The heated debate about hot air

The heated debate as to which greenhouse gas effects are most to blame for global warming rages on almost without reference to the 10²⁰ to 10²¹ J of anthropogenic Q released into the atmosphere every year by the energy industry. This has been increasing since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution at about the same rate as the atmosphere's CO₂- and for the same reasons.

Solar and other radiations from space beam down onto the earth and are partly trapped in the atmosphere by greenhouse gasses. Some, of these gasses, and other substances in the atmosphere (smog), also prevent radiations from space by reflecting them straight back out. This is the case for anthropogenic cloud- for instance, the vapour trails of jet aircraft. Some of the sulfur pollutants released by fossil fuel combustion also reflect energy back into space. Some convert such energy into Q and trap it in the atmosphere..

The controversy could be resolved if it were known how much Q really is added to the atmosphere per year due to anthropogenic CO₂. According to [G07](1998 CD), 5 x 10⁹ tons of CO₂ are added to the atmosphere every year. [w01] states that the annual CO₂ increment is 12.5 x 10⁹ tons- 4 times less. With 1.5 x 10¹¹ tons of CO₂ accumulated in the atmosphere since 1750 [G07]; and atmospheric CO₂ from 278 parts per million in 1750 to 365 ppm in 1998 ([G17]26, (IPCC 2001) the total weight of the CO₂ in the atmosphere in 1998 was 1.97 x 10¹¹ tons. That is 2.62 times more than the 0.750 x 10¹¹ tons indicated as the total weight of the CO₂ in the atmosphere given by [w01]

The amount of CO₂ in the atmosphere is open to debate. One reason for this is that there is so little of it that it is hard to measure. Different techniques yield different results. Spectroscopic measurements [w18] must be calibrated by tomoscopic or gravitometric measurements, both of which are imprecise by perhaps +/- 50%. CO₂ is a heavy gas- there is more of it close to the ground than high up. There is more in city air than in country air. Plants and oceans absorb or release it at different times of the year. Atmospheric CO₂ content is highly variable. This does not explain the 26800% discrepancy between [w01] and [G07], but does reveal the dubiousness of claims made for CO₂'s purported greenhouse gas effects.