Climate Bell Science

Preamble explanation for other readers – When I did my May presentation, for a few weeks I checked this forum daily.  With no questions, I’d stopped checking it after a few weeks and forgot to go back until the fall.  Then I discovered Scott’s 3 posts and wrote him an email apology and we started corresponding ever since by email.  I’m answering his questions here for the sake of future visitors who might want the explanation and the answers Scott and I discussed outside this forum.  I appreciate Scotts questions, his donation he made back in May, and other comments he has made have been helpful in refocusing the website.

Answer - You are 100% correct for the absorbed photons.  This was an error of omission on my part in the presentation. From my early days of R&D starting in 2022 I was wondering about the ability of an excited GHG to have a net transfer of kinetic energy during a collision or experience a collision and subsequently launch a photon.  Some readings suggested yes, others disputed it, and then there was curves suggesting at lower temperatures it could be "frozen out" but I never found any calculations.  Then I saw Dr. Markus Ott's presentation in the spring of 2023 I believe and he did those calculations.  I plan to acknowledge his work and correct my deficiency from my May presentation.  As you point out, it isn't involved the the calculations needed for the escape of photons from the Earth System but it is important to acknowledge the two mechanisms for a better understanding of what is going on.  Thanks again for pointing it out and for your fall interactions and support donation this spring.  All the best, Rodney

Preamble explanation for other readers – When I did my May presentation, for a few weeks I checked this forum daily.  With no questions, I’d stopped checking it after a few weeks and forgot to go back until the fall.  Then I discovered Scott’s 3 posts and wrote him an email apology and we started corresponding ever since by email.  I’m answering his questions here for the sake of future visitors who might want the explanation and the answers Scott and I discussed outside this forum.  I appreciate Scotts questions, his donation he made back in May, and other comments he has made have been helpful in refocusing the website.

Answer - If you remove all the GHGs except CO2, you will find that the detailed HITRAN approach does give you similar numbers as the log approximation when you look at the radiative forcing field W/m^2.  They support each other.  Where the log function breaks down is when you go multiples higher or lower in concentration change.  But this is already known and stated by those using the log function. Thus GHG Lab doesn't have that limitation. For instance, going to zero for Input B, which is necessary for computing the Earth's heating calculation from GHG when say Input A is at 2023 levels for all GHGs and input B is at zero for all GHGs obviously would never work for a log approximation.  You are right that CO2 absorbs close to the surface but that is irrelevant in the Earth System model where computing the greenhouse effect gives you the temperature change. The LEARN center has been overhauled with a better explanation and I plan to explain it again in a presentation soon into the New Year. Thanks for all your help Scott.  You are a great supporter.

Functionality overview:  Climate Bell's calculator computes the power of the photons redirected back to (retained by) Earth's system when intercepted by GHGs in the atmosphere as illustrated in the diagram above.

Can I suggest a better explanation is that
"the calculator computes the power of photons absorbed by GHG and retained in the atmosphere as illustrated in the diagram above."

This removes the suggestion that photons and back radiation do any real warming when it is nearly always kinetic collisions that do the warming.

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