blizzard1024

You also don't address why ERA5 has declining specific humidity in the convective mixed layer between the late 1970s and 2000, a time of warming. This makes no meteorological sense. This data looks suspect to me. At high levels, you are seeing the results of enhanced convection with heat and moisture fluxes to the upper troposphere. This does not prove a positve water vapor feedback from increasing CO2. It's global convective processes.

So brightness temperature is a measure of relative humidity. That is why there is a one-one correlation then between temperature and specific humidity. This still doesn't rule out enhanced tropical or global convection for these short term variations.

Thank you. I appreciate that. Just because someone has a difference in scientific opinion doesn't mean you should be nasty to them. This really shouldn't be tolerated on this forum. I follow the work of Lindzen, Curry, Spencer, and Christy all smart PhDs. I agree with their viewpoints and their uncertainties. I am not a climate change "denier". I just don't think that CO2 is as dominate in the climate system as mainstream climatologists think. An ECS of between 1C and 2C for doubling is pretty much where I stand. I don't see the doomsday scenarios. I also am concerned about the water vapor feedback not being as strong as modeled. I don't like that ERA5 is inconsistent in its specific humidity in the lower atmosphere and that it is so well correlated to temperature at high levels. This is a problem to me. It really all depends on how strong the water vapor feedback is and if that can be proven with REAL data, not models, I then will accept higher ECS. Anyway, take care and thanks for being professional in your response.

So what did the ancient people think when there was tremendous periods of warming and cooling? How can you explain these century plus long warming or cooling periods. CO2 didn't have anything to do with this variability. We could easily be naturally warming with some added effect from CO2. see graph below which is for Greenland ice core data but overall reflects rapid warming and cooling periods of the planet. And yes this is peer reviewed. It is Richard Alleys work.

How do you know that? Keep cats indoors don't kill them. Keep screens on your windows. Comms tower use white strobe lights instead of red lights. There are many things. But dotting the landscape with turbines is going to be an environmental disaster not to mention the aesthetics. Plus where do you get the energy to build them and solar panels...fossil fuels. But solar panels have a lot of hazardous materials that will have to go somewhere when the panels need to be replaced. This whole thing is dangerous to the environment right now. We are not ready for a wholescale overhaul of our energy infrastructure especially with such an uncertain science.

This is an excellent paper by two brilliant atmospheric scientists... https://www.heartland.org/_template-assets/documents/publications/CO2 coalition Lindzen On Climate Sensitivity.pdf

This will be a disaster for seabirds. How can they tell how many are killed when they drop to the bottom of the ocean. Wind farm lower the energy of incoming TCs? Smh.

Where is tropospheric water vapor in all this? That is the PRIMARY GHG. Everyone knows that. And don't tell me it is a feedback. That is a cop out. Plus the Earth cools a substantial amount from convection. If the Earth didn't have convection, the Earth's Greenhouse effect would be a 75C instead of 33C. This goes all the way back to Manabe and Strickler (1964). So convective air currents and weather, reduce the Greenhouse effect by 42C. So it is weather and convection that ultimately controls the natural greenhouse effect. Precipitation is a sink of water vapor if you think of it.

Yeah stitching together coarse sparse proxy data set with much higher resolution actual measurements works really well. / sarc. Greenhouse gases only are significant if there is a positive water vapor feedback and this is very much uncertain from scientists that are objective.

So from roughly 950 AD to 1350 AD there was 4 centuries of warming culminating in the Medieval Warm Period globally. What natural factors caused that? What natural factors caused the Little Ice Age? What about the Dark Age cold period, the roman warm period? There is about a 1000 year or so cycle. What natural factors caused that? We just don't know enough about natural forcings to make such bold statements. Overwhelming body of evidence? What evidence? Its climate models. That's not evidence. Estimating all the energy flows with such certainty? This is junk science in my opinion.

What about ocean currents? What about global cloud cover? What about global convection? You left off a bunch of stuff. That is why they invoke the use of climate models. But these models don't handle said clouds or convection explicitly. So it is a leap of faith to believe them....

Really, try 4 times the state of SC for solar farms and wind energy. Green energy companies downplay bird deaths to make a money. They are just like any other big corporations. Solar farms same thing. Why not have panels on people's homes and buildings? Because there would be no grid to sell you power. The "green" corporate folks are looking to cash in on this exaggerated climate change predictions. You think they really care about the environment? Naive. Any who the heck do you think you are? I have explained to you dozens of times that CO2 does not drive climate and you don't listen. You say I am propagating lies? I could say the same thing about you. But I am not stooping to your level. This is unfair and malicious of you. I continue to try to get you removed from this forum. This forum has no place for climate activists that are abusive and offensive to others. People like you are shutting down science. I hope I am successful in getting you removed. Maybe you can start you own forum and I won't be on it.

Yep. I actually agree 100%. can you believe that?

I respectfully disagree here. How do they know? Climate models do not have this level of precision to make such claims. If you believe the models yes, you are correct. I am skeptical of atmospheric models especially ones that don't forecast convection or clouds explicitly.

Yes I agree that a doubling of CO2 would bring around 1.2C or so of warming. Modest warming, not a crisis.

How? How do you know that? Let me guess...climate models. yeah right! Climate models are insufficient like weather forecast models. They have some usefulness but not this kind of precision. So this is all based on climate models. I know this. That is where I have to disagree. I want to see data, that proves a water vapor feedback first and foremost. So far, I haven't seen anything convincing. ERA5 was very interesting to look at but a 1:1 relationship of high level T and specific humidity? What is the mechanism? The only I can think of is tropical convection. That is NOT a positive feedback. It is the prevalence of El Ninos over La Ninas since 1977 the great climate shift.

How do you know the modest warming isn't natural? The Earth likely has been in an energy imbalance since the 1800s, the end of the Little Ice Age. That's all.

ANYTHING that doesn't go along with the "CO2 is the thermostat of the planet narrative" is dismissed. UAH for instance doesn't include the spurious warmth of NOAA14. BUT the other satellite datasets keep it. So they must be right /sarc. The surface record is rife with changes in instrumentation, land use and even location changes over 100s of sites across the planet. Plus the way SSTs were measured has changed so much in 150 years. BUT it shows a lot of warming especially after "homogenization"....i.e adjusting upward in the present and cooling the past. So this dataset is better than UAH? Of course it is /sarc because we already know that CO2 is our global thermostat. Cloud datasets show that cloud fraction seems to correlate well with global average temperature. Whoops, wait a minute.... NO it can't be correct /sarc. We know what Arctic sea ice was like in the 1930s without satellite data. It had to much higher than today, of course is was /sarc. Now NCEP reanalysis data which matches up with NASA NVAP specific humidities at high levels is wrong because it shows a negative feedback. But ERA5 is correct because it shows a linear almost 1:1 relationship with temperatures in the upper troposphere. It doesn't matter that the low levels don't make sense at all. Just sweep that under the rug. What is the mechanism besides convection for the upper tropospheric T and q 1:1 correlation? What is the mechanism? Just because temperatures warm doesn't mean the air moistens. So basically the entire "science" is dedicated to prove CO2 is the global thermostat. The tail is wagging the dog.

Nevertheless the data shows an inverse relationship between temperature and cloud fraction. But they ignore this because it explains the recent temperature trends quite nicely. More lunacy.

Wind is terrible for the environment. It destroys natural habitats, fragments forests, and yes it does kill birds, especially raptors which include eagles. The eagles finally make a comeback due to the environmental movements of the 1970s. Now ironically it is the same groups that will cause their demise. Solar farms take up so much land that destroys habitats. So we wreck the planet to save the planet? This is lunacy.

Plus this ERA5 dataset doesn't even make sense showing drying at 850 mb when the Earth was warming from the late 1970s to 2000? This dataset is obviously flawed. Plus the correlation with temperature and specific humidity at 500 and 300 mb is striking. Something isn't correct with this dataset. BUT it fits the narrative of the climate crisis so IMO climate scientists are being disingenuous. They overlook such things because they are inconvenient. If a dataset goes against their preconceived notions, of course it HAS to be wrong. NASA's cloud fraction from 1983-2009 is a great example. This dataset shows an inverse relationship to global average temperature and global cloud fraction. Hmmm. So of course this can't be accurate too. It goes on and on. NCEP water vapor shows moistening down low where there is convective mixing and slight drying above suggesting precipitation processes are leading to a negative water vapor feedback. Nope. Can't be. You see where I am going? There is no objectivity anymore. I want to see data and I thank you for sharing this KNMI explorer site. And no I don't trust the peer review process it is very flawed.

Seriously? You have got to be kidding me. You have a highly non-linear dynamical climate system with clouds, and convection and a one to one relationship between temperature and specific humidity at high levels in the troposphere and you compare this to something simple like gravity? Shows a deep lack of understanding of atmospheric science....

ERA5 reanalysis data specific humidities, q, at 500, and 300 mb show almost a 1:1 correlation with temperature. 200 mb q looks like 500 and 300 mb but the temperature trends are contaminated by the fact that 200 mb is in the stratosphere farther north and south on the globe and especially in the winter months (both hemispheres). So the cooling of the lower stratosphere offsets some of the warming in the upper troposphere and there is no temperature trend at all. But 500 and 300 mb are pretty much wholy in the troposphere. 500 mb looks similar. Look at 850 mb... But for some strange reason, the 850 mb temperature and specific humidities decline from the late 1970s to around 2000 and then increase. If anywhere in the atmosphere there should be a nearly 1:1 correlation it IS at 850 mb because warmer(colder) temperatures leads to more(less) evaporation off the oceans and land since 850 mb is well within the diurnal convective mixed layer. Once you get above 700 mb, you are well above the mixed layer for most of the planet. So at 500, and 300 mb a 1:1 correlation looks fishy. There is no mechanism that would describe this very short term strong correlation that I could think of except global convection. If the temperature increases at 300 mb for instance, yes it CAN support more water vapor but some mechanism has to get the water vapor up there. Conversely at 850 mb, there IS a mechanism that explains why more warmth = more water vapor, it is insolation and convective mixing. So this ERA5 data is either suspect IMO in the lower troposphere and is more likely is showing increased global convection causing more water vapor at high levels. This would not be proof that there is a long term positive feedback as has been described by many authors. In many respects NCEPs reanalysis data does show increasing water vapor at the lower levels up to 600 mb and then decreasing water vapor above. This actually makes more sense in the low-levels because of the warming planet and more evaporation. Precipitation processes and enhanced convection would eventually lead to drying in the upper troposphere and a negative feedback. Radiosondes also show this too of which I believe NCEP uses in their reanalysis data. The fact that the NASA NVAP satellite retrieval data showed drying upper troposphere too until 2001 (data never released to 2009) which agreed with the radiosondes also suggests NCEPs data could be more accurate. In any event, I wish I could see the AIRs datasets which supposedly support the positive feedback but I wonder if they would show the same thing as ERA5. A while back, I read from Spencer and Christy a criticism of AIRS (I can't find it yet, I believe it was a blog post) that there is a lot of difficulty in retrievals of water vapor due to clouds and even radiances from temperatures at high levels. I wonder if that also is why this ERA5 data looks suspect. In any event, it is far from certain that there is a significantly positive water vapor feedback. That is a reasonable statement IMO based on the data so far.

Ok. I will look again.

I totally agree that nuclear energy would be the way to go assuming it is safe and there is where the fear is. But yes ultimately it's too bad there was Three Mile island, Chernobyl and Fukushima. These accidents/disasters I think really hurt nuclear energy proliferation.