[Lore]

The rapid loss of the Ogallala Aquifer is exacerbated by climate change. More evaporation, more water needed.

[dohboi]

"The loss of the Ogallala Aquifer...has nothing to do with Climate Change."

Again, the article doesn't claim this (one wonders why you constantly think people are making claims about GW that they just aren't), though as Lore points out, it is rather obviously an exacerbating factor (thought they might not have covered that in your elementary school).

In fact, the article I cited says that compared to this loss of water, the effects of GW are just going to be branches hitting the windshield as the car speeds toward the brick wall.

[joewp]

I'm sorry we squandered the water by spraying it into the air. But I do not regret feeding people or farm animals from the grain produced. I have here in the PO Forum listed the exhaustion of the Ogallala several times as the #1 environmental issue, ahead of both Fossil Fuels exhaustion and Climate Change.

The rest of you are still denying the truth. It truly is impossible at the present time to be a champion of BOTH mankind and the Environment. There are simply too many people present for the rest of the Biosphere to survive. The planet dies around us, and the die-off accelerates as time passes.

I know it, and I don't deny it. What about you?

It sure sounds like you regret it, with your list of the intelligent things we should have done with the Ogallala, all of which would have delayed the depletion of the aquifer for centuries and probably kept the human population down to more reasonable levels.

I'm not denying the truth. For decades, if not a over a century, we've been past overshoot. The crash is coming. But at this point, I'm more inclined to ramp up mitigation strategies even at the expense of humans. We lost the real intelligence test, we failed to keep our population in line with the environment that supports us. So I'd rather help nature along a little while we still can to perhaps clean up some of our mistakes and give the rest of life on the planet a small window of hope, rather than continuing a bad idea, constant growth in a finite environment.

Knowing that nature bats last, I'd prefer to go all in on the sure thing.

[Lore]

This is known as burning the candle at both ends.

[KaiserJeep]

Well, we are in agreement about the brick wall.

The overpopulation of humans produces a lot of water vapor, including that transpired by humans and human food animals. We are diverting so much fresh water that the increase in sea water salinity is measurable, not good news for the oceans.

One of my problems with AGW is that I believe that the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has negligible effects, but the water vapor does not. But the role of water vapor in climate change depends upon what form it is in. Water vapor is a potent GHG that increases heat absorption, and condensed vapor in the form of high altitude clouds reflects infrared and has a cooling effect. Yet low altitude clouds absorb heat and change to vapor, which causes more heat absorption and still more transpiration from animals and plants.

Modelling the actual impact of water vapor is much harder than carbon dioxide. But water vapor is a more potent GHG and the atmosphere contains a lot of it. I think when you ignore the water vapor effects you cannot make a valid climate model. Which is pretty much why every single model that is based on carbon dioxide content alone is broken.

[Lore]

Higher levels of CO2 in turn raises the amount of water vapor the atmosphere can carry. This is a primary positive feedback in AGW.

[KaiserJeep]

Higher levels of CO2 in turn raises the amount of water vapor the atmosphere can carry. This is a primary positive feedback in AGW.

While this is true, it only makes a difference at the high end of the humidity scale when the relative humidity approaches 100%. The net effect of the higher carbon dioxide content in modern times is to enable the 100% relative humidity to increase to the equivalent of 100.00001%. Even on a planetary scale, the net impact is extremely hard to measure.

By contrast, the spraying of megatons of liquid water into the air has an immediate and easy to measure local effect. The practice of spray irrigation is so widespread that the cumulative impact is significant. Likewise the human population overshoot is huge and distributed around the globe. Humans and food animals produce heat both directly and indirectly by exhaling water vapors that absorb infrared energy near the Earth's surface.

I actually believe that halting the burning of FF's will not affect climate change. We are so far beyond the carrying capacity of the Earth that the mere presence of so many humans and food animals dooms the planet. We consume too much food and water and oxygen, and produce two much solid and liquid and gaseous waste products. The Earth is starting to smell bad, look bad, and die.

[Lore]

Higher levels of CO2 in turn raises the amount of water vapor the atmosphere can carry. This is a primary positive feedback in AGW.

While this is true, it only makes a difference at the high end of the humidity scale when the relative humidity approaches 100%. The net effect of the higher carbon dioxide content in modern times is to enable the 100% relative humidity to increase to the equivalent of 100.00001%. Even on a planetary scale, the net impact is extremely hard to measure.

This is pretty basic understanding. If the air temperature is 55F rather then 50F, the warmer atmospheric temperature will retain more water vapor. The connection to increased temperature is why it's snowing more in the Antarctic which should be the world's largest desert and also the coldest place on the planet. Once the atmosphere reaches maximum saturation, how much being dependent on temperature, precipitation falls out at100% humidity. The relationship not being insignificant since the warming atmosphere of the last century can now retain more moisture content.

Basic theory, observations and climate model results all show that the increase in water vapor is roughly 6 percent to 7.5 percent per degree Celsius warming of the lower atmosphere.

https://www-pls.llnl.gov/?url=science_a ... s-moisture

It's also not negligible, since CO2 has a long term compound effect which amplifies the positive feed backs it triggers.

[joewp]

This is known as burning the candle at both ends.

Nah, we threw that candle into a pre-heated 500 F oven, that's what we did.

[dohboi]

KJ, the depth of your ignorance in these matters seems to be boundless. You might have noticed that most of the surface of the earth is covered with water. If the temperature goes up, more of that water evaporates into the atmosphere. All human activity wrt direct evaporation is minor compared to this basic physical fact.

When the temperature goes up, because of CO2 and other GHGs, more water can be evaporated from this vast pool (as well as from soils and some other sources). Last I heard, average global humidity has gone up by about 6% from these dynamics. This is one of the basic 'fast' feedbacks included in every climate model for the last 50 years, at least.

Do you really think that you have stumbled across some basic physics that somehow eluded all the scientists who spend their lives studying this stuff??? Wow. Talk about Dunning Kruger!!!

Now, please, if you want to question the basic elements of physics, please start your own thread on that marvelous subject and do it there.

If you have some news or accurate information about desertification, please do share it here.

Otherwise, take it elsewhere.

[KaiserJeep]

-snip-

This is pretty basic understanding. If the air temperature is 55F rather then 50F, the warmer atmospheric temperature will retain more water vapor. The connection to increased temperature is why it's snowing more in the Antarctic which should be the world's largest desert and also the coldest place on the planet. Once the atmosphere reaches maximum saturation, how much being dependent on temperature, precipitation falls out at 100% humidity. The relationship not being insignificant since the warming atmosphere of the last century can now retain more moisture content.

Basic theory, observations and climate model results all show that the increase in water vapor is roughly 6 percent to 7.5 percent per degree Celsius warming of the lower atmosphere.

https://www-pls.llnl.gov/?url=science_a ... s-moisture

It's also not negligible, since CO2 has a long term compound effect which amplifies the positive feed backs it triggers.

True as far as it goes, but my point was that the enhanced carbon dioxide content, while it does increase water vapor capacity, does not do so with enough magnitude to make a difference.

Just as when a mouse farted during hurricane Katrina, the duration, intensity, and direction of the storm changed by a miniscule, probably impossible to even measure amount.

The extra water vapor carrying capacity in an atmosphere with modern carbon dioxide content differs from before such changes by a miniscule amount.

The phenomenon you are discussing, the water vapor carrying capacity as a factor of temperature, is a different discussion, and absolutely dominates the difference between an atmosphere with 275 ppm carbon dioxide, and one with 400 ppm carbon dioxide.

The only thing we disagree about is whether the water vapor or the carbon dioxide is driving global temperatures. I think water vapor has a much greater impact, clearly you do not.

dohboi, you are an insulting idiot. I learned about dew points before you were born, and later in life became a weather observer certified by NOAA for numerous tasks including measuring humidity for the official records.

[dohboi]

Resorting to name calling just confirms that you have no other arguments and have no glimmering clue what you are talking about. Now take it elsewhere.

[dohboi]

Heartland water crisis: Why the planet depends on these Kansas farmers – ‘We need to make sure our grandkids and our great grandkids have the capacity to feed themselves’

http://www.desdemonadespair.net/2014/07 ... lanet.html

In America’s Breadbasket, a battle of ideas is underway on the most fundamental topics of all: food, water, and the future of the planet.

Last August, in a still-echoing blockbuster study, Dave Steward, Ph.D., and his colleagues at Kansas State University, informed the $15 billion Kansas agricultural economy that it was on a fast track to oblivion. The reason: The precipitous, calamitous withdrawal rates of the Ogallala Aquifer...
Steward’s study predicted that nearly 70 percent of the portion of the Ogallala beneath western Kansas will be gone in 50 years. He’s not the kind of person to shout these results; he speaks slowly and carefully. Yet, he has the evident intensity of one who’s serving a greater purpose...

Now the chief executive of the state, himself from a farming family, is using Steward’s report as a call to action.

“One of the things we [have] to get over … is this tragedy of the commons problem with the Ogallala,” says Governor Sam Brownback, a Republican who at age 29 was the youngest agriculture secretary in state history. “It’s a big common body of water. It’s why the oceans get overfished … You have a common good and then nobody is responsible for it.”

“That’s one of the key policy issues that you have to get around,” Brownback says in his roomy, towering office at the capitol in Topeka. “Everyone has to take care of this water.”

In that spirit, a tiny legion of farmers and landowners in the northwest corner of Kansas, where the Rockies begin their rise, have just begun year two of what could be one of the most influential social experiments of this century.

[Serial_Worrier]

Frying through this record-hot summer, I'm wondering if these are the early stages of the vaunted die-off so many on PO.com preached about for years. We didn't listen...

[KaiserJeep]

Resorting to name calling just confirms that you have no other arguments and have no glimmering clue what you are talking about. Now take it elsewhere.

Rest assured that if I had called you a name, I would have capitalized such a name. But I did not, I used the lower case descriptive insult "idiot" to answer your own insult which was "KJ, the depth of your ignorance in these matters seems to be boundless."

Which you still found it necessary to say even after I took the time to explain that I was NOT EVEN TALKING ABOUT the point you are arguing, and in fact you were the one who was not following the actual topic.

Now go back, read what I actually said, and if my point still escapes you, either ask me or consult some Physics text for a refresher on the Bögel modification to the Magnus formula.

For the record, I DON'T think you are ignorant, because you show signs of understanding the various gas laws. But I do think you are one of those people who were not harmed in the least by your exposure to Physics, you got the grade, but you are not someone who uses the knowledge thus acquired to understand the world he lives in. This actually describes most people who think of Physics as abstract knowledge.

[Newfie]

Frying through this record-hot summer, I'm wondering if these are the early stages of the vaunted die-off so many on PO.com preached about for years. We didn't listen...

I think you are on to something. In general it seems the news is pretty bad and there is downward pressure everywhere.

Some say the Arab Spring was about food and economics.
Syria is really about water.
Various drought/floods are unprecedented and put. Upward pressure on food stuffs.
Oil resources are depleting in the face of unwarranted optimism.

The real question is when do the average guys grab their pitchforks?

[dohboi]

Right now, the general FAO Food Price Index is not setting records. On the other hand, we are at the third highest level of prices for this time of year in modern history. So, yeah...upward pressure.

[Lore]

True as far as it goes, but my point was that the enhanced carbon dioxide content, while it does increase water vapor capacity, does not do so with enough magnitude to make a difference.

You have a different idea of what's significant. CO2 levels have helped add an additional .85°C to global temperatures since 1880. Which, as I pointed out, means the moisture content of the atmosphere has increased by upwards of 7%. That is a lot of water vapor!

Just as when a mouse farted during hurricane Katrina, the duration, intensity, and direction of the storm changed by a miniscule, probably impossible to even measure amount.

Poor analogy, you're not talking about the same mechanics.

The extra water vapor carrying capacity in an atmosphere with modern carbon dioxide content differs from before such changes by a miniscule amount.

That amount of CO2 added has a dramatic effect on overall climate. The climate sensitivity related to the amount the temperature will increase resulting from CO2 above the 275 ppm pre-industrial levels means, that at our current rate, temperatures will rise on an average an additional 1.5°C to 4.5°C by centuries end. That is not a miniscule effect.

http://www.climate.gov/news-features/cl ... ial-levels

The phenomenon you are discussing, the water vapor carrying capacity as a factor of temperature, is a different discussion, and absolutely dominates the difference between an atmosphere with 275 ppm carbon dioxide, and one with 400 ppm carbon dioxide.

No, it's the same discussion since water vapor is a GHG, but it is not a temperature forcing. It's a feedback, while CO2 acts as a trigger to increase temperature.

Here's a video from our good friend Peter Sinclair based on the accepted science to help educate you in the differences.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LAtD9aZYXAs

The only thing we disagree about is whether the water vapor or the carbon dioxide is driving global temperatures. I think water vapor has a much greater impact, clearly you do not.

I don't and neither do scientists. You're pushing an opinion based on a lack of science.

[dissident]

The usual denier "debate": ignore all established facts that do not fit your agenda.

If water vapour was a self-sustaining tracer in the atmosphere, then you would have epic spontaneous warming events where this forcing would be its own feedback. More moisture => higher temperature => more moisture. As Lore noted a very small temperature increase produces a significant moisture increase, it is a nonlinear, exponential dependence (one that will eventually saturate at much higher levels of both temperature and moisture). There is no evidence of such events in the geological record. All the previous warmings and coolings are associated with CO2 and CH4.

The key detail is that water exists as a vapour in the atmosphere. It is continuously condensing and precipitating to the surface. It does not instantly re-evapourate and pools in oceans, lakes and ice sheets. The condensation feedback is stronger than any evapouration feedback. Why? Because the temperature is stratified along with the density. Density falls off with height exponentially, so that the atmosphere is optically thin in most bands above the tropopause and radiation to space is the leading order term in the radiative transfer equation. Temperature falls off linearly but this is due to the fact that convection warms upper layers. But even with convective heating the temperature still falls and is about 240 K at the tropopause, which is 33 K below freezing. In other words, the radiative cooling is so rapid in the upper troposphere and around the tropopause that it clamps down the whole water vapour cycle on the planet. From another view, the tropopause does not jump tens of kilometers higher sporadically and is very resistant to warming from below. Convection is acting like a very efficient heat pump to dump heat energy accumulated near the surface via infrared radiation to space near the tropopause.

In order to get more moisture to stay in the atmosphere in the face of this very efficient cooling and condensation mechanism requires a dry greenhouse gas like CO2. It maintains higher temperatures and is not subject to the convective cooling pump such as water vapour. It does not condense at 240 K and is well mixed all the way to 80 km. Dialing CO2 allows you to dial temperature. The water vapour feedback via the Clausius-Clapeyron relation is an added bonus.

A negative cloud feedback would require a coverage pattern not observed up to now. Specifically lots of low altitude clouds with very little high altitude clouds and more spatial extent. But higher temperatures dissipate clouds faster. It's that damned nonlinear Clausius-Clapeyron relation again. It is describing of the holding capacity of dispersed moisture and not condensate. This is why you get more extreme rain events. When the conditions for condensation are right, there is more available water vapour to condense. Higher temperatures are not consistent with more widespread condensation conditions and so deluge events are very sporadic (more of them would flush water vapour out of the system faster). In addition, the increase in moisture in the troposphere over the last 40 years has produced an observable trend of increasing cirrus (i.e. ice cloud) formation around the tropopause as well as increased moisture in the lowermost stratosphere. This moisture is acting as a literal greenhouse glass ceiling which is trapping infrared while allowing visible band light to penetrate. This is not the cloud feedback the deniers want.

[Keith_McClary]

I think when you ignore the water vapor effects you cannot make a valid climate model. Which is pretty much why every single model that is based on carbon dioxide content alone is broken.

Do you really think that climate models are "based on carbon dioxide content alone" and "ignore water vapor"?