Carl's Climate Letters

Carl’s theory of precipitable water’s (PW’s) greenhouse effects provides detailed explanations that are useful for showing how these effects have an impact on surface temperatures. The phenomenon known as “Arctic amplification” is probably the most prominent of all impacts that can be explained in considerable detail by the theory. I don’t think there is anything in the science literature that matches it from the standpoint of describing a source of ordinary heat energy involved in the high level of warming. Under my theory, the main source of energy is nothing other than an extra supply of plain old radiative forcing, the same as that produced in all places by everyday greenhouse effects. PW is the one thing that is capable of generating the necessary amount of forcing, once given the opportunity. My theory describes how such an opportunity has been created by the upper-level wind system, and is actually being exploited by concentrated streams of PW at this very time as those streams move northward.\.

Why do I think science is unaware of this activity?  Only from reading various things that should be mentioning it if any kind of recognition were in place.  Today I will give you a perfect example of what I mean, using a newly issued study written by three professors who work for leading universities and are well-versed on the subject.  Their new work is entitled, Arctic amplification of climate change: a review of underlying mechanisms.  It has open access and is ready for reading at this link: https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/ac1c29#back-to-top-target.  I suggest that you should check out the Abstract, then click on “5. Summary and outlook,” where you need to pay particular attention to conclusion “(a)  AA is a robust response to climate forcing.”  It closes with these two sentences: “The fact that AA occurs in response to these very different climate forcings suggests that the characteristics of the forcing (e.g. spatial pattern, longwave or shortwave) cannot be of primary importance. Instead, AA must fundamentally owe its existence to feedbacks and other mechanisms that—at least to first order—are insensitive to the precise details of the forcing.” 

That’s a pretty clear statement. So, what were the authors reviewing, that gave rise to it? You need to open the References, and scroll down through them. I started to make a count, and gave up, as there must be over 200. It’s a very popular subject for researchers to ponder over, including a number of the biggest names in climate science.

Carl’s theory agrees with everyone on one thing, that increases in the evaporation rate, the original causation of increases in total PW, are created as a feedback to increases in the atmospheric content of CO2—except for one difference. I can’t attribute the increases to CO2 by itself, important as this gas may be. I think evaporation increases as a result of everything that helps make the planet’s surface waters grow warmer.  The list is long, headed by every well-mixed greenhouse gas, all of which serve as primary generators of longwave greenhouse energy, acting in concert.  The feedbacks that result from their increased production then add elements of warmth to the surface through an assortment of activities that are typically not of the greenhouse energy type.  Water vapor is the one major exception (although methane is often treated as an important feedback exceeding its role as a primary producer that humans have only partial control over).  Water vapor is regarded as strictly a feedback, in no way under direct human control, except by actions that initially get rid of whatever causes it to grow as a feedback. (Again, my view on that last point, about the identity of “whatever,” is not openly shared by scientists.)

Carl’s theory has one more unique deviation which could prove to be crucial is some circumstances. My observations of activity taking place in the upper atmosphere fail to detect any kind of influence that could be attributed to the Clausius-Clapeyron equation. Moreover, the principles behind the equation are much easier for me to grasp when applied to condensation activity near the surface, compared with the more limited opportunities for condensation in the generally cold reaches of the thinned-out atmosphere higher up. If there are actually no such rules in effect at that level, which would need to be confirmed by more extensive observations, a widely accepted constraint on PW’s energy output would no longer be justified. A completely independent variety of PW ends up with a big role in my Arctic amplification theory, controlled only by jetstream winds that have fading strength in the NH.

Carl

There is an interesting development in the Antarctic region today that I think should be recorded. It involves a concentrated stream of precipitable water (PW) that looks and behaves exactly like those we see entering the high-altitude wind system, except that it turns out to be not one of them. Here is a picture of the stream, specifically the one that emerges from northeastern Australia in the form of a spike. You can follow its path around New Zealand and over the sea ice, finally ending before it reaches the Antarctic continent, while constantly decaying as it proceeds: 

This stream could not possibly have its existence within the upper level wind system because its poleward movement would then be blocked by a strong jetstream wind instead of passing under it. The jet wind is plainly visible in this image:

What got me interested in the first place is that I happened to notice a peculiar break in the sea level air pressure map, something I have been paying more attention to lately, and wondered whether it had any special effects.  Well yes, the PW stream appears to be using the gap as a clear and well-defined passageway—probably available within a higher part of the low-level wind system.

This meant opening the low-level Wind Speed map (also not a regular habit) and sure enough, there is a pretty good breeze that can be tracked without interruption along the very same course where we see the PW stream. Here and there the wind gains speed, before finally coming to an abrupt end over an area of sea ice, where it curls around and veers off mainly toward the east:

What is the altitude of this wind? I can’t say for sure, but it has to be high enough to enable a constant outpouring of first rain and then snow over its entire course, as you can see on this next map. The map also provides a clear indication of exactly where it comes to a halt, well short of the continent:

This stream obviously carries a heavy load of PW at all times, as we saw on the first map and again on the most recent one. Everything about it, except for altitude, matches up in many ways with the PW streams we analyze more often as they move through the upper wind system. With nothing in the way to block this one’s movement, I think it could possibly have merged into a low-lying jet wind shortly before coming to such an abrupt halt. That’s only a guess. We don’t need to guess about whether so much concentrated PW had an effect of surface temperatures as it passed overhead—we’ll just see what the anomaly map has to say:

There is evidence of warming over the entire course, except for the stretch that showed heavy snowfall over open water.  Of further interest, the strongest anomaly we see, a bit more than +6C in a spot over the ice, is not far from a cold spot that reads minus-18 or less, also over ice and at the same latitude.  The first has a PW value of not less than 8kg, the latter no more than 2kg—a difference of better than twice doubled, well in line with the Carl’s theory rule of 10C per double.  Temperatures over Antarctica’s sea ice remain generally much colder than they were on average for this time of year thirty years ago, which accounts for today’s average reading of only -3.5C for Antarctica as a whole.  That by itself is enough to penalize the full SH number, and even has a possibly significant effect on the average for the globe as a whole!

Carl

Carl’s theory came into being for one basic reason—because of my peculiar fascination with Today’s Weather Maps and the fact that I kept seeing close relationships between imagery details of one kind on one map and those of a different kind on a different map. Every such coincidence needed an explanation and I always felt the challenge to either uncover the real explanation or come up with a theory that might do the job, if it could be verified. There were quite a number of different relationships to be looked at and thought about, each of which was assigned with an explanation that may or may prove to be true. The next realization was that some of these independent explanations appeared to themselves have a relationship of a coincidental nature that was close enough to require a whole new level of explanation. That’s where things really got complicated. and also more challenging, and more “fun” to think about even if the result was not always to one’s personal liking. It all ended up in a kind of porridge of many parts that I call Carl’s theory.

Anyway, I still keep looking for new relationships in the imagery, and am happy to announce that I just found one. It even comes with an explanation that looks quite convincing to me. The only hitch is that now I have to make an adjustment to a previous explanation. Luckily it happens to be one that I have always felt contained a good deal of truth but probably not quite the whole story. It all has to do with how the visible components of high-altitude air pressure configuration take their shape on the map. Are the details all transmitted from differences in surface air temperature, which was the only conspicuous option I was aware of, or is there something else? Well, there is something else; it goes hand in hand with temperature differences, and is probably about equal in effectiveness. The key imagery involved is found on the Sea Level Pressure map.  This has been a map full of imagery that I could not relate to the imagery on any of the other maps in a meaningful way, and as a consequence have rarely reproduced it in these letters or used it as part of any explanation of the theory.  (Mostly I just wondered about how sea level pressure could be measured and reported from locations where great land masses stood in the way.) 

Now let me show you three maps that tell me it’s time to adopt a new understanding of how the high-altitude air pressure configuration imagery is established. The first is today’s configuration map (500hPa Geopot. Height), which is practically identical to the one in yesterday’s letter. I have always maintained that its blue zone imagery for the most part reflected regions of below freezing temperatures on the surface below, due to thermal contraction, thus reducing both spatial volume and upward push of any pressure coming from the air masses near the surface.

This map of today’s air temperatures at the surface, coded in dark blue plus a dab of magenta, should therefore be reflected on the other map as the heart of a solid nice-sized blue zone, right?  We just don’t see anything of the sort on the map above.

The reason the blue zone is not there might be attributed to a feature gleaned from this next map, showing a broad stretch of higher than average air pressure covering every bit of the area where we observe the freezing temperatures. There is no way to escape this as a fact. We just need a good explanation for whatever connection may be involved.

The explanation I have in mind is still preliminary, so I will only say what I can today to get started. I think of air pressure, in absolute terms, as being determined by measuring the total weight of all the molecules within a specified column of air from the level of measurement to the top of the atmosphere. If you add more molecules to the column the pressure will be higher, etc. Next, we can imagine a floating “surface” surrounding the entire globe, several miles above sea level, where the molecular weight of the air above is always the same, and thus also its gravitational pressure. We can see this by dividing the entire high atmosphere into vertical columns that all have the same exact number of molecules above a cutoff point that establishes the imaginary surface. The zone of atmosphere below this surface will also be divided into vertical columns, always set up as extensions of the ones already established above. These lower column parts will all have different numbers of molecules, because of differences in things like density and topographical elevation. They will also contain air of greatly differing temperatures, depending on their global surface location. These two factors will both have a bearing on the elevation of the point that divides the upper part of the vertical column from the lower. Collectively, when these points of elevation create the surface we have imagined, the inevitable result will be a continuum of dips and bulges in that surface. (To be continued.)

Carl

Yesterday we looked at the stark differences in 30-year temperature anomalies between the NH and SH, and drew a few possible conclusions respecting causation. It’s a really fascinating subject because of all the future implications. Today I will add some more visual material that can be further reviewed as the seasons switch over the next six months. We’ll start with a picture of the current high-altitude air pressure configuration in the north, which you can compare with the one in yesterday’s letter. Yes, the three little blue zones will consolidate into one, and create a renewed jetstream wind pathway of reasonable strength, but how will it compare with the one we now see in the south? How much the latter weakens in the coming summer will be just as interesting.

Now we’ll turn to one of the most critical differences between the two hemispheres, the sea surface temperature anomalies that have developed over the past thirty years. I’d say that, overall, they are more extreme than the air temperature anomalies, signifying extreme differences in causation. Anyway, whatever is causing Antarctica’s ice shelves to be melting on their undersides is not leaving leaving much of a signature on the surface water, but the same cannot be said for the outflow of ice-cold meltwater that is most likely the result.

Next, a detailed look at the pattern of air temperature anomalies in the south. The most extreme cold ones, which reach close to -20C in spots, do not appear over the elevated and extremely cold continental land mass, nor anywhere over open water. Instead, while hugging the shoreline, this very cold air is largely perched on top of sea ice, thus right at sea level. You can refer back to the map just above to see how snugly the borders fit:

The next map shows that actual below-freezing temperatures for the whole region extend a little way farther out than sea ice, but not much.  The sea water soon reaches +3 to 5C, as does the air above it.  The question is, why does so much of this surface air drop all the way down to -30C by the time it reaches the shoreline?  The anomaly (up to -20C) is telling us that thirty years ago, on an average day at this time of year, air temperatures of similar location were dropping to only about -10C.  I think the much bigger drop we see in today’s chart is fairly regular, not just a one-day extreme.  Why so?

The best answer I can come up with is found on the Precipitable Water (PW) map. Concentrated streams are getting close, but just cannot do much penetrating of the jetstream wind wall that is set up around the blue zone, as detailed in yesterday’s letter.  So instead of getting PW readings of 10kg and more, which the streams are carrying, all we see on the “inside” parts of the sea ice are readings that range from below-1kg to +1 or a little bit more—leaving plenty of room for declines that can cause the big anomalies.  I suspect that the blue zone is larger now than it was thirty years ago and that the jetstream wall around it was probably not as strong then as it is today, but have no hard data as evidence.  I wonder if the needed data is filed away in some place where it could be accessed?

Carl

Every day now when we look at the daily map of temperature anomalies we get the same story: the NH will be up by an expected amount or more while the SH is down, which means the SH is cooler now than it was thirty years ago. The difference between the two hemispheres has been running by a full one degree or a bit more. The numbers at the bottom of this map are typical:

The globe as a whole is always stuck in the middle.  Today’s +0.2C is typical.  Such a low number may sound like good news, compared with what we are accustomed to seeing for the current global warming trend—around +0.2C per decade—but we really need to get a handle on what is happening to cause the big hemispheric discrepancy, and how long are things going to stay this way?  The news is not at all good for those of us who live in the NH, and means very little for people who live anywhere in the tropics (+0.4C). Most of the really cool trend is found inside of the Antarctic zone (-1.9C) and, as you can see on the map, it extends from there all the way out past the latitude of 60S, which is mostly ocean.  Something is causing that entire region not just to be cold, which is normal, but quite a bit colder now than it was on an average day thirty years ago.  This is in spite of all the greenhouse energy we have been adding to the atmosphere, which spreads out over the entire surface. But does it spread out evenly?

I belong to a school of thought that says “no.”  The “ordinary” greenhouse gases, all of which have long lives in the atmosphere, do spread out evenly, maybe not quite perfectly, but with gaps of not more than around 10% in most cases, or for the important ones.  The one greenhouse gas that I keep writing about, water vapor, which happens to be at least as powerful as all the others put together, does not spread out the least bit evenly, except that variations within the tropical region generally stay low.  Outside of the tropical belt its distribution gets more and more irregular as it approaches either of the polar zones.  On many occasions the difference in overhead H2O from one short number of days to the next can be a full 100% (or -50% in reverse) and the range will at times extend up to 200% or even 400%.  Those figures lead to some serious temperature differentials all the way up to a maximum of 30 degrees—in just days   We can pick numbers of that magnitude right off the daily maps, in some places!

It is quite possible that the amount of water vapor (or precipitable water) in the high-altitude layer of the atmosphere south of 60S latitude is lower on most current days than it was on an average day thirty years ago, maybe quite a bit less. This could cause a steady flow of daily temperature anomalies for the entire region being well on the cold side of average. What would cause such a situation to happen? I think a wall of very strong and tightly packed jetstream winds is in place, beyond those of thirty years ago, and holding back the movement of larger amounts of vapor. An example from today:

Next we can see the consequences of being held back from the oncoming vapor’s point of view. Notice that no such difficulty exists in the north, where vapor streams can penetrate deeply the high latitudes much more easily, thanks in large part to seasonal factors, but not entirely:

There is a good reason behind the great strength and tightly packed formation of jetstream winds in the south: their pathways are being governed as always by the positioning of high-altitude air pressure differentials, as currently observed on this next map.  Notice how large and solid the blue zone is, and how snugly the thin construction of the green zone fits around its border:

I can only guess at this, but I reckon that the blue zones we see today are consistently larger than those that existed on an average day thirty years ago.  The shape of the blue zone basically reflects the extent of below-freezing temperatures on the surface below.  According to some well-accepted research, the surface of the Southern Ocean beyond latitudes of around 60S is being cooled these days by meltwater flow moving away from the undersides of the massive ice shelves around the continent.  This could be just the early stages of a long-term trend, and we might look for a continued pronounced skewing of global temperatures as a result.

Carl

Climate change is here.  Serious impacts are now highly visible and widespread, especially in the Northern Hemisphere.  You will hear individuals and whole groups of climate scientists say that the impacts are worse than expected at this stage in the underlying trend of development.  The most highly respected climate forecasting models end up with basically the same conclusion, which suggests they are missing something.  Many scientists are searching for the identity of the missing factor, or factors.  Carl’s theory actually provides an explanation, inadvertently stumbled upon, since it was never my objective.  My attitude has simply been to report and perhaps interpret the remarkable relationships I was observing while engaged in regular cross-over examination of imagery found in the Today’s Weather Maps website.  I remember several years ago telling readers about the “goldmine” of information contained in these maps, which I found endlessly fascinating, and still do.  In recent months certain conclusions became practically inevitable because of all the persistent relationships that had turned up, and these formed the foundation of Carl’s theory.

What the theory essentially tells us is that Earth’s surface is actually receiving more heat-producing energy (or “radiative forcing”) than the amount calculated in the climate models. The source of this additional energy is not sunlight, or anything weird. It is generated in an ordinary way by what we call greenhouse effects, but not because of any change in the trend or behavior of any of the regular and most talked-about greenhouse gases. It’s all because of the one most extraordinary greenhouse gas, the outsider, that we seldom hear about except in weather reports—water vapor. The atmospheric content of water vapor may very well be increasing at a greater rate than it is supposed to, of as models predict.. I am not sure about that, but I think it is quite possible, even likely. What I do know is that its behavior is changing in certain ways, and certain places, which could be causing its extraordinarily large greenhouse energy warming power to be circumstantially magnified.

This is something that I can see quite directly by studying and comparing the weather maps. It is something climate scientists have probably overlooked, because the great volumes of information they work with present their data in a more complicated and less visually accessible format. The weather maps still need to be studied in a particular way, with a completely open mind, while especially keeping an eye out for the different kinds of close relationships that keep showing up. Water vapor down near the surface behaves in a manner that scientists are very familiar with, following a set of rules that cannot be broken. It’s the small fraction of all vapor, maybe about 10 percent of the total, that finds a passage into the upper part of the troposphere, but only on either side of the tropical belt, that seems to be capable of breaking many of the rules. The fraction itself could be growing—I am not sure about that, but it looks like a possibility. I am only sure that once water vapor gets into that situation it does things that are not in keeping with what it does at lower levels, or in the upper atmosphere of the tropical belt. Importantly, while doing these things, and for as long as it survives in this position, it never seems loses any of its regular greenhouse power, even after it has partially condensed into clouds and the more precipitable forms of aerosols.

Anyone who takes the time to study the maps will soon learn about all kinds of peculiarities that characterize vapor’s follow-up behavior in these high-altitude regimes.  Using the separate animated website completes the story with an enrichment of details, by adding on the dimensions of time, sense of direction, and constant motion, with the latter two marked by extensive twisting, turning and meeting of resistance.  The original formation of vapor into highly concentrated streams, well-separated from one from another, and how they erode and dissipate, is of great interest because it is unique to one kind of greenhouse gas in one very special situation.  Condensation within the streams and precipitation out of them is marked out on the maps, and so are the streams’ interactions with jetstream wind currents. All of these phenomena are curiously intermittent, and to some extent interrelated.  The relative strength and positioning of jetstream winds clearly has a major influence on the forward progression of the streams, normally inhibiting their movement toward higher latitudes, which is an inherently preferred sense of direction.  A current trend toward general weakening of the strength and positioning of these winds in the Northern Hemisphere can be detected, as opposed to those in the SH, for reasons that become clear upon separate study.  That weakening trend is what allows the concentrated streams to better hold on to both their contents and their shape, and to progress farther to the north than they otherwise would have. This is a point of great significance, because all of the power to generate greenhouse warming effects from the content of the streams remains intact as they do do.  These effects will then be regularly added to the similar effects generated by the same kind of contents within the vertical bounds of the lower level, often outweighing the latter by a considerable margin, always for intermittent spells as they pass across the overhead sky. The last couple of letters explain how these special effects translate into higher temperatures on the surface, and how the final effects can be accurately measured.

Carl

There is a way to accurately measure the surface warming effect of the precipitable water (PW) in the atmosphere, relative to any given location. I described the method in yesterday’s letter, basically repeating descriptions given many times in previous letters. The way I have been doing it is crude, and most likely does not end up with reliable numbers, but that’s not the point. Does the method itself have utilitarian value, capable of producing results that are both trustworthy and useful, if practices of a less crude nature are put into action? I have already described many approaches to improving those practices, and to this day I keep finding more that that are needed and doable, but not without help. I can only urge a broader and more professional undertaking. But why? What is the value of knowing more about the role of PW in the climate system?

PW contains all of the water vapor that exists in the atmosphere and all of the matter formed into clouds.  The former is known to be the most powerful of all greenhouse gases and also the most difficult of all gases to evaluate because of its short life and highly irregular pattern of distribution.  The other, which is just as irregular or more so—often being completely absent—is known to have surface warming capabilities that are virtually impossible to evaluate with measurements of any kind, with respect to source or by tangible results.  We can sense its presence at night, when there is no albedo effect being generated on cloud tops, but the situation in daytime is much more complicated. Cloud albedo power has its own set of significant irregularities to deal with on the cool side.

To repeat, PW, in its entirety, contains all there is of both substances. The atmosphere over any given location on the surface will always contain some amount of water vapor. Most locations will also have some amount of cloud cover on a good majority of days, but not every day. The PW measurements that we receive each day, all mapped out, are particularly useful because they show results, in terms of total molecular weight, for the combined amount of these materials as contained in the air above each location. It cannot separate the results for each material, but having a total number is by itself of real interest for one good reason, because the total keeps changing every day—and, by implication, so should the combined impact of the two sources of warming be changing every day. So—for any given location, total PW weight changes every day; average surface temperature as we know it also changes every day; plus one more thing— now strike up the band—we also receive good numbers informing us of the exact difference between today’s temperature number and the average value of that same number spread out over all of the same days of year for each of the 20 years in a selected baseline period. This combination provides us with a view of global warming that we can analyze bit by bit, at the grass roots level, where a good part of the action is happening in real time.

With just this amount of information, we can immediately go ahead and compare what we see in PW numbers, all color coded and spread out on a map, with what we see in anomaly numbers, also color coded and spread out on another map. Do they ever seem to overlap, like high-to-high and low-to-low, in ways that go beyond coincidence? I see them do so every day, with nothing more than a quick glance. This has always been enough to call for further investigation, which in my case has led to a number of conclusions about PW that, if true, have meaningful implications that will improve our understanding of climate behavior. Since these implications, as previously spelled out in the structure of Carl’s theory, are not favorable, the next step in this investigation should be taken sooner rather than later.

Carl

There is a simple solution to the problem I have been writing about, which will preserve the primary substance of Carl’s theory. I will just stop calling the effect of precipitable water (PW) a greenhouse energy effect—and not even a plain greenhouse effect, which might create a false impression. I will do the same thing scientists do, and call it a surface warming effect. Scientists regularly talk about cloud cover having a noticeable warming effect on the surface apart from the cooling effect of surface albedo. Cloud warming is not commonly referred to as a greenhouse effect, and as a rule there is no attempt made to offer a detailed alternative explanation for the warming. I should be justified in calling the PW outcome a warming effect without even mentioning the physics, and nothing important will be changed within the theory.

My theory, to begin with, is not about cloud cover. It only refers to PW, which is a more complex kind of material. I don’t think you will find any other references, anywhere, to the warming effect of PW as such. I only happened to land on it as something worth looking at because it is being so accurately measured all the time on a basis of multiple locations. That, plus of course my ordinary realization that PW in its entirety contains all of the water vapor in the atmosphere and all of the matter that has been temporarily condensed into clouds. The fact that it contains other materials as well—in more advanced states of condensation—did not seem critical. PW, specifically attributed to the atmosphere as it exists over any given location, carried the promise of generating all of the actual greenhouse energy effect due to whatever amount of water vapor it contained at that location plus the total warming effect of whatever amount of material had been made up in the form of clouds above the same location. Both of these effects are by definition realized at the surface, in the form of departures from whatever temperatures at the surface would be reported in their absence. Each effect causes warming, so why would their separate effects not be combinable into one total amount of warming for that location?

The temperature “anomalies” that attract our attention are seldom expressed as departures from point of no effect.  We always look for departures from whatever the average was during some convenient baseline period where averages could be ascertained within reason.  This is done in many different ways, with varying degrees of accuracy.  We are fortunate to have a solid baseline set up for daily average temperatures, over a 20-year period, covering a bountiful array of individual locations which include the most remote parts of the planet’s surface, very accurately measured through 24-hour days.  On each new day we receive a map showing the current departures from average, reasonably condensed, over virtually every bit of the entire surface.  Absolutely priceless, if you know what to do with it.  What I have been doing with it is very simple.  I have another map of precisely the same shape and dimensions showing the total weight of the H20 molecules in a vertical column of air over any selected location for that same day.  The given values vary over an incredibly wide range, starting at “under 1kg” and running up to practical limits of around 80kg.  Go to https://climatereanalyzer.org/wx/DailySummary/#t2max at any time and see these for yourself.

The PW values that come up each day for any one location show a surprising amount of variation.  They are generally on the numerical high side for tropical locations and lowest in the polar regions, with fairly steady rates of decline in between.  Individual locations at any one latitude, on land, will also vary considerably by elevation, with lowest kg values at the highest elevations. All individual locations are marked by a range of kg values, some wider than others, with some making wide daily changes and in all cases seasonal.  In nearly every case, when kg values are observed near the high end of the range for a particular location the daily temperature will be relatively higher than when values are lower.  One thing is missing that we might wish for, and that is a daily baseline average for the PW value at each location, comparable in practicality to the ones we are now getting that reveal temperature anomalies.  The temperature and PW anomalies could then be matched up on the widest possible scale with the least amount of guesswork.  This is well beyond my reach but could be accomplished with an organized effort.

What kind of result do I think would be most likely?  Relying only on estimates of baseline averages for PW, Carl’s theory was formulated on the basis of observations that, outside of the tropical belt, and after adjusting for other factors known to cause temperature changes, any observed doubling of PW value for a given location, on a given day of the year, would cause a temperature increase of close to 10C at the planetary surface, attributed to the combined greenhouse and warming effects of the water vapor and clouds contained in the overhead column of PW.  The actual proportion of each, which I can be aware of but cannot closely estimate, has not seemed to make a significant difference in the outcome.  This perceived outcome, if at all accurate, would suggest that the warming power of clouds, weight for weight, is practically the same as the greenhouse energy effect of water vapor alone. As an added note, the skies that have PW values are often cloudless.  The perceived outcome also gives us a new way of calculating the climate-warming power of water vapor on a long-term basis, well beyond the limitations of daily anomalies, when tied to overall projected future increases of any incremental value—no matter how much cloud cover was being carried. The cooling effect of cloud cover albedo, serving as a powerful offset, would still need to be measured and calculated independently, and should continue to be studied on that basis.  

Carl

The question now in hand:  Are atmospheric gases the sole source of greenhouse energy effects?  This is what the sciences keep telling us (see my recent letters).  Their conclusion rules out anything made of liquid or solid material that is suspended in the air, including a number of significant components of precipitable water (PW).  The water vapor component cannot be ruled out, just the water drops or droplets and icy aerosols that are formed by the condensation of water vapor once it has entered the atmosphere.  Science is effectively informing us that none of these things are able to generate any of the special kind of radiation, all infrared, that delivers extra heat to the surface with the same effect that gases have.  One point of clarity is needed here—gases do in fact have their own unique way of generating this radiation in the initial step. Each kind of gas is only able to capture outgoing radiation made of photons of certain specific wavelengths.  The actual spectrum happens to be divided into photons of many different wavelengths, from which the individual selection by each gas is determined by nature.  Molecules that have condensed into tightly-knit bodies are not recognized as having this kind of selectivity.  They are apparently considered capable of capturing photons of all wavelengths, although I don’t remember learning about this having become established as a fact in all cases. 

Carl’s theory has never emphasized the importance of making this distinction.  It was built around an interpretation of greenhouse energy’s final effects, in terms of actual temperature changes observed at the surface. In the case of PW, as well as water vapor, and in contrast with all other greenhouse gases, these effects are most vividly expressed on a short-term basis, meaning as little as one or two days rather than many years or centuries. The creation of Carl’s theory was put together based on information gathered from extensive observation of the Climate Weather Maps website.  The full set of maps reveal a diversity of relationships in a manner that is highly amenable to outside interpretation.  Early on, I began to wonder about what could be the cause of all the temperature anomalies, both warm and cold, a few of them quite extreme, that keep showing up all over the globe on a short-term basis.  It didn’t take long to realize that PW was involved, by making visual relationships between daily temperature anomalies of a given location and current readings of total PW values on the same day for the same location.  Warm anomalies revealed a strong tendency to correspond with higher PW values, cold anomalies with lower, with extreme cases being the most prominent in both respects.  This could not be due to mere coincidence when the relationship was so extraordinarily common. The one thing missing was always an accurate number for average, or “normal,” PW values, but these could at least be estimated with a reasonable margin of error.

The short-term effects causing temperature anomalies were clearly established by direct linkage to the relative total weight of all the PW molecules in a vertical column of atmosphere directly overhead at the location.  We get these weight numbers from measurements taken several times a day, with unquestionably high accuracy.  The values have nothing to say about the composition of materials making up the total PW value or their relative altitudes, just the total weight of all the H2O molecules in the column.  Again born of curiosity, the next step was to learn all I could find out about the various differences in the way these H2O molecules were distributed, by altitude and with or without condensation.  There was plenty of information available from observations of other maps.  Cloud cover and precipitation signals from all locations came from one great source.  Another, even more fascinating, revealed the courses of streaming concentrations of PW moving through the atmosphere in the mid to upper latitudes of each hemisphere from sources of evaporation on the borders of the tropical belt.  Static and animated imagery were both available, from separate sources that were perfectly consistent with each other. 

The streams tell a story that is perfectly consistent with the constantly changing pace of reported PW values, as measured instrumentally, and their effect on surface temperature anomalies. Their implied altitude and habits of movement suggested a kind of behavior for these quantities of PW unlike the behavior of quantities closer to the surface. The separate effects of these quantities, relative to their respective contribution by weight, can simply be added together to determine the final outcome. Variations in the cloud cover and precipitation associated with each stream have another story to tell, equally surprising. Whatever the status of condensation, ranging from none at all to observed maximums, and if everything else is known to be normal, the effect on temperatures seldom seems to be altered because of any likely difference in greenhouse effects. The only conclusion I can draw from this observation is that, weight for weight, the greenhouse energy effect of PW in any state is nearly the same as that of pure water vapor. This finding can easily be tested in a more accurate way using the same methodology but with the aid of resources having fewer limitations than my own. That kind of knowledge, once obtained, is surely worth having.

Carl

For over a year now, Carl’s Climate Letter has mostly been spent on the development of “Carl’s theory.” The theory is basically devoted to a series of claims tied to “the greenhouse energy effects” of precipitable water (PW). Thankfully, the theory has never quite been finalized, or written up in a formal way, or submitted for publication, with or without peer review. It would immediately be shoved aside as unreviewable gibberish. There is indeed a concept of greenhouse energy and its effects that is held in high esteem in the sciences. It refers to a clearly defined physical process, viewed as a specific way of processing energy in Earth’s atmosphere, or any atmosphere of a similar kind. Critically, science has settled upon an understanding that the process and its effects are only applicable to matter in the form of gases. PW is a complex material, many parts of which are not gaseous. For that reason, even though a significant fraction is gaseous and thus subject to independent review, PW in its entirety does not receive consideration as an instrument of greenhouse energy producer.

In Friday’s letter (CL#2011) I admitted to being unaware of this scientific limitation and went on to spell out the reasons why, by detailing an alternative meaning of how greenhouse energy is processed in the atmosphere. The alternative is very much broader in scope than the one accepted by science. It includes potential greenhouse generation from practically any kind of matter, solid or liquid as well as gases, that happens to be suspended in the atmosphere. Most such material can be of no possible significance for quantitative reasons, but what about the high-volume participants? The potential for PW as the highest of all would then necessarily qualify for consideration. I have been imagining a procedure wherein tiny droplets of water capture infrared photons that are headed toward space at their surfaces, and then re-emit energy in the form of photons that are headed outward in a completely random direction, half of them toward the planetary surface. Any such fundamental turnaround, on any scale or as part of any cascading sequence, should be sufficient as an explanation for how the greenhouse process gets underway. Some photons are virtually sure to end up on the surface that would not have done so without the admission of a fundamental turnaround process. Has this rather simple idea ever been fully debated by scientists? If it has, there should be some records in the literature.

With that in mind, I have headed back to Spencer Weart’s classic book, The Discovery of Global Warming, published in 2003, which has reviews of practically everything scientists argued about from the days of Fourier up until our present century.  On page 134 he discusses the work of Sean Twomey, who made a number of important observations about cloud albedo effects in the 1960s and ’70s and is still frequently cited.  One sentence in particular from Weart’s review caught my attention:  “Moreover, while a cloud would reflect sunlight back into space, it would also accept radiation coming up from below, causing a greenhouse effect.” (my ital) Twomey also did calculations leading to a conclusion that the net effect of this warming and cooling should be to cool the Earth.  Other scientists paid little attention at the time, apparently because too many of these things were being widely debated.  Cloud theory has made its way into many new observations and genuine advances since that time, and remains hotly debated, but never to my knowledge with greenhouse energy calculations included as a basic consideration for causation of the warming effect of clouds. No way has yet been found to precisely calculate the strength of this effect, and attempts made to describe the physical mechanism of warming in a detailed way are uncommon.

Tomorrow I will once again review a method of calculation that has been overlooked and could not be more simple. The calculation itself offers extraordinary evidence of greenhouse energy production beyond the province of gases alone.

Carl