A Null Hypothesis for CO₂

Abstract

Energy transfer at the Earth's surface is examined from first principles. The effects on surface temperature of small changes in the solar constant caused by the sunspot cycle and small increases in downward long wave infrared (LWIR) flux due to a 100 ppm increase in atmospheric CO 2 concentration are considered in detail. The changes in the solar constant are sufficient to change ocean temperatures and alter the Earth's climate. The surface temperature changes produced by an increase in downward LWIR flux are too small to be measured and cannot cause climate change. The assumptions underlying the use of radiative forcing in climate models are shown to be invalid. A null hypothesis for CO 2 is proposed that it is impossible to show that changes in CO 2 concentration have caused any climate change, at least since the current composition of the atmosphere was set by ocean photosynthesis about one billion years ago.

A Dynamic, Coupled Thermal Reservoir Approach to Atmospheric Energy Transfer Part I: Concepts

“…The observed 100 ppm increase in atmospheric CO 2 concentration has produced an increase in the downward atmospheric LWIR flux at the surface of approximately 1.5 W m -2 . [14] This is too small to have any measureable effect on surface temperatures when it is added to the net LWIR flux term and used to calculate the total flux balance. This follows from Eqn.…”

“…The detailed description of the high resolution atmospheric radiative transfer calculations is complex and only a brief overview and summary of the pertinent results will be presented here. The results are derived from high resolution radiative transfer calculations using a spectral resolution of 0.01 cm -1 and an altitude resolution of 100 m. Further details are given in [14]. Within the atmospheric absorption bands, LWIR radiation is absorbed and emitted.…”

“…The spectrally resolved absorption vs. altitude for a surface/air temperature of 325/295 K at 50% relative humidity is shown in Figure 5. For this case, 75% of the surface flux is absorbed within the first 100 m. Further details are given in references [13] and [14]. The upper limit to the local LWIR flux for a specific molecular line is the blackbody emission at the local air temperature within the same spectral range as the line.…”

“…[10][11][12] Below this, within the first 100 m depth, ocean temperatures are determined by the balance between solar heating and the downward diffusion of cooler water from the surface. [13,14] The interaction of the wind speed with the ocean thermal reservoir induces long term thermal fluctuations in the ocean surface temperatures that produce characteristic quasi-periodic ocean thermal oscillations including the El Nino Southern Oscillation (ENSO), the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) and the Atlantic Multi-decadal Oscillation (AMO). [15][16][17] Long term climate change is caused by small variations in the solar flux that accumulate in the oceans.…”

“…This work is the continuation of research described in a previous paper 'A Null Hypothesis for CO 2 ' that was published as part of the 2010 E&E Special Issue 'Paradigms in Climate Research'. [14,24] The conclusion to this earlier paper was that 'It is impossible to show that changes in CO 2 concentration have caused any change to the Earth's climate, at least since the current composition of the atmosphere was set by ocean photosynthesis about one billion years ago'. This was based on the results of a combination of thermal reservoir modeling of land and ocean heating and a high resolution radiative transfer analysis of the atmospheric cooling flux that included molecular line narrowing effects.…”