prove” conclusively that the current rise in global average temperature is the direct result of humans burning fossil fuels (though I think it is, probably!). I am more concerned with learning to live lightly on the earth right now. If we use an integral map as an ethical basis, such as that provided by permaculture design, namely caring for our environments, our communities and ourselves, then there is less chance of us doing harm and at least we will have some fun on the way.

Re: Carbon dioxide and its greenhouse effect

Thanks Chris!!! I really appreciate what you said.
Namasté

Re: Carbon dioxide and its greenhouse effect

Great picture Kes! The future of the world is in safe hands.

Hwyl!

Chris

Those terrible twins of climate change, CO2 and H2O

http://circleh.wordpress.com/2009/01/19/those-terrible-twins-of-climate-change-co2-and-h2o/
Global warming has indeed stopped since 2005, due to the Sun. Ironically, the excess CO2 that has been produced by man and contributed to global warming when the Sun was roaring is causing a thermal backlash due to the Sun going quiet now. The reason is because of the other component involved in climate change: water vapor.
One of the most commonly held misconceptions about the man-made global warming hypothesis is that temperatures must increase every year and evenly over the world. No one knowledgable about climate issues would seriously claim that, so it’s an obvious strawman.  The question is, why do temperatures fluctuate so much and does global warming explain this? Indeed it does!
The process begins with the slight increase in carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere known to be caused by human emissions. Because CO2 traps slightly more heat, it also causes more water to evaporate. Water vapor (H2O) is also a greenhouse gas, so that causes a feedback loop, in which the temperature increases further, causing more water to evaporate. In the summer months, the result is much hotter weather than you might expect from CO2 alone.
But H2O has an opposite effect in winter. As temperature drops, the increased amounts of H2O forms clouds, which block sunlight and thus cool the earth further. Winters will be even colder than one would expect, plus there would be increased precipitation, including snow.
As long as the average temperature over the course of a year at a certain place or region is below the melting point of water, then global warming actually has the paradoxical effect of causing colder winters, more snow and thus increased ice in certain places. It is where the average annual temperatures have risen above the melting point of water that we see glaciers retreating. And the hotter summers at the northern ice cap are nothing to ignore, for its melting away will still have a tragic effect on polar bears.
In the southern hemisphere, global warming has had less of an effect, and this can be explained by geography. There is far more land up north than down south. Land radiates heat, while oceans absorb it. Also, the Arctic Ocean is water surrounded by warmer land, while Antarctica is frigid land surrounded by cold oceans that insulate it from warmer regions. So it stands to reason that the Arctic Ocean will melt long before the Antarctic does, and that there may even be some increase in Antarctic ice for the reasons I explained above.
If there was no CO2, or any other greenhouse gas in our atmosphere, the average temperature on Earth would actually be below the freezing point of water, thus the oceans would be frozen solid and life on Earth would be impossible.  And if there was no H2O to form oceans and absorb CO2 from the atmosphere, then CO2 would have accumulated so greatly in the atmosphere from volcanic eruptions over billions of years that we would have experienced temperatures too high for carbon based life forms to survive, thus we would already be like Venus. The abundance of water on Earth, plus the small amount of CO2 in our atmosphere, provide the delicate balance that maintains life on Earth. But too much CO2 can be as much a problem as too little, hence our concern about how much longer it may be before we reach a tipping point in the climate change problem.
The solar activity has dropped, while the CO2 levels have remained high AND the H2O levels are also high. The end result: Warm summers and VERY COLD WINTERS!
But wait until the Sun roars again. When that happens, we will get: Mild winters and VERY HOT SUMMERS!

Those terrible twins of climate change, revisited

http://circleh.wordpress.com/2009/11/10/those-terrible-twins-of-climate-change-revisited/
Although both CO2 (carbon dioxide) and H2O (water) are indeed greenhouse gases when both are in their gaseous state, in practice only CO2 is always in that state in the atmosphere. That is why CO2 is indeed the most important greenhouse gas, despite it being less prevelant than water vapor. Global warming denialists have exaggerated the greenhouse role of H2O to justify ignoring CO2. That is flat out dishonesty.
The proportions and molecular weights of the most common components of the Earth’s atmosphere are:

Nitrogen (78%) : 28 
Oxygen (21%): 32
Argon (1%) : 40
CO2 (0.38%) :  38
H2O (0.4%) :  18
Note that! Water vapor has less than HALF the molecular weight of CO2! And that leads to some serious results.
Since nitrogen and oxygen form nearly 99% of the atmosphere, the average molecular weight of it will be between 28 and 32. CO2 is heavier than that average, while water vapor is MUCH lighter than that average. Thus water vapor will tend to rise much more than the other gases listed.

This crude illustration represents how the various gases interact. Because CO2 is lower in the atmosphere, it traps heat closer to the surface. Trapped heat causes evaporation. The H2O quickly rises and as it does, it cools. In some cases, the relative humidity of the rising H2O exceeds 100% and that results in the formation of clouds, which block and reflect sunlight. And this nullifies H2O’s greenhouse effect and it instead becomes a cooling agent, all the way down to the surface. It is common knowledge that cloudy days are cooler than clear ones. The only times the greenhouse effect of H2O is really significant is at daytime when the sky is clear, and at night when the sky is cloudy. In the latter case the clouds hold in heat that would otherwise escape when the sky is clear.
Thus this statement by ICECAP is falsified:
http://icecap.us/index.php/go/faqs-and-myths#5    
CO2 is the most important greenhouse gas. 
Not even close. Most of the greenhouse effect is due to water vapor, which is about 100 times as abundant in the atmosphere as CO2 and thus has a much larger effect.  
They are liars. The overwhelming tendency of water vapor to rise, to form clouds, and to shield the Earth’s surface from the Sun’s rays make that simply a falsehood. CO2 by nature actually has the larger effect because it NEVER forms clouds and thus can ONLY be a greenhouse gas. It operates regardless of the weather. 
Of course, that will not deter denialists. They will still say, “Well, if CO2’s greenhouse effect is opposed by the cooling effects of water clouds, doesn’t that mean CO2 can’t change climate?” But that is wrong too. The skies are not always cloudy. Increasing CO2 amounts by human activities DO trap more heat, which goes into the oceans and into other bodies of water, including the Arctic Ocean. And that stored heat is why the Arctic ice cap has been melting away. That is also why we had that incredibly strong El Nino of 1998 and why we had so many devestating hurricanes a few years ago. In deserts, where there is hardly any water, the cooling effects of H2O do not apply and those areas will be even hotter and drier. And in areas where there is already plenty of rain, there will indeed be more rain, resulting in flooding in certain regions.
By the way, one of the expected proofs of the man-made global warming hypothesis is that, because CO2 is lower in the atmosphere, the increased amounts of it will result in the lowest level of the atmosphere warming and the higher levels cooling. If most of the recent warming was due to the Sun, we would expect all levels of the atmosphere to warm equally. 
http://www.wunderground.com/education/strato_cooling.asp
{{{ By Jeffrey Masters, Ph.D. — Director of Meteorology, Weather Underground, Inc.

Global temperatures in 2006 were the third coldest on record in the lower stratosphere, according to the National Climatic Data Center. Only 1997 and 2000 had colder temperatures since record keeping began in 1979 (Figure 1). Why is this important? Well, the stratosphere is that layer of the upper atmosphere approximately 14-22 km (9-14 miles) above the surface that contains our protective ozone layer. The main reason for the recent stratospheric cooling is due to the destruction of ozone by human-emitted CFC gases. Ozone absorbs solar UV radiation, which heats the surrounding air in the stratosphere. Loss of ozone means that less UV light gets absorbed, resulting in cooling of the stratosphere. Cooling of the stratosphere results in the formation of more polar stratospheric clouds, which require very cold temperatures to form. The presence of these clouds allows even more ozone destruction to occur, since the reactions responsible for ozone destruction occur much faster in clouds than in dry air. Thus, the recent cooling of the stratosphere allows high levels of harmful UV light to reach the surface. As CFC gases begin to decline in coming years thanks to banning of these substances in 1987, the stratosphere should start to warm, and ozone levels will recover.

Figure 1. Global lower stratospheric departure of temperature from average since 1979, as measured by satellites. The large spikes in 1982 and 1991 are due to the eruptions of El Chicon and Mt. Pinatubo, respectively. These volcanos ejected huge quantities of sulphuric acid dust into the stratosphere. This dust absorbed large quantities of solar radiation, heating the stratosphere. Image credit: National Climatic Data Center.
Greenhouse gases also cause stratospheric cooling
However, this recovery of the ozone layer is being delayed. A significant portion of the observed stratospheric cooling is also due to human-emitted greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide and methane. Climate models predict that if greenhouse gases are to blame for heating at the surface, compensating cooling must occur in the upper atmosphere. We need only look as far as our sister planet, Venus, to see the truth of this theory. Venus’s atmosphere is 96.5% carbon dioxide, which has triggered a run-away greenhouse effect of truly hellish proportions. The average surface temperature on Venus is a very toasty 894 °F! However, Venus’s upper atmosphere is a startling 4-5 times colder than Earth’s upper atmosphere. The explanation of this greenhouse gas-caused surface heating and upper air cooling is not simple, but good discussions can be found at Max Planck Institute for Chemistry and realclimate.org for those unafraid of radiative transfer theory. One way to think about the problem is that the amount of infrared heat energy radiated out to space by a planet is roughly equal to the amount of solar energy it receives from the sun. If the surface atmosphere warms, there must be compensating cooling elsewhere in the atmosphere in order to keep the amount of heat given off by the planet the same. As emissions of greenhouse gases continue to rise, their cooling effect on the stratosphere will increase. This will make recovery of the stratospheric ozone layer much slower.
Greenhouse gases cause cooling higher up, too
Greenhouse gases have also led to the cooling of the atmosphere at levels higher than the stratosphere. Over the past 30 years, the Earth’s surface temperature has increased 0.2-0.4 °C, while the temperature in the mesosphere, about 50-80 km above ground, has cooled 5-10 °C (Beig et al., 2006). There is no appreciable cooling due to ozone destruction at these altitudes, so nearly all of this dramatic cooling is due to the addition of greenhouse gases to the atmosphere. Even greater cooling of 17 °C per decade has been observed high in the ionosphere, at 350 km altitude. This has affected the orbits of orbiting satellites, due to decreased drag, since the upper atmosphere has shrunk and moved closer to the surface (Lastovicka et al., 2006). The density of the air has declined 2-3% per decade the past 30 years at 350 km altitude. So, in a sense, the sky IS falling!
What about global warming being caused by the sun?
Some scientists have theorized that increases in solar output are responsible for a significant portion of the observed global warming. For instance, Scafetta & West (2006) estimated that 25-35% of the global warming in the 1980-2000 period was attributable to solar variability. Other scientists disagree, finding no evidence of global warming due to solar activity changes since the 1940s. Since any increase in solar radiation would heat both the lower and upper atmosphere, the observed drop in upper atmospheric temperatures in the past 30 years argues against a large portion of the observed greenhouse effect being caused by solar variability. The observed cooling of the upper atmosphere in recent decades is strong evidence that the warming at Earth’s surface is due to human-emitted greenhouse gases. It should also give us additional confidence in the climate models, since they predicted that this upper atmospheric cooling would occur. }}}

In short, the denialism of global warming/climate change is based entirely on ignorance, dishonesty, and hypocrisy. We need to debunk and do away with it for good!