The Fraudulent Keeling Curve

StarMan wrote:
Not only is the infamous hockey stick a fraud, but the Keeling Curve is as well.
There are several reasons it is fraudulent.
First the Scary Graph, as I call it:



I don't know which of these reasons is more important, so I'll let you decide.

From the bottom up:

1. The base is non-zero. This is so the graph will be skewed upward, it will have a much greater slope, and encourage everybody to "do something!"

If the base were 0, the graph would be much, much flatter even with these exaggerated values. Keep in mind "parts per million volume".

2. Next, the top. It is topped off at ~390 ppmv when in fact it SHOULD be 15,500 ppmv. This is because water vapor is THE dominant greenhouse gas.

Here is the graph of carbon dioxide, in red, with just these two adjustments:



Please, don't anyone pretend that water doesn't count. It really does. Yes, it rains, but "old water" behaves just the same way "new water" does. And their IR spectra are remarkably similar. Biggest difference is that water vapor, at 1.5%, is 15,000 parts per million volume. The annual increase in atmospheric CO2 of ~1.36 ppmv is insignificant.

Into the Night wrote: Neither water vapor, liquid water, nor carbon dioxide warm the Earth. Absorption of infrared light by any of the substances in the atmosphere is just another way for the surface to heat the atmosphere and be cooled in the process. In the end, it is no different than conduction and convection.

Into the Night wrote:
Neither water vapor, liquid water, nor carbon dioxide warm the Earth. Absorption of infrared light by any of the substances in the atmosphere is just another way for the surface to heat the atmosphere and be cooled in the process. In the end, it is no different than conduction and convection.

StarMan wrote:

Into the Night wrote:
Neither water vapor, liquid water, nor carbon dioxide warm the Earth. Absorption of infrared light by any of the substances in the atmosphere is just another way for the surface to heat the atmosphere and be cooled in the process. In the end, it is no different than conduction and convection.

Rhetoric is NOT science. Please stop playing your rhetorical games.
A blanket does not "warm" you at night, but it retains your body's warmth in the same way carbon dioxide and water vapor retain earth's warmth. You of course know this, but you think you can play rhetorical games and deceive people.
It is most unintelligent and anti-scientific of you to do so. Stop it.

Wake wrote:

Into the Night wrote: Neither water vapor, liquid water, nor carbon dioxide warm the Earth. Absorption of infrared light by any of the substances in the atmosphere is just another way for the surface to heat the atmosphere and be cooled in the process. In the end, it is no different than conduction and convection.

Firstly, water vapor, water held as droplets in clouds and CO2 DO warm the earth. So why are you pretending otherwise?

Wake wrote:
Clouds hold heat and can only rid themselves of this by conduction and convection.

Wake wrote:
Since this takes time this is a delayed or "blanketing" effect.

Wake wrote:
The warming of the clouds and the humidity in the air occurs essentially instantaneously because energy from the sun enters as radiation which moves at the speed of light.

Wake wrote:
More importantly why are you changing the subject which was about the intentional scaling of CO2 and H2O to make CO2 to look important when it, as a trace gas, is barely detectable in the maintenance of heat?

StarMan wrote:

Into the Night wrote:
Neither water vapor, liquid water, nor carbon dioxide warm the Earth. Absorption of infrared light by any of the substances in the atmosphere is just another way for the surface to heat the atmosphere and be cooled in the process. In the end, it is no different than conduction and convection.

Rhetoric is NOT science.

StarMan wrote:
Please stop playing your rhetorical games.

StarMan wrote:
A blanket does not "warm" you at night, but it retains your body's warmth in the same way carbon dioxide and water vapor retain earth's warmth.

StarMan wrote:
You of course know this, but you think you can play rhetorical games and deceive people.

StarMan wrote:
It is most unintelligent and anti-scientific of you to do so.

StarMan wrote:
Stop it.

Wake wrote:

StarMan wrote:

Into the Night wrote:
Neither water vapor, liquid water, nor carbon dioxide warm the Earth. Absorption of infrared light by any of the substances in the atmosphere is just another way for the surface to heat the atmosphere and be cooled in the process. In the end, it is no different than conduction and convection.

Rhetoric is NOT science. Please stop playing your rhetorical games.
A blanket does not "warm" you at night, but it retains your body's warmth in the same way carbon dioxide and water vapor retain earth's warmth. You of course know this, but you think you can play rhetorical games and deceive people.
It is most unintelligent and anti-scientific of you to do so. Stop it.

If you pay attention to his postings you will soon perceive that he actually believes what he is posting. Those are the problems I was talking about. It's like talking to a log.

Into the Night wrote: If water vapor, water, or CO2 warm the Earth, why is the daylit side of the Earth COLDER?

Clouds are liquid water (or ice). Liquid water has a high specific heat value. It takes a long time to heat them up, and a long time to cool them down. A cloud is like a thermal 'anvil' floating there in the sky.

Clouds are formed by the presence of water vapor and the convection. They only exist BECAUSE OF conduction and convection.

Blankets work by reducing heat. Clouds have a high conductivity of heat, just as water does. They do not act like insulators. Quite the opposite. Clouds are good conductors of heat.

WRONG! Liquid water has a high specific heat index. It takes quite a lot of time to heat up a cloud. The air around a cloud will heat up before the cloud does. The surface will heat up the fastest. At night, the reverse happens. The surface cools the fastest, the air around a cloud will cool faster than the cloud does.

Because it is basing its argument on the magick properties of CO2 and water vapor to 'warm the Earth'.

It is nice that StarMan made his point by putting the graphs into a proper baseline, and his argument is sound as far as the misrepresentation of data the Church of Global Warming likes to use, but the argument IS assuming properties of CO2 and water, and water vapor that just aren't there.

Absorption of infrared energy by CO2 and water is just another way for the surface to lose heat to the atmosphere, just like conduction and convection. Big hairy deal.

Into the Night wrote: You two can go look up the properties of carbon dioxide and water anytime you want to.
You can go look up the Stefan-Boltzmann equation anytime you want to.
You can go look up the 2nd law of thermodynamics anytime you want to.
You can go look up the temperature and energy profiles of the atmosphere anytime you want to.
You can go look up why science is nothing more than a set of falsifiable theories anytime you want to.

I am not going to deviate from these just to agree with you.

hubble wrote:
if you want to reduce CO2 , rebuild the forest.

hubble wrote:
Keeling curve is just a joke:
first, 50 years of measurements are not relevant to propose any serious climate model , the temperature curve doesn't even follow this curve, although IPCC ( not a scientific organisation ) based the AGW on correlation between CO2 and temperature.
second, the CO2 from ice cores cannot be taken in consideration as the air bubbles still in contact with atmosphere for hundreds years .
third, for last 2 millions of years we are considered to be in cold time as before we couldn't find any piece of ice in northern hemisphere, so before humans could make fire !
The temperature difference is about +-10 degrees C between cold and hot periods, comparing to last century +- 0.5 °C
Fourth, CO2 has not linear effect on warming , doubling CO2 will not add the same temperature difference and still has only 10% part of global warming.
Fifth, the oceans contain much more CO2 than atmosphere and much more energy , so the understanding of global warming should start with ocean currents analysis.
Climate science is about energy balance and clouds albedo should be part of the equation ! 1% of albedo change will have the same impact than pretending AGW.
Finally, the most important thing is to stop fossile energy and support sustainable projets, not because CO2, but only because pollution and other aspects.
stop arguing, now it's time to do something !
if you want to reduce CO2 , rebuild the forest.

Into the Night wrote:

hubble wrote:if you want to reduce CO2 , rebuild the forest.

Places like Weyerhaeuser and Georgia-Pacific are doing just that. They need the trees for the products they produce.They are farmers.

Wake wrote:

hubble wrote:
Keeling curve is just a joke:
first, 50 years of measurements are not relevant to propose any serious climate model , the temperature curve doesn't even follow this curve, although IPCC ( not a scientific organisation ) based the AGW on correlation between CO2 and temperature.
second, the CO2 from ice cores cannot be taken in consideration as the air bubbles still in contact with atmosphere for hundreds years .
third, for last 2 millions of years we are considered to be in cold time as before we couldn't find any piece of ice in northern hemisphere, so before humans could make fire !
The temperature difference is about +-10 degrees C between cold and hot periods, comparing to last century +- 0.5 °C
Fourth, CO2 has not linear effect on warming , doubling CO2 will not add the same temperature difference and still has only 10% part of global warming.
Fifth, the oceans contain much more CO2 than atmosphere and much more energy , so the understanding of global warming should start with ocean currents analysis.
Climate science is about energy balance and clouds albedo should be part of the equation ! 1% of albedo change will have the same impact than pretending AGW.
Finally, the most important thing is to stop fossile energy and support sustainable projets, not because CO2, but only because pollution and other aspects.
stop arguing, now it's time to do something !
if you want to reduce CO2 , rebuild the forest.

Of course the time period is relevant but the AGW True Believers don't understand that.

Wake wrote:
They have been using ice core research because it plays into their hand. There is another way of measuring historic levels of CO2 and it isn't being used because it demonstrates entirely different results.
CO2 has almost NO effect on warming for a very simple reason - CO2 absorbs radiation in a very narrow set of bandwidths.

Wake wrote:
Four to be exact.

Wake wrote:
And H20 covers three of those.

Wake wrote:
The fourth band has the problem that there is almost no energy in it.

Wake wrote:
So any levels above about 250 ppm or so have already absorbed all the available energy and there simply is no further effect on the climate.

Wake wrote:
So any higher levels of CO2 act as coolants because CO2 has a higher specific heat capacity than other common atmospheric gases

Wake wrote:
hence not radiating as early as other gases

Wake wrote:
as it absorbs heat via conduction.

Wake wrote:
What does larger amounts of CO2 do? It increases plant growth dramatically. And since 70% of the Earth is covered in water, Plankton and Algae are most strongly effected. Because of this the sea life is returning to pre-industrial era fishing. There are now more blue whales just in the Pacific Coast pods than were thought to exist in the world.

Wake wrote:
Everything an increase in CO2 has done has been positive.

Wake wrote:
Only those who have to have something to hate disagree.

litesong wrote:

Into the Night wrote:

hubble wrote:if you want to reduce CO2 , rebuild the forest.

Places like Weyerhaeuser and Georgia-Pacific are doing just that. They need the trees for the products they produce.They are farmers.

Logging companies didn't replant forests.

litesong wrote:
Neither did the city, county, state or Federal gov'ts.

litesong wrote:
Gifford Pinchot brought the forest conservation techniques developed in the colleges of europe. He hammered his way into the U.S. gov't, developing enough power to lead, teach, cojole, & beg U.S. & private forestries to implement such practices.
Without Gifford Pinchot, the United States would have been a score or two years late(too late?) to good forest management.

Into the Night wrote:


Rhetoric is NOT science.///Agreed. Rhetoric is the process of presenting arguments. You seem to think it means something else.
?

Tim the plumber wrote:
What had the surrender of Japan to do with anything?

Into the Night wrote:

Wake wrote:

hubble wrote:
Keeling curve is just a joke:
first, 50 years of measurements are not relevant to propose any serious climate model , the temperature curve doesn't even follow this curve, although IPCC ( not a scientific organisation ) based the AGW on correlation between CO2 and temperature.
second, the CO2 from ice cores cannot be taken in consideration as the air bubbles still in contact with atmosphere for hundreds years .
third, for last 2 millions of years we are considered to be in cold time as before we couldn't find any piece of ice in northern hemisphere, so before humans could make fire !
The temperature difference is about +-10 degrees C between cold and hot periods, comparing to last century +- 0.5 °C
Fourth, CO2 has not linear effect on warming , doubling CO2 will not add the same temperature difference and still has only 10% part of global warming.
Fifth, the oceans contain much more CO2 than atmosphere and much more energy , so the understanding of global warming should start with ocean currents analysis.
Climate science is about energy balance and clouds albedo should be part of the equation ! 1% of albedo change will have the same impact than pretending AGW.
Finally, the most important thing is to stop fossile energy and support sustainable projets, not because CO2, but only because pollution and other aspects.
stop arguing, now it's time to do something !
if you want to reduce CO2 , rebuild the forest.

Of course the time period is relevant but the AGW True Believers don't understand that.

It is also undefined. Something else the Church of Global Warming can't seem to get their head wrapped around.

Wake wrote:
They have been using ice core research because it plays into their hand. There is another way of measuring historic levels of CO2 and it isn't being used because it demonstrates entirely different results.
CO2 has almost NO effect on warming for a very simple reason - CO2 absorbs radiation in a very narrow set of bandwidths.

CO2 has many bands of absorption. Most are outside the infrared spectrum.

Wake wrote:
Four to be exact.

For the infrared portion, true.

Wake wrote:
And H20 covers three of those.

It covers one of them. Water also has a many more absorption bands.

Wake wrote:
The fourth band has the problem that there is almost no energy in it.

Energy is energy. Are you saying infrared light has no energy?

Wake wrote:
So any levels above about 250 ppm or so have already absorbed all the available energy and there simply is no further effect on the climate.

Adding more CO2 adds more absorption in the bands of CO2.

The affect of CO2 (or water) absorption for infrared frequencies is the material becomes warmer.

Due to the nature of the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere, that thermal energy is easily dispersed into the surrounding atmosphere.

The same thing occurs with water, even though it has a higher concentration in the atmosphere.

Wake wrote:
So any higher levels of CO2 act as coolants because CO2 has a higher specific heat capacity than other common atmospheric gases

CO2 does NOT have a higher specific heat. It is about the same as any other gas in the atmosphere.

Wake wrote:
hence not radiating as early as other gases

ALL materials above absolute zero radiate. It is neither first or last. It is simply radiating like everything else does.

Wake wrote:
as it absorbs heat via conduction.

CO2 absorbs thermal energy by conduction, convection, and absorption; just like any other gas in the atmosphere.

Wake wrote:
What does larger amounts of CO2 do? It increases plant growth dramatically. And since 70% of the Earth is covered in water, Plankton and Algae are most strongly effected. Because of this the sea life is returning to pre-industrial era fishing. There are now more blue whales just in the Pacific Coast pods than were thought to exist in the world.

We don't know how many blue whales there are in the world. Blue whales are not hunted anymore by most of the world. Good old Big Oil saved the whales.

Wake wrote:
Everything an increase in CO2 has done has been positive.

Indeed, we couldn't survive without the stuff.

Wake wrote:
Only those who have to have something to hate disagree.

This point is usually countered by the Church of Global Warming by bringing up the toxic effects of concentrated CO2...basically the fallacy of building a strawman by taking an argument to extremes.

StarMan wrote:

Into the Night wrote:


Rhetoric is NOT science.///Agreed. Rhetoric is the process of presenting arguments. You seem to think it means something else.
?

No, rhetoric is NOT "the process of presenting arguments."
Rhetoric is the process of playing word games.

I have no more time to listen to your nonsense.

Wake wrote:

Into the Night wrote:

Wake wrote:

hubble wrote:
Keeling curve is just a joke:
first, 50 years of measurements are not relevant to propose any serious climate model , the temperature curve doesn't even follow this curve, although IPCC ( not a scientific organisation ) based the AGW on correlation between CO2 and temperature.
second, the CO2 from ice cores cannot be taken in consideration as the air bubbles still in contact with atmosphere for hundreds years .
third, for last 2 millions of years we are considered to be in cold time as before we couldn't find any piece of ice in northern hemisphere, so before humans could make fire !
The temperature difference is about +-10 degrees C between cold and hot periods, comparing to last century +- 0.5 °C
Fourth, CO2 has not linear effect on warming , doubling CO2 will not add the same temperature difference and still has only 10% part of global warming.
Fifth, the oceans contain much more CO2 than atmosphere and much more energy , so the understanding of global warming should start with ocean currents analysis.
Climate science is about energy balance and clouds albedo should be part of the equation ! 1% of albedo change will have the same impact than pretending AGW.
Finally, the most important thing is to stop fossile energy and support sustainable projets, not because CO2, but only because pollution and other aspects.
stop arguing, now it's time to do something !
if you want to reduce CO2 , rebuild the forest.

Of course the time period is relevant but the AGW True Believers don't understand that.

It is also undefined. Something else the Church of Global Warming can't seem to get their head wrapped around.

Wake wrote:
They have been using ice core research because it plays into their hand. There is another way of measuring historic levels of CO2 and it isn't being used because it demonstrates entirely different results.
CO2 has almost NO effect on warming for a very simple reason - CO2 absorbs radiation in a very narrow set of bandwidths.

CO2 has many bands of absorption. Most are outside the infrared spectrum.

Wake wrote:
Four to be exact.

For the infrared portion, true.

Wake wrote:
And H20 covers three of those.

It covers one of them. Water also has a many more absorption bands.

Wake wrote:
The fourth band has the problem that there is almost no energy in it.

Energy is energy. Are you saying infrared light has no energy?

Wake wrote:
So any levels above about 250 ppm or so have already absorbed all the available energy and there simply is no further effect on the climate.

Adding more CO2 adds more absorption in the bands of CO2.

The affect of CO2 (or water) absorption for infrared frequencies is the material becomes warmer.

Due to the nature of the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere, that thermal energy is easily dispersed into the surrounding atmosphere.

The same thing occurs with water, even though it has a higher concentration in the atmosphere.

Wake wrote:
So any higher levels of CO2 act as coolants because CO2 has a higher specific heat capacity than other common atmospheric gases

CO2 does NOT have a higher specific heat. It is about the same as any other gas in the atmosphere.

Wake wrote:
hence not radiating as early as other gases

ALL materials above absolute zero radiate. It is neither first or last. It is simply radiating like everything else does.

Wake wrote:
as it absorbs heat via conduction.

CO2 absorbs thermal energy by conduction, convection, and absorption; just like any other gas in the atmosphere.

Wake wrote:
What does larger amounts of CO2 do? It increases plant growth dramatically. And since 70% of the Earth is covered in water, Plankton and Algae are most strongly effected. Because of this the sea life is returning to pre-industrial era fishing. There are now more blue whales just in the Pacific Coast pods than were thought to exist in the world.

We don't know how many blue whales there are in the world. Blue whales are not hunted anymore by most of the world. Good old Big Oil saved the whales.

Wake wrote:
Everything an increase in CO2 has done has been positive.

Indeed, we couldn't survive without the stuff.

Wake wrote:
Only those who have to have something to hate disagree.

This point is usually countered by the Church of Global Warming by bringing up the toxic effects of concentrated CO2...basically the fallacy of building a strawman by taking an argument to extremes.

Then by all means I'm sure you wouldn't mind telling us the absorption bands of CO2 that are not in the IR.

StarMan wrote:
Clear nights are cold nights, as water vapor clouds absorb vast quantities of heat and retain it. The carbon dioxide concentrations are the same whether the night is clear or cloudy. The temperature differs dramatically.

StarMan wrote:
rhetoric - noun. language designed to have a persuasive or impressive effect on its audience, but often regarded as lacking in sincerity or meaningful content.
"all we have from the opposition is empty rhetoric"
synonyms: bombast, turgidity, grandiloquence, magniloquence, pomposity, extravagant language, purple prose;

Into the Night wrote:

StarMan wrote:
Clear nights are cold nights, as water vapor clouds absorb vast quantities of heat and retain it. The carbon dioxide concentrations are the same whether the night is clear or cloudy. The temperature differs dramatically.

Quite true.

Surface Detail wrote:

Into the Night wrote:

StarMan wrote:
Clear nights are cold nights, as water vapor clouds absorb vast quantities of heat and retain it. The carbon dioxide concentrations are the same whether the night is clear or cloudy. The temperature differs dramatically.

Quite true.

Nope, quite false. Clouds consist of liquid water droplets, not water vapour.

Surface Detail wrote:
Clear night are cold nights because most of the IR radiated by the ground goes straight into space; cloudy nights are warmer because that IR is instead absorbed by the water droplets, which are thus warmed and radiate IR, some of which travels back down to the ground.

Into the Night wrote:

Surface Detail wrote:

Into the Night wrote:

StarMan wrote:
Clear nights are cold nights, as water vapor clouds absorb vast quantities of heat and retain it. The carbon dioxide concentrations are the same whether the night is clear or cloudy. The temperature differs dramatically.

Quite true.

Nope, quite false. Clouds consist of liquid water droplets, not water vapour.

Good catch here. You are correct.

Surface Detail wrote:
Clear night are cold nights because most of the IR radiated by the ground goes straight into space; cloudy nights are warmer because that IR is instead absorbed by the water droplets, which are thus warmed and radiate IR, some of which travels back down to the ground.

This part is wrong. You cannot heat the ground with something that is colder.

Surface Detail wrote:

Into the Night wrote:

Surface Detail wrote:

Into the Night wrote:

StarMan wrote:
Clear nights are cold nights, as water vapor clouds absorb vast quantities of heat and retain it. The carbon dioxide concentrations are the same whether the night is clear or cloudy. The temperature differs dramatically.

Quite true.

Nope, quite false. Clouds consist of liquid water droplets, not water vapour.

Good catch here. You are correct.

Surface Detail wrote:
Clear night are cold nights because most of the IR radiated by the ground goes straight into space; cloudy nights are warmer because that IR is instead absorbed by the water droplets, which are thus warmed and radiate IR, some of which travels back down to the ground.

This part is wrong. You cannot heat the ground with something that is colder.

The clouds don't heat the ground, they just stop it cooling so fast by radiating IR towards it. This reduces the net rate of heat loss by the ground.

Into the Night wrote:

Surface Detail wrote:

Into the Night wrote:

Surface Detail wrote:

Into the Night wrote:

StarMan wrote:
Clear nights are cold nights, as water vapor clouds absorb vast quantities of heat and retain it. The carbon dioxide concentrations are the same whether the night is clear or cloudy. The temperature differs dramatically.

Quite true.

Nope, quite false. Clouds consist of liquid water droplets, not water vapour.

Good catch here. You are correct.

Surface Detail wrote:
Clear night are cold nights because most of the IR radiated by the ground goes straight into space; cloudy nights are warmer because that IR is instead absorbed by the water droplets, which are thus warmed and radiate IR, some of which travels back down to the ground.

This part is wrong. You cannot heat the ground with something that is colder.

The clouds don't heat the ground, they just stop it cooling so fast by radiating IR towards it. This reduces the net rate of heat loss by the ground.

Only if they are already warmer. Liquid water has a high specific heat and a high heat conductivity. If a cloud is cold, it will actually cool the surface beneath it faster as it tries to heat the cloud.

Surface Detail wrote:

Into the Night wrote:

Surface Detail wrote:

Into the Night wrote:

Surface Detail wrote:

Into the Night wrote:

StarMan wrote:
Clear nights are cold nights, as water vapor clouds absorb vast quantities of heat and retain it. The carbon dioxide concentrations are the same whether the night is clear or cloudy. The temperature differs dramatically.

Quite true.

Nope, quite false. Clouds consist of liquid water droplets, not water vapour.

Good catch here. You are correct.

Surface Detail wrote:
Clear night are cold nights because most of the IR radiated by the ground goes straight into space; cloudy nights are warmer because that IR is instead absorbed by the water droplets, which are thus warmed and radiate IR, some of which travels back down to the ground.

This part is wrong. You cannot heat the ground with something that is colder.

The clouds don't heat the ground, they just stop it cooling so fast by radiating IR towards it. This reduces the net rate of heat loss by the ground.

Only if they are already warmer. Liquid water has a high specific heat and a high heat conductivity. If a cloud is cold, it will actually cool the surface beneath it faster as it tries to heat the cloud.

Are you seriously suggesting that clouds are warmer than the ground below them? Have you ever climbed a mountain?

Into the Night wrote:

Surface Detail wrote:

Into the Night wrote:

Surface Detail wrote:

Into the Night wrote:

Surface Detail wrote:

Into the Night wrote:

StarMan wrote:
Clear nights are cold nights, as water vapor clouds absorb vast quantities of heat and retain it. The carbon dioxide concentrations are the same whether the night is clear or cloudy. The temperature differs dramatically.

Quite true.

Nope, quite false. Clouds consist of liquid water droplets, not water vapour.

Good catch here. You are correct.

Surface Detail wrote:
Clear night are cold nights because most of the IR radiated by the ground goes straight into space; cloudy nights are warmer because that IR is instead absorbed by the water droplets, which are thus warmed and radiate IR, some of which travels back down to the ground.

This part is wrong. You cannot heat the ground with something that is colder.

The clouds don't heat the ground, they just stop it cooling so fast by radiating IR towards it. This reduces the net rate of heat loss by the ground.

Only if they are already warmer. Liquid water has a high specific heat and a high heat conductivity. If a cloud is cold, it will actually cool the surface beneath it faster as it tries to heat the cloud.

Are you seriously suggesting that clouds are warmer than the ground below them? Have you ever climbed a mountain?

Clouds can easily be warmer than the ground below them. I don't need to climb a mountain. I fly aircraft.

Surface Detail wrote:
Are you seriously suggesting that clouds are warmer than the ground below them? Have you ever climbed a mountain?

Surface Detail wrote:

Into the Night wrote:

Surface Detail wrote:

Into the Night wrote:

Surface Detail wrote:

Into the Night wrote:

Surface Detail wrote:

Into the Night wrote:

StarMan wrote:
Clear nights are cold nights, as water vapor clouds absorb vast quantities of heat and retain it. The carbon dioxide concentrations are the same whether the night is clear or cloudy. The temperature differs dramatically.

Quite true.

Nope, quite false. Clouds consist of liquid water droplets, not water vapour.

Good catch here. You are correct.

Surface Detail wrote:
Clear night are cold nights because most of the IR radiated by the ground goes straight into space; cloudy nights are warmer because that IR is instead absorbed by the water droplets, which are thus warmed and radiate IR, some of which travels back down to the ground.

This part is wrong. You cannot heat the ground with something that is colder.

The clouds don't heat the ground, they just stop it cooling so fast by radiating IR towards it. This reduces the net rate of heat loss by the ground.

Only if they are already warmer. Liquid water has a high specific heat and a high heat conductivity. If a cloud is cold, it will actually cool the surface beneath it faster as it tries to heat the cloud.

Are you seriously suggesting that clouds are warmer than the ground below them? Have you ever climbed a mountain?

Clouds can easily be warmer than the ground below them. I don't need to climb a mountain. I fly aircraft.

Sure you do. What are you rated for?

GasGuzzler wrote:

Surface Detail wrote:
Are you seriously suggesting that clouds are warmer than the ground below them? Have you ever climbed a mountain?

Most of the time no, but it happens....it's called a thermal inversion. Example would be a warm front pushing up and over a cold wedge. Very typical in a freezing rain event.

GasGuzzler wrote:

Surface Detail wrote:
Are you seriously suggesting that clouds are warmer than the ground below them? Have you ever climbed a mountain?

Most of the time no, but it happens....it's called a thermal inversion. Example would be a warm front pushing up and over a cold wedge. Very typical in a freezing rain event.

Into the Night wrote:

Surface Detail wrote:

Into the Night wrote:

Surface Detail wrote:

Into the Night wrote:

Surface Detail wrote:

Into the Night wrote:

Surface Detail wrote:

Into the Night wrote:

StarMan wrote:
Clear nights are cold nights, as water vapor clouds absorb vast quantities of heat and retain it. The carbon dioxide concentrations are the same whether the night is clear or cloudy. The temperature differs dramatically.

Quite true.

Nope, quite false. Clouds consist of liquid water droplets, not water vapour.

Good catch here. You are correct.

Surface Detail wrote:
Clear night are cold nights because most of the IR radiated by the ground goes straight into space; cloudy nights are warmer because that IR is instead absorbed by the water droplets, which are thus warmed and radiate IR, some of which travels back down to the ground.

This part is wrong. You cannot heat the ground with something that is colder.

The clouds don't heat the ground, they just stop it cooling so fast by radiating IR towards it. This reduces the net rate of heat loss by the ground.

Only if they are already warmer. Liquid water has a high specific heat and a high heat conductivity. If a cloud is cold, it will actually cool the surface beneath it faster as it tries to heat the cloud.

Are you seriously suggesting that clouds are warmer than the ground below them? Have you ever climbed a mountain?

Clouds can easily be warmer than the ground below them. I don't need to climb a mountain. I fly aircraft.

Sure you do. What are you rated for?

What diff does it make to you?

GasGuzzler wrote:

Surface Detail wrote:
Are you seriously suggesting that clouds are warmer than the ground below them? Have you ever climbed a mountain?

Most of the time no, but it happens....it's called a thermal inversion. Example would be a warm front pushing up and over a cold wedge. Very typical in a freezing rain event.