A study published on 20 August 2024 titled “Roles of Earth’s Albedo Variations and Top-of-the-Atmosphere Energy Imbalance in Recent Warming: New Insights from Satellite and Surface Observations” by N. Nikolov and K.F. Zeller challenges the claims of the 6th Assessment Report (6AR) published by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) regarding “climate change”.
The 6th Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC AR6) concluded “It is very likely that well-mixed GHGs [greenhouse gases] were the main driver of tropospheric warming since 1979” (p. 5). This statement implies that all known climate forcings have properly been evaluated using the available data, and GHGs have been found to exert a disproportionally large radiative effect on the Global Surface Air Temperature (GSAT) over the past 45 years. However, a close examination of Chapter 7 … reveals that the observed decrease of Earth’s albedo and the corresponding increase of absorbed shortwave radiation by the planet for the past 20 years have not been taken into account as a contributor to the recent warming.
To the authors’ knowledge, “no study has yet quantified the amount of warming attributable to solar forcing alone”.
The model uses monthly time series of top-of-the-atmosphere radiative fluxes, lower-troposphere (near-surface) temperatures, and ocean temperatures at the depth range of 0m to 100m. The study period is from March 2000 to December 2023. This is then compared to actual data.
The GSAT anomalies track changes in the absorbed solar flux with a variable lag of 0 to 9 months (the average lag is approximately 4 months). This close empirical relationship suggests a direct control of the absorbed solar flux on GSAT. Dividing the measured surface warming trend (0.23 K/decade) by the observed trend of the absorbed solar flux (0.797 (W m−2)/decade) produces an empirical estimate of the Earth’s climate sensitivity to absorbed shortwave radiation: 0.288 K/(W m−2). For comparison, Equation (15b), which solely quantifies the effect of absorbed solar fluxes on GSAT, yields a climate sensitivity of 0.297 K/(W m−2). The close agreement between these two estimates, along with the slightly higher value of the modeled sensitivity, indicates that the observed warming during the past 24 years was likely caused by a planet-wide increase of shortwave-radiation absorption resulting from a decrease of Earth’s albedo. [Emphasis mine.]
As for the claim that greenhouse gases trap thermal energy which then heats up the ocean, implying longwave (LW) radiation, “it is well-known that thermal radiation only penetrates less than a millimeter into sea water before it is completely absorbed and, therefore, cannot directly warm the deep ocean”.
Figure 8 shows that the mean annual temperature of the top 100 m ocean water closely follows changes in the absorbed solar flux by the planet. The dynamics of this flux explains 80% of the observed interannual ocean temperature variability in the upper mixed layer. Unlike the LW radiation, sunlight easily penetrates to a depth of 100 m and more in the ocean. Hence, the CERES data strongly suggest that, for the past 2.4 decades, the global ocean has been heated directly by shortwave radiation rather than indirectly by atmospheric thermal radiation thought to modify a hypothetical TSL [Thermal Skin Layer] and cause heat retention in the deeper ocean. [Emphasis mine.]
The inconsistencies regarding the so-called Earth Energy Imbalance (EEI) are discussed. This may be of interest to mechanical engineers as it is discussed in thermodynamic terms. The authors assert that the mechanics of heat transfer regarding greenhouse gases are fundamentally misunderstood.
If there was such an effect, “any real forcing (or amplifying feedback) outside of the increased planetary uptake of solar radiation would have produced additional warming above and beyond the amount explained by changes in the planetary albedo and TSI”. However, there is no such additional warming according to the available data.
[EEI] is defined as the difference between the absorbed shortwave and outgoing LW flux at the TOA. … However, our analysis of observed data, model calculations, and standard thermodynamic theory showed that EEI has been misinterpreted by the science community, since it arises from adiabatic dissipation of thermal energy in ascending air parcels in the troposphere due to a decreasing atmospheric pressure with height.
In short, as stated in the conclusion, “solar forcing (i.e., TSI and albedo changes) measured by CERES explain 100% of the observed global warming trend and 83% of the interannual GSAT variability over the past 24 years (Figure 9), including the extreme 2023 heat anomaly (Figure 10)”.
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