Climate Policy

[kandrathe]

And how does the 88.7 break down, if not into anthropogenic sources?

Um, I'm not sure. It was related to the portion of the unsequestered CO2 based on calculations I used from some scientific paper. But, as I recall, the IPCC goes has 4 scenarios (Gton CO2 per annum);

Scn. Human (+) Natural (+) Subtotal (+) Natural (-) Net (+&-)
---------------------------------------------------------------
_A_ 7.0 (100%) 0.000 ( 00%) 07.000 03.50 (50%) 3.5
_B_ 7.0 ( 95%) 0.400 ( 05%) 07.400 03.90 (53%) 3.5
_C_ 7.0 ( 50%) 7.000 ( 50%) 14.000 10.50 (75%) 3.5
_D_ 7.0 ( 05%) 133.0 ( 95%) 140.00 136.5 (98%) 3.5

The IPCC prefers Scenario C (the 50/50 model) which results in 75% of the added carbon from both natural and human sources being sequestered, leaving 1.25 Gton / annum of anthropogenic CO2 left in the atmosphere (and 1.25 Gton from nature). But, it is likely all four scenarios are too static to be of much use anyway in describing such a dynamic system. There are large changes in the natural release of CO2, and also in the sequestration of CO2. It really shocks me that the measured CO2 increase is so very linear and constant. You would think if it were due to human release that it would vary with the world GDP, or at least the fluctuations in power plant usage. But, rather it oscillates up and down each year with the coming of summer and winter, almost as if it rose and fell with the average daily temperature.

Again, as I see there are two simple explanations (not that this is a simple problem); A) CO2 rises linearly with the seemingly linear increase of small levels of GHG's released by humans for the past 300 years, or B) CO2 rises with an increase in temperature due to a reduced ability of the environment to sequester it. So I think that is the $10,000 Climatologist question; which came first, the CO2 rise, or the temperature rise?