What We Could Have Said At a March For Science
via Climate Scepticism
https://cliscep.com
We should have been there–you skeptics and we lukewarmers both. We shouldn’t let those on the other side of the political fence claim science for their own. Getting there might have been half the fun–we might have been dragged off of airplanes or at least hit in the head with a baby stroller. And certainly […]
via Climate Scepticism https://cliscep.com
April 23, 2017 at 10:53AM
Appeal Court Overturnes Defamation Suit By Green Scientist
via The Global Warming Policy Forum (GWPF)
http://www.thegwpf.com
Andrew Weaver won a $50,000 judgment in B.C. Supreme Court in 2015 after accusing the newspaper of defaming him in four articles by three authors published in late 2009 and early 2010.
In the case brought by Andrew Weaver, now leader of the British Columbia Green Party, the trial judge’s key mistake was to determine the allegedly defamatory meaning of four separate articles by reading them together, as a whole, and then assigning joint liability to all the authors, the court ruled Friday.
“For Dr. Weaver to establish a cause of action based on a combined reading of the articles he needed to rely on extended defamatory meaning by innuendo, and to prove joint liability with respect to its publication,” reads the judgment, written by Madam Justice Gail Dickson on behalf of a unanimous three-judge panel. “In sum, in my view, the judge’s erroneous approach to combined defamatory meanings was pervasive and inextricable from her individual findings.”
The decision overturns the 2015 finding of defamation, for which the Post was ordered to publish a retraction and pay Weaver $50,000. No retrial has been scheduled.
“Fair comment for columnists and opinion writers is a pillar of journalism and we feared the original judgment could have had a chilling effect,” said Anne Marie Owens, the Post’s editor-in-chief. “We are delighted with this ruling, and will continue to fight for important press freedoms.”
“We are very pleased with the victory and happy that the errors in the trial judgment will be corrected,” said Dan Burnett, a lawyer who represents the Post.
The Post was unable to reach Weaver on Friday.
via The Global Warming Policy Forum (GWPF) http://www.thegwpf.com
April 23, 2017 at 07:36AM
Manipulated IPCC Science supported by Manipulated Appeals to Authority
via Watts Up With That?
http://ift.tt/1Viafi3
Guest opinion: Dr. Tim Ball
The story of how Maurice Strong and the Club of Rome set up the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP), the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to direct political and scientific focus on CO2 to ‘prove’ it was causing global warming is well documented. If you want a detailed account read my book, The Deliberate Corruption of Climate Science or a simpler, abbreviated version for the non-scientist titled Human Caused Global Warming: The Biggest Deception in History. The books are unique because they integrate how the science was created to achieve the political agenda. Focus on the bad science was necessary, but once demonstrated, demands an explanation of the motive.
Consensus was a central theme to the political promotion of anthropogenic global warming (AGW) from the start. Initially, it was the 6000+ representatives of the IPCC. Later, it became the manufactured percentages of 95 of Naomi Oreskes and 97 for John Cooke. However, there was another form of manufactured consensus that continues to influence public and political opinion. It is a more powerful form of consensus because it encompasses an appeal to authority. Not only do the ordinary people support the cause and claims but also those with standing, even though it is usually self-assigned. The two best examples used to promote the consensus of authority in the climate deception are the Nobel Prize, jointly awarded to Al Gore and the IPCC and the openly declared support of scientific societies for the IPCC Reports.
I know that these are still major arguments used to support the claims of the IPCC because they are cited in most legal documents I receive and are quoted in almost every media interview I have ever done. In both cases, they make a mockery of all the Nobel awards even though in the case of Gore and the IPCC it was the Peace Prize. The Nobel Committee provide evidence of the phoniness of the entire exercise. First, they list their prize under the field of “humanitarian work, world organizing.” Then they justify it as a Peace Award as follows;
According to the IPCC, there is a real danger that the climate changes may also increase the danger of war and conflict, because they will place already scarce natural resources, not least drinking water, under greater pressure and put large population groups to flight from drought, flooding, and other extreme weather conditions.
As I read that, they are accepting the IPCC’s word for the danger. This is incredible and shows they did not do their homework or even if they did, failed to understand there is no empirical evidence to support the IPCC claims. It underlines how phony these awards and ripe for political exploitation.
Those are bold charges, but they are supported by what happened with the award to Al Gore. Here is what they posted
According to the Nobel Committee, Gore is probably the single individual who has done most to rouse the public and the governments that action had to be taken to meet the climate challenge. “He is,” in the words of the Committee, “the great communicator”.
The problem is Gore received his award in the same week that Justice Burton of the UK Court released his judgment of Gore and his movie.
I viewed the film at the parties’ request. Although I can only express an opinion as a viewer rather than as a judge, it is plainly, as witnessed by the fact that it received an Oscar this year for best documentary film, a powerful, dramatically presented and highly professionally produced film. It is built round the charismatic presence of the ex-Vice-President, Al Gore, whose crusade it now is to persuade the world of the dangers of climate change caused by global warming. It is now common ground that it is not simply a science film – although it is clear that it is based substantially on scientific research and opinion – but that it is a political film, albeit of course not party political. Its theme is not merely the fact that there is global warming, and that there is a powerful case that such global warming is caused by man, but that urgent, and if necessary expensive and inconvenient, steps must be taken to counter it, many of which are spelt out. Paul Downes, using persuasive force almost equivalent to that of Mr Gore, has established his case that the views in the film are political by submitting that Mr Gore promotes an apocalyptic vision, which would be used to influence a vast array of political policies, which he illustrates in paragraph 30 of his skeleton argument:
“(i) Fiscal policy and the way that a whole variety of activities are taxed, including fuel consumption, travel and manufacturing …
(ii) Investment policy and the way that governments encourage directly and indirectly various forms of activity.
(iii) Energy policy and the fuels (in particular nuclear) employed for the future.
(iv) Foreign policy and the relationship held with nations that consume and/or produce carbon-based fuels.”
4. Martin Chamberlain, who, with equal skill, has adopted a very realistic position on the part of the Defendant, does not challenge that the film promotes political views. There is thus no need to consider any analysis or definition of the word ‘political.’
The judge also ruled that
There are errors and omissions in the film, to which I shall refer, and respects in which the film, while purporting to set out the mainstream view (and to belittle opposing views), does in fact itself depart from that mainstream, in the sense of the “consensus” expressed in the IPCC reports.
He later lists nine errors, although, Lord Monckton showed there are many more. It is important to note that the Wikipedia entry on the trial works very hard to discredit Monckton because of his efforts to obtain funding for the working-class father of the child forced to submit to the biased presentation without proper balance, as the law required.
The question is why didn’t the Nobel Committee know about all this information? Obviously, they did no research and simply gave the prize as they were directed. Do they apply a similar laxity of investigation in any other discipline? The information given at the trial was publicly available because the major witness at the trial was the late Professor Bob Carter. Few people were more industrious and rigorous as he published extensively and traveled the world spreading the information. He was a contributor and reviewer of the monumental Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC).
A most troubling aspect of this abuse of awards is that it diminishes the value of the award for those who earned and deserved it. But it gets worse. Here is the most disgraceful, disgusting and shameful part of Gore’s award.
As media do a victory lap over Friday’s Nobel Peace Prize announcement, it seems a metaphysical certitude that few Americans are aware of the other 180 nominees for the award besides the Global Warmingist-in-Chief Al Gore.
For instance, meet Irena Sendler, a 97-year-old Polish woman who saved 2,500 Jewish children from certain death in the Warsaw ghetto during World War II.
Hadn’t heard of her? Well, don’t feel bad, for since the Nobel Committee announced the nominees in February, there have only been 107 reports about Mrs. Sendler being one of them. By contrast, Al Gore and “Nobel” have been mentioned in 2,912.
To put an even finer point on the astounding difference in media coverage, since the nominees were announced, Mrs. Sendler has been referred to in only six newscasts on television and radio, one by conservative Glenn Beck. Gore’s Nobel nomination was discussed in 249!
Well, how does Irena Sendler’s contribution to “Humanitarian work and world organizing” compare with Gore’s promotion of a falsely created scientific fraud?
Scientific Societies
In 2005 Brian May or Lord May (another undeserving award), President of the Royal Society gave an address speaking to his belief that a major function of the Society is to spread what it considered important. Here are two quotes from the address that explain why other scientific groups and societies around the world were used.
The remainder of the Address will survey some specific threats to tomorrow’s world, in the form of climate change, diminishing biological diversity, and new or re-emerging diseases. The increasingly deliberate internationalisation of scientific institutions, particularly in response to the above-noted problems, will be emphasised.
In what follows, I concentrate on three particular problems: climate change, biological diversity, infectious diseases. In each case, the problems are essentially global, not recognising the boundaries between human states. Correspondingly, the involvement of the scientific community – in basic understanding, in practical measures, and in policy recommendations – needs to transcend national boundaries.
The cachet of the Royal Society was sufficient to convince most scientific societies to support the claims of the IPCC. One society, the Russian Academy of Sciences under the recommendation of Yuri Izrael, Director of its Institute of Global Climate and Ecology, refused to participate. He was also Vice-chair of the IPCC and said after a visit to a cooling Antarctic
“Climate change is obvious, but science has not yet been able to identify the causes of it.”
He also stated,
“There is no proven link between human activity and global warming.”
In most cases, the society accepted and promoted the IPCC support without consulting the members. When Emeritus Professor of physics, the late Hal Lewis discovered that the executive of the American Physical Society (APS) had given their support he resigned in a very public protest. As he wrote in his October 2010 resignation letter,
“the global warming scam, with the (literally) trillions of dollars driving it, that has corrupted so many scientists, and has carried APS before it like a rogue wave. It is the greatest and most successful pseudoscientific fraud I have seen in my long life as a physicist.”
If it is that obvious, why didn’t Lord May or members of the Royal Society see it? This granting of unwarranted awards to bolster credibility is a disgrace, but typical of why politics and politicians are held in such disdain. It is likely Al Gore had a great deal to do with it because he used the power of the Vice-Presidency in so many self-serving ways. Remember, Barack Obama also received a Peace Prize that puzzled even ardent supporters. Gore’s presence, influence and aggrandizement are everywhere throughout this entire climate deception story. As usual, people know these machinations occur but still have a hard time believing it.
via Watts Up With That? http://ift.tt/1Viafi3
April 23, 2017 at 07:13AM
How hurricanes replenish their vast supply of rain water
via Climate Etc.
https://judithcurry.com
by Makarieva A.M., Gorshkov V.G., Nefiodov A.V., Chikunov A.V., Sheil D., Nobre A.D., Li B.-L.
New questions and ideas about hurricanes and their power.
Predicting the intensity of tropical cyclones, hurricanes and typhoons is a recognized challenge. We are grateful to Judith for this further opportunity to discuss our work with the Climate Etc. readers. (Some of you may remember previous posts about our work here, here, here and here). In this post we discuss how tropical cyclones fuel themselves by their motion, how this determines their intensity and we note some of the more general implications for atmospheric and land-cover sciences.
Intense tropical cyclones — hurricanes and typhoons — involve violent winds, torrential rain and low atmospheric pressures. (Please note that hurricanes and typhoons reflect the same atmospheric phenomena — the label used depends only on where they occur.)
It is known that local evaporation accounts for less than a quarter of ongoing rainfall within the hurricane’s rainfall area (about 600-800 km in diameter and comprising the distinct vortex of clouds visible from space). Remarkably, despite the danger associated with hurricane rainfall, where the other three-quarters of the rain come from remains uncertain.
Fig. 1. An approximate water budget for a hurricane (square): mean evaporation 0.5 mm/h, mean rainfall 2 mm/h and imported moisture 1.5 mm/h within 400 km from the center. Mean tropical evaporation in a hurricane-free environment is about 0.2 mm/h. Also shown are relative humidity H and surface pressure ps at different radial distances r from the hurricane center.
In our recent study (in press in Atmospheric Research, accepted manuscript available from here, discussed in Physics World here) we argue, based on an analysis of available data, that hurricanes extract pre-existing moisture from the atmosphere as they move through it. Thus, the storm’s so-called propagation velocity — its velocity relative to the rest of the atmosphere — is key.
Our result has implications for understanding hurricane intensity too. It is widely believed that a hurricane derives its energy extracting heat from the ocean. Theory tells us that the power of such a steady-state process is constrained by Carnot efficiency (see http://ift.tt/1DMSFuQ) multiplied by the oceanic heat flux. In contrast we argue that a hurricane derives its energy from the water vapor previously accumulated in the atmosphere (this vapor represents a major store of potential energy). The power of such a system is not constrained by Carnot efficiency: while the potential energy is limited to what is stored in the atmosphere, there is no thermodynamic limit on the rate that this can be released (as in an avalanche).
Before discussing the storm intensity in more detail, it is relevant to examine why water budgets have received such limited attention.
In 1960, in an influential paper, Malkus and Riehl (1960) [hereafter MR] proposed that rainfall does not matter. They wrote (our emphasis):
“… variations in the rate of import, condensation and export of normal tropical air will not lead to variations in surface pressure because the ascent path, and therewith the density of the vertical column, is entirely determined by the θE of the rising air. A storm will not deepen if simply more water is condensed at θE=350oA in the core; it can do so only if there is an additional heat source so that condensation will occur at θE greater than 350oA.”
For those unfamiliar with the meterological terminology, equivalent potential temperature θE is a measure reflecting, besides local temperature and pressure, the amount of water vapor in the air. Essentially, MR say that a surface pressure difference driving the hurricane-force winds can form only if the air rising in the hurricane core carries more water vapor than the ambient air. This excess water vapor — provided by oceanic evaporation as the air moves towards the hurricane core — represents the (main part of the) “additional heat source”.
In other words, rainfall does not matter, but evaporation does. This statement is somewhat puzzling. Indeed, for the surface pressure to fall, something must be removed from a hydrostatic atmospheric column, not added — meanwhile evaporation adds water vapor to the atmosphere.
We use our new approach to explain MR’s ideas as follows. Consider the mean tropical troposphere which we will here approximate as having a mean lapse rate of 6 K/km, surface temperature 26 oC and surface pressure 1015 hPa. We thus know the dependencies of pressure p and temperature T on altitude z. Relative humidity at the surface is about 80% (see, e.g., Table 5 of Jordan 1958 — the data used by MR).
Let’s compare this environmental pressure profile pe(z) with the pressure profile ph(z) the hurricane air would have if it were rising adiabatically from the surface with the same pressure and temperature, but with a higher relative humidity — 100%.
Fig. 2. Pressure Δp(z) = ph(z)-pe(z) and temperature ΔT(z) = Th(z)-Te(z) differences between hurricane air rising adiabatically and the mean tropical environment. The red square marks the altitude where air densities are equal, the blue circle marks the altitude where pressures are equal. (Cf. Fig. 1c in Makarieva et al. 2017b and Fig. 2 in Makarieva et al. 2015a).
We can see that the hurricane has a greater pressure in the troposphere. The reason is that as the air rises and cools, the water vapor condenses. The more water vapor condenses, the more latent heat is released. As there is more water vapor in the hurricane’s air, its temperature drops with altitude more slowly than in the surrounding air: or, to put it simply, the hurricane is warmer. Thus, since the scale height of the exponential pressure distribution is proportional to temperature, the air pressure drops with height more slowly in the hurricane than it does in the environment outside the storm.
So far we have not created (i.e., explained) any pressure drop at the surface. Now the key point: Let us imagine that this mid-altitude pressure surplus drives air away from the hurricane core. Since the surface pressure reflects the weight of air in the column, as soon as some air is removed, the surface pressure drops. But the pressure surplus diminishes as well, since the hurricane pressure at any altitude is proportional to surface pressure. Thus, gradually decreasing surface pressure in the hurricane we observe that at a certain moment the pressure surplus disappears altogether:
Fig. 3. Pressure difference between hurricane and environment versus altitude as dependent on the surface pressure drop.
Once this happens, we obtain an “unperturbed top” for our hurricane — an altitude where pressure, density and temperature in the hurricane and environment coincide.
This is the gist of the conventional hurricane intensity theory: pull the bottom of the pressure difference curve in Fig. 3 to the left until the pressure surplus disappears, and you get the maximum hurricane pressure drop at the surface. In this context “maximum” presumably refers to two things: (1) the fact that the rising air has 100% relative humidity at the surface and thus contains the maximum possible amount of water vapor and (2) the fact that once the unperturbed top is obtained, we, for some reason, cannot pull the curve any further to the left.
This approach ignores rainfall and other fluxes: it only requires a difference in the water vapor content between hurricane air and the wider environment. Since this difference is provided by evaporation, other factors such as rainfall are, this approach suggests, irrelevant.
Thus obtained surface pressure drop appears to be highly sensitive to minimal variations of atmospheric parameters in the vicinity of the unperturbed top. This sensitivity of the surface pressure estimates to parameters set at the top of the troposphere was discussed by Holland (1997) and, from a different perspective, by Makarieva et al. (2015a). However, the main problem with this approach is that it is not specified why an unperturbed point should exist at all in the presence of hurricanes. Why cannot we pull the pressure difference distribution even further to the left reaching greater surface pressure drops?
In MR’s approach maximum potential intensity (MPI) is a unique function of the relative humidity H in the hurricane core (provided the environmental pressure profile and surface temperature Ts are known). The temperature and pressure of the unperturbed top is also set by H. Emanuel (1986) modified MR’s approach by adding one more free parameter to the MPI calculation. In his approach the environment is represented not by a fixed pressure profile, but by an isotherm and an adiabat (see curves DE and EF, respectively, in Fig. 1). Varying the altitude where the isotherm and the adiabat meet (i.e. point E), for a given H in the hurricane core it is possible to arrange an unperturbed top at any desirable altitude, pressure level and temperature. The temperature of the unperturbed top has become a free parameter called the outflow temperature To.
With two isotherms (one at the surface and another in the upper atmosphere, curves FB and DE in Fig. 1) and two adiabats (BD and EF) it became possible to interpret the hurricane as a Carnot cycle working on an isothermal oceanic surface and receiving heat and moisture from the ocean.
But it is a peculiar kind of Carnot cycle. Emanuel’s approach retained an essential property of MR’s approach: no mechanical work is performed in the upper atmosphere. Indeed, when an air parcel of a given mass rises from the surface in the hurricane core to reach the unperturbed top, then flows along the unperturbed top to the outer environment where it descends back to the surface, such an air parcel does not generate any mechanical work along its path (see Appendix A in Makarieva et al. 2017b for details). This is because the change of its potential energy along this path is zero, and no kinetic energy is generated either because at the unperturbed top there is no horizontal pressure gradient (by definition). Likewise, Emanuel’s hurricane is assumed to produce zero work in the upper atmosphere. Thus the total work produced by this Carnot cycle is equal to the work at the lower isotherm (surface); this mechanical work takes the form of the kinetic energy of the hurricane.
The rest is simple: since work W on the warmer isotherm is a function of the surface pressure difference Δps, while heat input Q is a function of Δps and ΔH, relating W = kQ via Carnot efficiency k=(Ts–To)/Tsprovides an equation on Δps as a function of k and ΔH. The intensity of such a cycle can be considered a maximum in that sense that all kinetic energy is produced at the warmer isotherm – i.e. at the surface where the hurricane develops. Nothing is left for the upper atmosphere.
The sensitivity problem persists and the question why work in the upper atmosphere should be zero, lying at the heart of this approach, remains unanswered.
Before Holland (1997) exposed the high sensitivity of MPI to the outflow temperature, DeMaria and Kaplan (1994) had compiled intensity estimates of North Atlantic hurricanes to find that maximum intensity for each surface temperature agrees favorably with Emanuel’s MPI — provided some dependence is postulated between the surface and outflow temperatures. Since the outflow temperatures are defined and measured with far less certainty than surface temperatures, it was difficult to test this dependence empirically. Since then, MPI is considered as a plausible upper limit to hurricane intensity.
Reports of intensity beyond the MPI are rare but they do occur (see Montgomery et al. (2006)discussing Hurricane Isabel in 2003); to our knowledge, sporadic mentions of these intensity “over-achievers” are not systematized.
When in 2000 Pauluis, Balaji and Held proposed that the gravitational power of precipitation makes a significant contribution to the atmospheric power budget, nobody in the hurricane world seemed to notice. (The fact that it was the 21st century before the atmospheric sciences noticed rain as something beyond latent heat, is interesting in itself. Even now the global gravitational power of precipitation has only been estimated by only one group, ours — and we have recently submitted this estimate to publication.)
Another advance occurred in 2015 when a team of Japanese physicists estimated that in hurricanes, too, a significant part of the circulation power goes to raise the rainwater. They noted that hurricane intensity (i.e. their kinetic energy) must be significantly influenced by this drain on their energy substantially reducing estimates. Thus Sabuwala et al. (2015) published corrected intensity estimates for the 1999-2010 hurricane seasons — all by 10-30% lower than the conventional MPI. Since most hurricanes never reach their MPI, accounting for the gravitational power of precipitation has driven the corrected intensity estimates closer to observations. The authors interpreted this as a positive thing.
However, this achievement has raised a problem: what about those most intense hurricanes that have been previously shown, by DeMaria and Kaplan (1994) and others, to match the uncorrected (i.e. overestimated) MPI? Since those hurricanes do raise rainwater too, they are apparently over-achievers – i.e. total mechanical work performed by them goes beyond the Carnot cycle output.
Fig. 4. This is modified Fig. 1 of DeMaria and Kaplan (1994) (small black dots and thin curves) where we conservatively (and very approximately) applied the intensity corrections from Fig. 4a of Sabuwala et al. (2015) (large red dots and thick curve). Hurricanes above the red curve are potential “over-achievers” (1-5% of all observations).
Thus, now we do not just have hurricane Isabel possessing an apparently higher intensity than MPI (see Montgomery et al. 2006). We have a whole population of them.
The findings of Sabuwala et al. indicate conceptual problems with the MPI approach, which could be expected to have stirred a community of theorists. Yet, two years after publication in a high profile journal, this illuminating study has only one citation as reported by CrossRef — that was by our team.
To summarize, the problems with the current MPI approach are
The use of numerical models to understand hurricanes deserves a comment. To generate a hurricane, we must remove air to reduce surface pressure and generate the center of the storm. This requires air flowing out from the hurricane center. In modern hurricane models this radial motion is governed by parameters of turbulent friction — these parameters are fitted empirically to provide a realistic pressure profile (e.g., Bryan and Rotunno 2009). Such models — by their construction — are unable to test whether (and to what degree) the pressure surplus associated with a higher water vapor content in the hurricane core can produce the pressure gradients required to drive an intense hurricane. Likewise, switching rainfall “on” and “off” in such fitted-parameter models sheds little light on how rainfall influences hurricane dynamics.
We thus argue that there are good grounds to revisit the imperatives set out half a century ago when the knowledge about the atmosphere, and the resources allocated to study it, were way poorer than they are now. The statement that the rain does not matter should be re-considered.
Having established a linear correlation between rainfall rate and hurricane intensity Sabuwala et al. 2015 were apparently puzzled as to how to best account for what people actually think about rainfall in this field. In the Introduction, with a reference to Rodgers et al. 1994, Sabuwala et al. discussed the idea that rainfall can actually increase hurricane intensity: “latent heat is released which helps propel the updraft, which in turn increases the supply of water vapor and so forth.” However, this reasoning, as we have discussed, runs counter to the conventional paradigm, which denies any importance for rainfall intensity.Emanuel (1991) put it in this way: “Attempts to regard the condensation heat source as external lead to the oft-repeated statement that hurricanes are driven by condensation of water vapor, a view rather analogous to that of an engineer who proclaims that elevators are driven upward by the downward acceleration of counterweights.”
(It is of interest that in a closely related field monsoon scientists widely use the concept of “moisture advection feedback” – whereby the circulation intensity is assumed to be proportional to the (horizontal differences in) rainfall intensity – exactly because it is believed that latent heat release is proportional to rainfall rate and is what propels updrafts etc.)
Sabuwala et al. further noted that “from the positive correlation between P [precipitation] and V [hurricane wind speed] evinced in Figure 1d, it is tempting to argue that the effect of rainpower is to increase hurricane intensity. And yet positive correlation might not signify causality nor can the effect of P on V be understood in isolation from other aspects of a hurricane’s thermodynamics.”
However, the dependence between rainfall and hurricane intensity is not just a “positive correlation”. We have formulated a theoretical approach that quantitatively explains the empirical dependence between rainfall and hurricane intensity.
Fig. 5. Observations of Sabuwala et al. 2015 explained in the framework of condensation-induced hurricanes (Makarieva et al. 2015b).
In our approach, rather than being driven by latent heat, the hurricane is driven by condensation which releases potential energy accumulated in the form of atmospheric water vapor. As the water vapor condenses in the rising air, a non-equilibrium vertical pressure gradient forms that enhances the ascending motion. Once the hurricane air reaches the height where condensation ceases, it is propelled away by the centrifugal force — the centrifugal force overcomes the horizontal pressure gradient which diminishes with height. In other words, the air outflow can efficiently occur at the expense of the centrifugal force — it does not require any pre-existing pressure surplus shown in Fig. 2. Work output in the upper atmosphere can be negative (similar to what happens in Ferrel cells, see Makarieva et al. 2017b) — it does not have to be zero as currently assumed.
Hurricane power is determined by the work per unit time of the non-equilibrium pressure gradient of water vapor that formes during condensation. As water vapor fuels the storm, it is the availability of this vapor and the rate at which it can drawn into the cyclone that limits its intensity. Such processes are not steady-state Carnot cycles receiving heat from the ocean but rather deplete the potential energy of the pre-existing water vapor and can thus outperform a Carnot cycle. Key to hurricane intensity is the availability of water vapor in the surrounding atmosphere.
Thus hurricanes are not steady-state Carnot cycles receiving heat from the ocean – they deplete potential energy of the pre-existing water vapor as they move — as an avalanche. This explains why they can outperform a Carnot cycle.
Our view is that the same energy that powers hurricanes also drives many other air circulation patterns. This includes the main atmospheric transport of water vapor from the ocean to land. On land the store of water vapor in the atmosphere is largely created and maintained by plants. Thus forest and vegetation can ensure you a persistent flow of moist air from the ocean – e.g. the Californian drought could be eased by large-scale restoration of natural forests. Likewise, securing Amazon forests is crucial for ensuring reliable rainfall through South America, including in agricultural regions (Nobre 2014). Plants matter for climate much more than many of us are used to thinking (Ellison et al. 2017). We urge greater attention to the role and dynamics of water vapor condensation in hurricanes and in atmospheric sciences more generally.
Moderation note: As with all guest posts, please keep your comments civil and relevant.
via Climate Etc. https://judithcurry.com
April 23, 2017 at 06:26AM
Iowa Climate Science Education 