Tuesday, May 20, 2014

Carbon Dioxide and Climate Change

Open Email to Bill O'Reilly:

Dear Bill,
I saw your presentation on climate change last evening. Congratulations for bringing this to public view. A second congratulations for the obvious conclusion that carbon dioxide in the atmosphere from the burning of fossil fuels, as being response for climate change, is a hoax.
If you will bear with me, I will go through a rather simple explanation of how greenhouse gases, including carbon dioxide affect Earth temperatures.
The sun sends radiation to the parts of the earth exposed to the sun during the day. The radiation can pass through the Earth's atmosphere unimpeded. Much of that radiation is converted to heat as it strikes the earth. At night, there is no incoming sun radiation and no heat generation on earth. The previously accumulated heat then passes through the atmosphere to interstellar space. However, the presence of greenhouse gases, including nitrogen, oxygen, and carbon dioxide are insulators and slow down the loss of Earth's heat at night. We need these greenhouse gas insulators to retain some heat until the resumption of radiation from the sun in a new day. Without the greenhouse gases, Earth's temperature would fall to 100 or more degrees Fahrenheit below zero and make the planet unlivable.
Of three atmospheric greenhouse gases under consideration, carbon dioxide has about twice the insulating capacity compared to nitrogen and oxygen. The insulation properties of these gases has been measured in the laboratory and are reported as thermal conductivities in the Gas Encyclopedia of Air Liquid.
It is also obvious that the degree of insulation resulting from any insulating material is related to its quantity. For example, the usual amount of fiberglass insulation in a house is 4 to 6 inches. If one puts in only an eighth of an inch of insulation, he is wasting his time, since the insulating effect will be almost nothing.
On the same basis, let's say that the insulating capacity of carbon dioxide is 2, while the insulating capacities of nitrogen and oxygen are each 1. The greenhouse effect th is en from nitrogen, would be it's concentration in the atmosphere, which is 78 %, times 1 to equal 0.78. For oxygen, it is 21% times 1 equals 0.21. For carbon dioxide, it is 0.05% times 2 equals 0.0010. Add the three to total 0.991. The collective greenhouse component for nitrogen and oxygen is then 0.990÷0.991 = 99.9% greenhouse effect. The greenhouse component for carbon dioxide is 0.001÷0.991 = 0.1% greenhouse effect.
Why should we get excited about an atmospheric carbon dioxide component which has only one thousandth greenhouse effect compared to the other gases of the atmosphere?

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