Refrigerants in the Atmosphere

Open Email to EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy:

Dear Administrator McCarthy,
    In the June 17 issue of C&E News, Cheryl Hogue reports that Pres. Barack Obama and Chinese Pres. Xi Jinping have agreed to cooperatively phase down production and use of hydrofluorocarbons (HFC's). HFC's are used as refrigerants in air conditioning equipment. There is no indication of what would be used as a replacement, if HFC's were eliminated.

    It is also reported that HFC's have been adjudged to do no harm to stratospheric ozone. Ozone is said to be needed in the upper atmosphere in order to protect citizens from overexposure to ultraviolet at the surface. I will tentatively accept that conclusion.

    However, the main reason for the presidential agreement seems to be a matter of climate change. It is said that HFCs have a global warming potential 1300 times greater than that of CO2. I find that a very questionable assertion, since absorption of such heat by any molecule would be enough to break the bonds of atomic attraction. However, even if we take that at face value, we have to consider the extremely low concentration of such material in the atmosphere. Climate will be controlled by the majority of gases in the atmosphere, which includes nitrogen and oxygen. HFC's will have no significant effect on climate, because of their extremely low concentration.

Refrigerant Gases

Open email to Environmental Protection Agency Director Gina McCarthy:

Dear Director McCarthy,
    For those other persons who may also be reading this email, I explain that refrigerant gases are those gases which are used in mechanical heating and cooling devices, such as air conditioners, refrigerators, freezers, and heat pumps. While some naturally occurring gases, such as ammonia, can be used for this purpose, chemical companies have developed synthetic materials which are more efficient. The synthetic materials are usually methane modified with chlorine or fluorine.
    An article in the January 1 issue of Chemical & Engineering News is concerned with the the so-called threat of the synthetic refrigerant gases to the environment.
    In the manufacture of desired HFC-22, byproduct HFC-23 is also formed. Through the system of international "carbon credits", the manufacturers were paid to destroy the byproduct HFC-23, rather than release it into the environment. That profitable trading system involving destruction of HFC-23 has now ended, and it is supposed that manufacturers in China and India will now release HFC-23 to the atmosphere, rather than continue to destroy it.
    The concern is that HFC-23 is estimated to be a much more powerful greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide.
    As you know, being part of the Obama Administration,, the party line is to relate greenhouse gas emissions, particularly carbon dioxide, to global warming. There is no satisfactory mechanism suggested by which there is a connection between these two, but that seems to be irrelevant with respect to the Administration's desire.
    Since HFC-23 is considered a powerful greenhouse gas, which will also lead to global warming, the fear mongers are wringing their hands with respect to this new development. However, since there is no clear indication that global warming is related to increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration, it appears to me that we should not be concerned about any increase in atmospheric concentration of HFC-23, with respect to global warming.
    There is another factor that bears some consideration. That is, the effect of synthetic gases in the atmosphere with respect to ultraviolet density at the Earth's surface. The upper atmosphere contains a high concentration of ozone. Its purpose appears to be to react with incoming ultraviolet light (UV) from the sun to reduce the concentration of UV reaching the Earth's surface. Excessive concentrations of UV at the Earth surface are a physical danger to humans.
    HFC-22 has been found to be an ozone depletor, which means that by its presence in the atmosphere, less ozone will be available in the upper atmosphere, and more dangerous UV will arrive at the year's surface. While I am not inclined to believe that there is any effect of carbon dioxide relating to global warming, I tend to believe that the ozone/UV problem is real.
    Fortunately, HFC-23 is considered NOT to be an ozone depletor.
    The net result is that I anticipate no adverse effects on global warming nor increase in UV concentration at the Earth's surface by the fact that synthetic refrigerant manufacturers will no longer be destroying HFC-23 and will release it to the atmosphere. However, I do find it objectionable from the general point of view that we don't know what other damage HFC-23 will do to the environment. We do know that is a very stable compound and will tend to accumulate in the atmosphere. The good news is that according to the C&E News article, manufacture of HFC-22 (and HFC-23 as byproduct) is being phased out in developed countries starting this year.

Sincerely,
Arthur C Sucsy PhD

Global Warming

 

Submitted by a Political Associate:  The Arctic Ocean is warming up, icebergs are growing scarcer and in some places the seals are finding the water too hot, according to a report to the Commerce Department yesterday from Consulafft, at Bergen , Norway Reports from fishermen, seal hunters, and explorers all point to a radical change in climate conditions and hitherto unheard-of temperatures in the Arctic zone. Exploration expeditions report that scarcely any ice has been met as far north as 81 degrees 29 minutes. Soundings to a depth of 3,100 meters showed the gulf stream still very warm. Great masses of ice have been replaced by moraines of earth and stones, the report continued, while at many points well known glaciers have entirely disappeared. Very few seals and no white fish are found in the eastern Arctic, while vast shoals of herring and smelts which have never before ventured so far north, are being encountered in the old seal fishing grounds.Within a few years it is predicted that due to the ice melt the sea will rise and make most coastal cities uninhabitable. * * * * * * * * * I apologize, I neglected to mention that this report was from November 2, 1922, as reported by the AP and published in The Washington Post - 90 years ago. **************

More Negatives on Global Warming

  Excerpts from The Global Warming Policy Foundation ( http://www.thegwpf.org/category/science-news/ ):

  Vladimir Kotlyakov, from the Russian Academy of Sciences, said: ‘There are no grounds to claim that global warming will continue till the end of this century." A period of low solar activity is predicted between 2030 and 2040, and the earth’s average temperature is expected to fall by several degrees.
The area of Antarctica sea ice is now the second largest in 34 years.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change 4th Assessment report said in 2007 that for the next two decades, a warming of about 0.2°C per decade is projected. However, since 1998 there has been no statistically significant increase in global surface temperature.
There is compelling evidence that, across the disciplines, peer review often fails to root out science fraud.
The UK’s “irrational” use of biofuels will cost motorists around £460 million over the next 12 months, and the growing reliance on sustainable liquid fuels will also increase food prices

Laboratory Work on CO2/Global Warming Needed

Open email to explorers and producers of crude oil and associated products:

Pres. Obama told scientists at Argonne National Laboratories on March 15 that he wants to shift our cars and trucks entirely off oil. In effect, he wants to put you out of the oil business.
To do this, he will collect from you royalties paid for your drilling in federal waters. He expects to collect from you $2 billion over 10 years and use this money to develop advanced electric vehicles. Notice that he will be asking you to pay for your own demise

It seems to me that you have two choices. Either go into the electric car business or fight Obama's proposal with technological information.

For some years, we imported considerable quantities of crude oil and still do. Because of that, there have been continued minor attempts to release our economy from dependence on imported oil. That has recently changed. Large quantities of shale gas are now available through improved fracking technology. Similarly, advanced drilling technology has also made available increased quantities of crude oil. In several years, we can be basically energy independent. This obviates one of the reasons for Pres. Obama's push for electric vehicles.

The other reason for Pres. Obama's program to eliminate use of oil in motor vehicles is the fact that one of the products of use is emission of carbon dioxide. He has related carbon dioxide emissions to increased concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and the simultaneous include increase in global warming. Since global warming supposedly will have dire effects on the world economy, he takes the attitude that we obviously have to control global warming and eliminating carbon dioxide emissions will do that.

However, he has no basis for that conclusion other than the two facts. Atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration has been increasing simultaneously with increasing global temperature. He has taken no consideration that these two facts may be coincidental and unrelated. For some reason, he wants to place the blame for global temperature increase on carbon dioxide. You are responsible, because you produce oil and sell it to people who use it unwisely, such as transportation.

As a scientist, I see the weakness in this correlation, especially having checked some fundamental data available on the Internet. The term "greenhouse gas" has been invented and subsequently relegated as a bad term, even though greenhouse gases are responsible for our ability to live on this planet. The Obama theory is that the sun's radiation comes through the atmosphere unimpeded, strikes the earth surface to generate heat, which cannot pass out to the stratosphere, because of the presence of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere at 350 ppm. However, when one checks the insulation capabilities of various atmospheric gases, as reported in the Air Encyclopedia, carbon dioxide heat insulation is not significantly different from the other natural gases, such as oxygen and nitrogen.

I strongly recommend that you engage in a significant research effort, starting in the laboratory and following through to real-life speculation concerning whether carbon dioxide is a culprit as designated by Obama or a figment of his imagination. Once you have become convinced one way or another, you can then either contradict Obama's claim or support it to your own demise.

Weakening Global Warming Data

The government of Australia has been a strong promoter of the nonexistent relationship, up to now, between global warming and atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration.
The Australian is a broadsheet newspaper published in Australia from Monday to Saturday each week since 14 July 1964. It is the biggest-selling national newspaper in the country, although local newspapers in Sydney and Melbourne have substantially higher circulation.
The Australian recently ran an extensive article on global warming.  http://m.theaustralian.com.au/news/features/twenty-year-hiatus-in-rising-temperatures-has-climate-scientists-puzzled/story-e6frg6z6-1226609140980.
The Australian article quotes from various sources as follows:
"DEBATE about the reality of a two-decade pause in global warming and what it means has made its way from the skeptical fringe to the mainstream.
In a lengthy article this week, The Economist magazine said if climate scientists were credit-rating agencies, then climate sensitivity - the way climate reacts to changes in carbon-dioxide levels - would be on negative watch but not yet downgraded.
Another paper published by leading climate scientist James Hansen, the head of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, says the lower than expected temperature rise between 2000 and the present could be explained by increased emissions from burning coal.
The Economist says the world has added roughly 100 billion tonnes of carbon to the atmosphere between 2000 and 2010, about one-quarter of all the carbon dioxide put there by humans since 1750. This mismatch between rising greenhouse gas emissions and not-rising temperatures is among the biggest puzzles in climate science just now, The Economist article says."

Carbon Dioxide and Global Warming

Open email to Sen. Cornyn (TX):

Dear Sen. Cornyn,
    Thank you for your two responses to my emails on carbon dioxide and global warming. I recognize that the burden of responding to all of your correspondence requires the use of various "form" paragraphs. Those paragraphs indicate to me your general thought processes on any specific subject.
    With all due respect, Senator, you have been hoodwinked into the global warming scheme, as have many other relatively educated Americans. You seem to accept a relationship between carbon dioxide concentration emissions, from burning fossil fuels, and any apparent increase in earth average temperatures. Nothing could be father from the truth.    In effect, you say carbon dioxide heats the earth. What should we do about it? An analogy could be: witches are bad. What should we do to control them. In both cases, one would be making an assumption on the reality of the situation, which really does not exist. If something is not real, why would one want to control it?
    If I may be so bold as to improve your education on the subject, you should not talk about carbon dioxide as a greenhouse gas, with the implication that it is essentially responsible for all of the projected devastation of global warming. In fact, our total atmosphere is composed of global warming gases. They are not only advantageous but absolutely necessary for the existence of life on earth, since they average out the temperatures between the light and dark side reception of radiation from the sun. NASA's writeups on global warming cover that point in the first step of its various essays.
    Since the natural atmospheric gases, most of which are nitrogen and oxygen, are responsible for the positive greenhouse effect that we have, a more logical question to pose is whether there is something unusual about carbon dioxide, which exacerbates the greenhouse effect to a dangerous level, even though it's concentration in the atmosphere is at the extremely low level of about 350 ppm. Before we move on to the subject of how to control carbon dioxide and the various costs associated, plus relationships with China and India, would it not be reasonable to first determine whether there is a problem?