Part 2 Good Science Looks Bad for

Theory of Global Warming:

From a collection of articles, data, and

additional commentary by S.C. Luckhardt
DRAFT June 29, 2009

See also: GLOBAL ICE AGE PREDICTED BY CLIMATE SCIENTISTS by Gregory F.

Fegel, Pravda January 2009 http://english.pravda.ru/science/earth/106922-0/

Abstract: In the following we discuss historic climate data from two

sources. The 450-thousand year time-span Vostok ice cores, and the 5
million year climate record from the deep sea floor cores. Discussions of
this evidence of past climate change cycles leads us to conclusions about
likely climate changes in the future. Common misconceptions about the
importance of atmospheric CO2 and global warming are examined. The
discussion below is meant to be qualitative and accessible. Even so,
interesting observations and conclusions can be made by direct examination
of the analyzed data. This is possible because of the astonishingly high
quality of these data.

Contents by heading:

Caption. Quantities plotted in Figure 1

Figure 1. Vostok ice core climate data plot
Can atmospheric CO2 cause the temperature increase?
What about the effects of CO2 induced greenhouse warming?
How does this relate to present day CO2 induced greenhouse warming?
Figure 2. Five million year history of global climate variation from Lisiecki
and Raymo.
A few observations about the data in Figure 2 follow.
What is delta 18-O and delta 18-O Benthic Carbonate?
Here is a rough explanation of this isotope analysis.
Wikkipedia and common misconceptions about climate data and analysis.

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Figure 1. Vostok Ice Core Data over a 450,000 year time span from
Petit et al. Nature (1999).
The time axis of the graph below starts at zero on the left and proceeds into the past. The
causal events are therefore further to the right, earlier in time, than are the effect events.

Five quantities are plotted: The methane concentration indicator (CH4 green curve).
Ocean temperature indicator (red curve). Delta Oxygen 18 indicator (brown curve).
Atmospheric CO2 indicator (blue curve). The solar radiation indicator (Insolation, bottom
curve) roughly proportional to the daily average solar power striking the earth at the
given time. Insolation is the heat source for the earth’s climate.

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Can atmospheric CO2 be the cause of the temperature increase cycles?

With regard to the article http://english.pravda.ru/science/earth/106922-0/,

the author, Gregory Fegel, notes that in Figure 1 (above) the temperature
indicator, color coded red, rises earlier in time than the rise of the CO2
indicator, color coded blue. This can be verified by careful inspection and
analysis of the graphs in Figure 1. Hence it is concluded that increased CO2
concentration cannot be the cause of the temperature increase, delta T. That
is, the effect cannot occur before the cause. Rather, the author suggests that
natural cyclic warming (Milankovich cycle) of the oceans causes release of
CO2 into the atmosphere. Such a release of CO2 would naturally occur
because the solubility of CO2 in sea water decreases as the water
temperature increases. More CO2 gas comes out of the oceans and goes into
the atmosphere whenever the ocean temperature rises for any reason.

What about the effects of CO2 induced greenhouse warming?

We can draw an interesting conclusion about this question from the CO2
concentration data in Figure 1. During each warming cycle, the global
temperature reaches a maximum and then begins to cool. In the cooling
phase, there is a time period when the atmospheric CO2 concentration
remains elevated thus maximizing greenhouse warming, see Figure 1.
According to the historical record, this enhanced greenhouse warming was
not sufficient to prevent the onset of global cooling in these past climate
cycles. The data in Figure 1 shows that the global temperature
characteristically reached a peak and then began to decrease steeply in each
warming cycle. So it follows that even during periods of maximal CO2
concentration and maximal greenhouse warming, greenhouse warming was
insufficient to prevent the onset of global cooling and the subsequent ice age
cycle.

How does this relate to present day CO2 induced greenhouse warming?

The author G. Fegel addresses this question. Going again to the historic
record, he notes that past peaks in atmospheric CO2 concentration at
approximately 120ky, 230ky, and 320ky in Figure 1 are comparable and in
some cases larger than present day CO2 levels. In those cases atmospheric
CO2 induced greenhouse warming would have been comparable to what we

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are currently experiencing. Nevertheless, in these past climate cycles
greenhouse warming was not sufficient to prevent a reversal of the warming
trend and the subsequent global ice age phase.

It is well known that long term cyclic variations of average daily insolation
[average total solar radiation power onto the earth] are caused by natural
changes in the earth’s orbit and rotation axis. These changes in solar heating
occur on very long timescales and provide a rather good picture of historic
climate change data shown in Figure 1.

Although the so-called greenhouse-effect was undoubtedly occurring in past

climate cycles, it does not in itself appear as a significant causal agent of
past long-term global temperature variations. That is, one can get relatively
good agreement between climate modeling and historic data without need of
greenhouse effect corrections.

Moreover, in past climate cycles, maximal greenhouse warming, as indicated

by the CO2 concentration data in Figure 1, would have been comparable to
what we are experiencing at the present time. This suggests that
greenhouse-effect warming at present levels or even greater levels is not
sufficient to offset the insolation cycle, and a coming onset of global cooling
and subsequent ice age. In short, there is no evidence in Figure 1 that
present day levels of CO2 related greenhouse warming is substantially
different from that of past climate cycles.

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 Further data and discussion on global temperature
fluctuations, ice ages, warming ages.
Figure 2. DATA PLOT of five million year history of global climate variation from
Lisiecki and Raymo in (the Journal) Paleoceanography (2005).

Delta-T, the temperature variation relative to the present era baseline. Delta-
T is indicated by measured variations of Oxygen 18 concentration in deep
sea floor core samples. The time scale in Figure 2 covers the past 5 million
years. The present era is at “year zero” on the time axis and time marches
backward to the right. See below for details of data analysis.

A few observations about the data in Figure 2 follow.

First, very near the year zero time, one can see a strong warming trend
immediately after the most recent temperature minimum. The minimum
occurred at roughly 0.05 million years before the present. This most recent
temperature oscillation corresponds to the most recent ice age and the
subsequent present day warming trend.

Going back further in time, one sees repetitive short term warming and
cooling oscillations. This relatively rapid cycle repeats on a roughly 50 kyr
to 100 kyr timescale. Over the past few million years this oscillation
frequency is trending toward lower frequencies. Also evident in the Figure 1
data is a long term cooling trend during the past 3 million years.

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What is delta 18-O and delta 18-O Benthic Carbonate?

In both Figure 1 and Figure 2 a quantity called “delta of oxygen 18” is

plotted. These quantities in the data plots actually refer to somewhat
different drilling and analysis in the two figures. Since the two figures are
from different papers by different authors, it is not surprising. Below is a
brief overview of this type of oxygen 18 analysis and theory.

In Figure 1 the data comes from ice cores obtained by drilling into deep
ancient ice in the Antarctic. The deeper the ice, the older the ice. In fact the
top axis in Figure 1 gives the depth of each ice sample in meters and the
bottom axis gives the corresponding age of the ice deposit obtained from
that depth.

In Figure 2 drilling cores come from the sea floor and consist of deep layers
of accumulated sediment. Chronology is again established from the-deeper-
the-older concept. In both studies oxygen isotope analysis is used on
material samples from the drill cores.

Here is a rough explanation of this isotope analysis.

Oxygen atoms come in two isotopes 16O and 18O having atomic mass 16 and
18 respectively. Any sample of oxygen from nature will contain both
isotopes at a fixed concentration ratio. This ratio is called the natural isotopic
abundance ratio. However, there are natural isotope enrichment processes
that occur in the ocean. These include physical processes such as diffusion
and evaporation which tend to mobilize the lighter isotopes leading to small
but measurable variations of the isotope abundance ratios. Moreover, these
physical processes are strongly dependent on the ambient temperature and
their effects can therefore be used as an indicator of temperature change.

Next, we need samples of material to analyze.

Collected core samples from the ocean floor or from ice sheets can then be
analyzed. Measurements of the oxygen-18 oxygen-16 isotope ratios can be
done with great accuracy using sensitive mass spectrometers and thermal
desorption techniques. As you can imagine it requires a huge amount of
scientific work to get the data that is plotted in the above Figures.

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In order to track the natural isotope enrichment history, one tracks the
deviation in the enrichment from the natural isotope ratio. The deviation
from the natural ratio is referred to as “18O” and is the quantity plotted in
the Figures.

The term “benthic carbonate” refers to carbonate samples that originated in

the benthic zone. The benthic zone is the ecological region at the lowest
level of a body of water such as an ocean or a lake, including the sediment
surface and some sub-surface layers. Benthos are organisms inhabiting the
benthic zone. [Wikkipedia]

The plot, Figure 2, of “18O from benthic carbonate” refers oxygen isotope
analysis of calcium carbonate, CaCO3, deposits from drill core samples
obtained from the sea floor. The calcium carbonate is believed to originate
from skeletal remnants, shells, bones etc. of bottom dwelling foraminifera.

[Bottom dwelling foraminifera are sea creatures that crawl, walk, or slither
around on the sea floor.]

Wikkipedia and common misconceptions about climate data and analysis.

Popular discussions of these climate data range from thoughtful to careless

to bordering on disinformation. The following example is from a current
Wikkipedia entry relating to Figure 2. My comments and corrections are
added in italics.

Figure 2 above is from the paper of Lisiecki and Raymo (2005). It consists
of data from combined measurements on 57 globally distributed deep sea
sediment cores. The measured quantity is the oxygen isotope fractionation
(delta 18-O) in benthic foraminifera, which serves as a proxy for the total
global mass of glacial ice sheets.

[As far as I can see, the quantity 18O is used as an indicator of the
variation of the global ocean temperature. The authors of the paper, Lisiecki
et al. certainly appear use it as such. Considerably less clear is the assertion
by the Wikki author that 18O may be a strong indicator, e.g. proportional
to ice sheet coverage. -S.L.]

Lisiecki and Raymo constructed this record by first applying a computer

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aided process of adjusting individual "wiggles" in each sediment core to
have the same alignment (i.e. wiggle matching). Then the resulting stacked
record is orbitally

[Here the term ‘orbitally’ is used by the Wikki article’s authors to describe
well-known cycles of insolation caused by variations in the earth’s orbit and
it’s slowly changing axis of rotation. These cycles can be calculated rather
precisely using Newtonian mechanics and can be extended into the distant
past, even back to 5 million years ago. It seems likely that the Wikki authors
do not appreciate the mathematical precision of such calculations. They are
not ’assumptions,’ rather they are mathematically calculated quantities
stemming from basic Newtonian orbital mechanics. -S.L.]

tuned by adjusting the positions of peaks and valleys to fall at times

consistent with an orbitally driven ice model (see: Milankovitch cycles).
Both sets of these adjustments are constrained to be within known
uncertainties in sedimentation rates and consistent with independently dated
tie points (if any). Constructions of this kind are common, however they
presume that ice sheets are orbitally driven, and hence data such as this
cannot be used in establishing the existence of such a relationship.

The observed isotope variations are very similar in shape to the temperature
variations recorded at Vostok, Antarctica during the 420 kyr for which that
record exists. Hence the right hand scale of the Figure was established by
fitting the reported temperature variations at Vostok (Petit et al. 1999) to the
observed isotope variations. Hence, this temperature scale should be
regarded as approximate and its magnitude is only representative of Vostok
changes. In particular, temperature changes at polar sites, such as Vostok,
frequently exceed the changes observed in the tropics or in the global
average. A horizontal line at 0 °C indicates modern temperatures (circa
1950).

[However, the data in Figure 2 clearly shows the variation in temperature

indicator over an extensive time interval with very nice time resolution.
These features of the time series are independent of the absolute temperature
calibration factor. This data gives us a clear picture of these cyclic
oscillations in temperature and their time evolution that is more important
than their precise magnitude. -S.L. ]

Labels are added to indicate regions where 100 kyr and 41 kyr cyclicity [sic]

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is observed. These periodicities match periodic changes in Earth's orbital
eccentricity and obliquity respectively, and have been previously established
by other studies (not relying on orbital tuning).

Wikki authors do not give a satisfactory discussion of the significance of

their term ‘orbital tuning.’

For discussion of how such orbital changes might drive climate change, see
Milankovitch cycles.

[This Wikki article is an example of sloppy analysis and bad science. -S.L.]

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