Much Ado About Nothing -- The Global Average Temperature Debate

The global warming priests have presented no evidence that the process they claim causes "global warming" exists.   They just illogically claim that any increase in what they call the "global average temperature"  can only result from carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.   
     
Paul  Homewood has   reported on questionable manipulation of temperature data used to calculate this global average temperature.   Anthony Watts has documented problems with temperature data for several years on his blog.   

The controversy over the accuracy of the data can be viewed as much ado about nothing because the so-called global average temperature  "is thermodynamically as well as mathematically an impossibility, says Bjarne Andresen, a professor at The Niels Bohr Institute, University of Copenhagen, who has analyzed this topic in collaboration with professors Christopher Essex from University of Western Ontario and Ross McKitrick from University of Guelph, Canada." 

"It is impossible to talk about a single temperature for something as complicated as the climate of Earth", Bjarne Andresen says,  an expert of thermodynamics. "A temperature can be defined only for a homogeneous system. Furthermore, the climate is not governed by a single temperature. Rather, differences of temperatures drive the processes and create the storms, sea currents, thunder, etc. which make up the climate".

"While it is possible to treat temperature statistically locally, it is meaningless to talk about a a global temperature for Earth. The Globe consists of a huge number of components which one cannot just add up and average."

Even if the concept of a global average temperature was meaningful, the method of determining it is too primitive to produce a valid average.  Instead of using hourly temperatures, they just use the high and low temperature which may not be representative of temperatures during the day.   For example, the arrival of a strong  cold front late in the day can make the low temperature significantly lower than temperatures during the rest of the day.  

Even social scientists have moved away from using broad averages because such averages cover up too much information.   For example, social scientists look at the number of people in various age groups instead of the average age.   The number of homes with children or with one adult or two adults is used rather than the average household size which always ends up with a fraction of a person.   In the last presidential election people talked about the 3% in one income group and the percentage that didn't pay any income tax instead of the per capita income. 

 A third problem with the climate shaman's obsession with temperatures is that although a temperature decrease would disprove the claim of global warming, a temperature increase would not prove that CO2 was responsible.   The global warming preachers routinely commit the logical fallacy   "post hoc ergo proper hoc".    I learned that basic logic concept in high school English class. The global warming fanatics either didn't learn about the fallacy or don't understand that the fact that A follows B doesn't necessarily mean A causes B.

With their simple minded view of the situation they blithely assume that any temperature increase could only be a result of an increase in CO2.   They seemingly cannot understand that they must provide evidence that an increase in CO2 would cause any temperature increase.  They ignore the fact that other factors are known to be able to increase air temperature.

The teracalories of heat human activity generates each day would be the most likely cause of any temperature increase that wasn't caused by an increase in the sun's output.    Each teracalorie is capable of  raising the temperature of a trillion grams of water by 1 Celsius.   A teracalorie would raise the temperature of about 4-5 trillion grams of dry air 1 C.

Except in desert and tropical areas, most of the time the human body has a higher temperature than the air.   Automobile engines and other human technology generate sufficient heat to boil water.   Many types of air conditioning systems remove heat from the interior of buildings and transfer it outside where it heats the outside air.   Some of the heat used to warm the interiors of buildings in cold weather leaks out and heats the outside air.
 

Global Warming Theory Disproved a Century Ago

The claim that carbon dioxide (CO2) can increase air temperatures by "trapping" infrared radiation (IR) ignores the fact that in 1909 physicist  R.W. Wood disproved  the popular 19th Century thesis that  greenhouses stayed warm by trapping IR.   Unfortunately,  many  people who claim  to be scientists are unaware of Wood's experiment which was originally published in the Philosophical magazine , 1909, vol 17, p319-320.

Philosophical Magazine might not sound like the name of a science publication, but a century ago leading scientists published their discoveries in it.

During the early 19th Century many physicists  supported  the theory  postulated by Benjamin Franklin  that heat involved some type of fluid. The theory became known as "caloric theory".  Joseph Jean Baptiste Fourier's theory that the atmosphere was heated from infrared radiation from  the ground was a variation of caloric theory with IR functioning as the "fluid".  Fourier believed greenhouses were heated by trapping this radiation.

Physicists in the early 19th Century were attempting to develop theories to explain the nature of atoms and their properties such as heat.  Physicists theorized that atoms were the smallest particles of matter. 

By the end of the century a new theory of heat, called "kinetic theory",  was being developed that suggested heat was the motion, or kinetic energy, of atoms.  However,  Fourier's theory that IR heated the atmosphere particularly by interacting with carbon dioxide and water vapor continued to have support.

In 1897 J.J. Thompson overturned the popular theory of the atoms being the smallest particles of matter by reporting his discovery of the electron and predicting two other types of charged particles he called protons and neutrons.              

Wood  was an expert on IR.  His accomplishments included inventing both IR and UV (ultraviolet) photography.  In 1909 he decided to test Fourier's theory about how greenhouses retained heat.

Wood constructed two identical small greenhouses.   The  description  implies the type of structure a gardener would refer to as a "cold frame" rather than a building a person could walk into. 

He lined  the interior with black cardboard which would absorb radiation and convert it to heat which would heat the air through conduction.  The cardboard would also produce   radiation.   He covered one greenhouse with a sheet of transparent rock salt and the other with a sheet of glass.  The glass would block IR and the rock salt would allow it to pass.  

During the first run of the experiment the rock salt greenhouse heated faster due to IR from the sun entering it but not the glass greenhouse.  He then  set up another pane of glass to filter the  IR from the sun before  the light reached the greenhouses. 

The result from this run was that the greenhouses both heated to about 50 C with less than a degree difference between the two.  Wood didn't indicate which was warmer or whether there was any difference in the thermal conductivity between the glass sheet and the rock salt.  A slight difference in the amount of heat transfered through the sheets by conduction could explain such a minor difference in temperature.   The two sheets probably didn't conduct heat at the same rate.

The experiment conclusively demonstrates that greenhouses heat up and stay warm by confining heated air rather than by trapping IR.  If trapping IR in an enclosed space doesn't cause   higher air temperature than CO2 in the atmosphere cannot cause higher air temperatures.

The heated air in the greenhouses couldn't rise higher than the sheets that covered the tops of the greenhouses.  Heated air  outside  is free to rise allowing colder air to  fall to the ground. 

Atmospheric CO2 is even less likely to function as a barrier to IR or reflect it back to reheat the ground or water than the sheet of glass  in  Wood's greenhouse.

The blackened cardboard in Wood's greenhouses was a very good radiator of IR as is typical of black substances.  The water that covers 70% of earth's surface is a very poor radiator and produces only limited amounts of IR as is typical of transparent substances.     Water releases heat through evaporation rather than radiation.   

The glass sheet provided a solid barrier to IR.  Atmospheric CO2 is widely dispersed comprising less than 400 parts per million in the atmosphere.  Trapping IR with CO2  would be like trying to confine mice with a chain link fence.

Glass reflects a wider spectrum of IR than interacts with CO2.  The glass sheets reflected IR back toward the floor of the greenhouse.  CO2 doesn't reflect IR.

At the time of Wood's experiment, it was believed that CO2 and other gas molecules became hotter after absorbing IR.  

Four years later Niels Bohr reported his discovery that the absorption of specific wavelengths of light didn't cause gas atoms/molecules to become hotter.  Instead, the absorption of specific wavelengths of light caused the electrons in an atom/molecule to move to a higher energy state.  After absorption of light of a specific wavelength an atom couldn't absorb additional radiation of that wavelength without first emitting light of that wavelength.  He called the amount of energy absorbed and emitted as a "quantum".   (Philosophical Magazine Series 6, Volume 26  July 1913, p. 1-25)

Unlike  the glass which reflects IR back where it comes from, CO2 molecules emit IR up and sideways as well as down.    In the time interval  between absorbing and reemitting radiation, CO2 molecules allow IR to pass them by.  Glass continuously reflects IR.

Those who claim that CO2 molecules in the atmosphere can cause heating by trapping IR have yet to provide any empirical scientific evidence  to  prove  such a physical process  exists.  The experiment by R.W. Wood  demonstrates that  even  a highly reflective covering that reflects a broad spectrum of IR cannot  cause heating by trapping IR in a confined space.    There is no way  CO2, which  at best  only affects  a small portion of the IR produced by earth's surface, can heat the atmosphere by trapping IR.

Contrary to the lie repeated in news stories about climate, science doesn't say that CO2 is causing higher temperatures by trapping IR.  Empirical science indicates that  no such process exists in this physical universe.
 

Enron's Global Warming Scam Lives on

Remember Enron, the corrupt firm whose failure should have disproved the myth "too big to fail", but didn't?  At the time it was the seventh largest corporation.  It's bankruptcy was the largest in history  until Lehman Brothers failed.  Incidentally, Lehman Brothers was also involved  in carbon trading.

Enron owed part of its early success to emissions trading.       Basically emissions trading was established as a way for some companies to profit from pollution while allowing some companies to continue to produce the chemicals that can cause acid rain.

Lawrence Solomon, executive director of   Energy Probe  has reported that Enron played a major role in pushing  the global warming scam, including establishing the Kyoto Protocals.   

Enron had already profited from trading sulfur dioxide credits and saw the  potential for even greater profits from trading what would become known as "carbon credits".

The article is the first in a series of articles about those who seek to profit from what Weather  Channel founder John Coleman calls "the greatest scam in history." 

[NOTE:  Physicist R.W. Wood disproved the greenhouses gas theory in 1909.]

Solomon states,  " The climate-change industry — the scientists, lawyers, consultants, lobbyists and, most importantly, the multinationals that work behind the scenes to cash in on the riches at stake — has emerged as the world’s largest industry. Virtually every resident in the developed world feels the bite of this industry..."  which increases the costs of various goods and services.

Enron was an early player  beginning early in the  administration of Bill Clinton to push for a carbon dioxide trading system.   Enron also sought support from environmental groups.
"Between 1994 and 1996, the Enron Foundation donated $1-million to the Nature Conservancy and its Climate Change Project, a leading force for global warming reform, while [Chairman Kenneth] Lay and other individuals associated with Enron donated $1.5-million to environmental groups seeking international controls on carbon dioxide."

According to Solomon, "Political contributions and Enron-funded analyses flowed freely, all geared to demonstrating a looming global catastrophe if carbon dioxide emissions weren’t curbed. An Enron-funded study that dismissed the notion that calamity could come of global warming, meanwhile, was quietly buried."

 Enron advised  the Clinton administration what to do at the Kyoto Japan Conference in 1997. 

To improve its chances for success Enron hired former Environmental Protection Agency regulator John Palmisano to become the company's lead lobbyist as senior director for Environmental Policy and Compliance.  Palismano wrote a memo describing the historic corporate achievement that was Kyoto.

“If implemented this agreement will do more to promote Enron’s business than will almost any other regulatory initiative outside of restructuring of the energy and natural-gas industries in Europe and the United States,” Polisano began. “The potential to add incremental gas sales, and additional demand for renewable technology is enormous.”

The memo, entitled “Implications of the Climate Change Agreement in Kyoto & What Transpired,” summarized the achievements that Enron had accomplished. “I do not think it is possible to overestimate the importance of this year in shaping every aspect of this agreement,” he wrote.  He cited  three issues of specific importance to Enron in the climate-change debate:  the rules governing emissions trading, the rules governing transfers of emission reduction rights between countries, and the rules governing a gargantuan clean energy fund.

Polisano’s memo expressed satisfaction bordering on amazement at Enron’s successes. The rules governing transfers of emission rights “is exactly what I have been lobbying for and it seems like we won. The clean development fund will be a mechanism for funding renewable projects. Again we won .... The endorsement of emissions trading was another victory for us.”

“Enron now has excellent credentials with many ‘green’ interests including Greenpeace, WWF [World Wildlife Fund], NRDC [Natural Resources Defense Council], German Watch, the U.S. Climate Action Network, the European Climate Action Network, Ozone Action, WRI [World Resources Institute] and Worldwatch. This position should be increasingly cultivated and capitalized on (monetized),” Polisano explained.

Those who believe in Global Warming like to claim that they are opposed by corporate interests in the form of the energy companies.  They neglect to mention that the battle isn't against corporations, it is between different groups of corporations.  The energy companies are attempting to continue providing energy to consumers.  Companies on the other side are merely attempting to create a financial opportunity for themselves as financial parasites who provide nothing to anyone and get rich in return.

Democrats often criticize Republicans for being too close to business.  Democrats are just as close to business. They simply favor different businesses. 

As  William O'Keefe, chief executive officer of the Marshall Institute, puts it:  "The American people have had enough of convoluted, indecipherable financial schemes and the opportunists who exploit them. The public is understandably angry about Wall Street's exploitation of Main Street, and yet our political leaders are setting the stage for another complex trading market, ripe for corruption. The future Enrons and Bernie Madoffs of the world would like nothing better than to see the U.S. impose a new market for carbon emission trading