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Friday, September 25, 2020

The oversimplified picture of the climate behavior based on a single process can lead to distorted conclusions

An oversimplified picture of the climate behavior based on a single process can lead to distorted conclusions  

by Richard S. Lindzen, Ph.D

The European Physical Journal Plus, June 3, 2020
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1140/epjp/s13360-020-00471-z

This a brief summary of climate science, by Climate professor emeritus Richard Lindzen, Ph.D, as opposed to the usual climate alarmism in the mass media -- the always wrong wild guesses of a coming climate crisis, that we have heard for the past 50 years, and probably will continue to hear for the next 50 years!

(1)
The core of the climate system consists of two turbulent fluids, the atmosphere and oceans, interacting with each other.

(2)
Our planet is heated by the sun. Solar rays directly hit the equator, but skim the earth at the poles. That results in uneven heating.  And uneven heating drives the circulation of the atmosphere. The result is heat transport from the equator towards the poles (meridional).

(3)
Earth’s climate is always changing, and never in equilibrium.

(4)
The atmosphere also interacts with a very irregular land surface, distorting the airflow, causing planetary-scale 'waves'.

(5)
The two most important substances affecting climate today are variations of water vapor and clouds. CO2 concentration changes are much less important, and easily obscured by changes in water vapor and clouds. 


CO2 changes should most affect the climate in the drier and colder higher latitudes, such as the Arctic. Climate in the humid tropics is least affected by CO2, and is much more stable.