What is the ECS ? (Equilibrium Climate Sensitivity) -- The right answer is so obvious that a six year-old child could explain it ... to 99.9% of climate scientists, who are clueless !

Does someone have
a six year-old child 
available to explain this ?

Ask any 
six year-old child
what the CO2 ECS is,
and he'll say:
"I don't know".

That's the 
RIGHT ANSWER

Yet over 99.9% of 
"climate scientists"
do not give that 
correct answer.

And 99.9% wrong,
is a serious problem:
It supports junk
climate science,
and two false claims:
(1)
The false 
claimed ability 
to predict
the future climate, 
as computer
         ( confuser ? )
climate "models" 
keep predicting 
triple the global 
warming rate 
that we have actually 
experienced
since the 1970s, 

(2) 
The false 
claimed ability 
to "know"
that the 
future climate
must be 
bad news,
even though the past
325 years of intermittent
global warming, since
the late 1600s, has been 
100% good news !



Climate sensitivity 

to CO2 is defined 

as the surface 

global warming

that occurs when 

the concentration 

of carbon dioxide 

in the atmosphere

doubles. 

The equilibrium climate 

sensitivity (ECS) 

is defined as the change 

in global mean surface 

temperature, caused by 

a doubling of the 

atmospheric carbon 

dioxide concentration, 

after the climate system 

has had several centuries 

to respond. 

It is not possible 

to measure ECS 

directly.

The climate sensitivity 

to carbon dioxide, 
or ECS, is unknown.

To know the "right" ECS,

you would first need scientific

proof that CO2 is causing 

warming in the troposphere.

The only real 

"scientific proof"

is indirect:

Infrared 

spectroscopy,

proving CO2 

acts as a mild

greenhouse gas,

in a closed system

lab experiment,

using artificially

dried air

Results of the

lab experiments,

merely assumed 

to also happen 

in the troposphere, 

suggest

an ECS 

of about 

+1 degree C., 

excluding any 

    (unknown) 

feedbacks.

To know the 

"right" ECS number

for the atmosphere,

you'd need to know

if there are feedbacks,

reducing or increasing

the alleged warming 

effects of CO2 alone.

Only then 

would you know

what percentage of 

total global warming 

was caused by increasing 

CO2 levels in the air.

The ECS 

is currently,

and has 

always been, 

an assumption 

-- a wild guess 

that covers

a very wild range.

There's no way 

to know how much

global warming 

was caused 

by CO2, if any, 

and how much 

global warming 

had other causes, 

both natural, and 

other man made

causes.

Unfortunately, 

most scientists

are reluctant to say 

"we don't know".

They prefer 

to wild guess

a very large

range for ECS.

And they 

seemed to find 

a very wide range 
guess they really liked

back In the 1970s.

That wild guessed 

1970's ECS range 

has barely changed

in 40 years.

Probably 

because 

if scientists 

revised their 

wild guess

more often,

fewer people 

would believe it.

Measurements

of actual warming

strongly suggest

a WORST CASE

estimate of 

CO2 global

warming effect, 

must be

BELOW

the low end 

( +1.5 degrees C. )

of the popular 

wild guessed 

range !

( +1.5 to +4.5 degrees C. )

2007:

The UN's IPCC 

Fourth Assessment 

Report (2007) stated:

"The equilibrium 

climate sensitivity

... is likely to be

in the range of 

+2◦C  to  +4.5◦C 

with a best estimate 

of about +3◦C,

and is very unlikely 

to be less than 

+1.5◦C. 

Values higher than 

+4.5◦C cannot be 

excluded."

2013:

The UN's IPCC

Fifth Assessment 

Report (2013):

+1.5◦C  to  +4.5◦C 

( high confidence ), 

extremely unlikely 

less than +1◦C 

( high confidence) , 

and very unlikely 

greater than +6◦C 

( medium confidence ),

Note that "confidence"

has no scientific meaning

for these IPCC wild guesses --

"confidence" is just their

subjective "feeling" , 

not a real measurement 

of anything !

The wild guessed

ECS range varies 

by a factor of three !

These IPCC guesses 

are very similar to the 

1979 National Academy 

of Sciences study, 

( aka The Charney Report )

which wild guessed

an ECS range 

of +1.5 to +4.5◦C.

The stated reason 

for not citing a

"best estimate" 

in the 2013 IPCC

Fifth Assessment,

as they did in 2007, 

was a large difference

between actual 

global temperature

measurements

       ( lower ECS )

and estimates from 

the climate models 

        ( higher ECS ).

In the so-called 

climate models,

the equilibrium 

climate sensitivity 

is not directly 

calibrated, 

or tuned.

ECS is assumed. 

So in 2019, 40 years after 

the 1979 Charney Report, 

there is still a huge range 

for the wild guessed ECS.

40 years later, 

the right answer 

about ECS is still 

"No one knows".

But we can make 

a worst case 

ECS estimate:

We have measured

all global warming

since we started 

adding lots of CO2

into the air (1940 ) -- 

( although temperature data 

before the 1979 weather 

satellites were launched,

did not have full

global coverage ).

Assume all the warming 

since 1979 was caused 

by CO2, 

( IPCC only says "Over 50% ) 

and you get a worst case 

ECS estimate of about 

+1 degree C.

If ECS is actually 

near +1 degree C.,

rather than 

being near 

+3 or +4 degree C.,

then future global 

warming could not 

be a problem at all

= totally harmless.