Rethinking climate, climate change, and their relationship with water
Has climate research made any substantial progress since the debate in the 1970’s as to whether the world would slide into global warming or global cooling? One can doubt that if one takes Leonardo da Vinci’s (1452–1519) assessment seriously: Water is the driver of nature. No! The climate debate over the last 30 years gives the impression that we are still in the age of Nicolaus Copernicus (1473–1543), which opposed the prevailing opinion that the earth is flat, but that the Earth was a spinning ball and not flat.
For the historical “flat” stands today the opinion that the CO2 levels released by humans warm the atmosphere and lead to climate changes. This is not about the issue of global warming, which is undeniable, but about a flawed overall analysis, and the consequent lack of knowledge and very imprecise, if not sloppy, use of language. This much focused attribution is not shared by a small minority.
Recently Professor Demetris Koutsoyiannis, discussed this points, in a paper titled as this comment (Water 2021, 13, 849; pp 38, FN). The Abstract reads:
We revisit the notion of climate, along with its historical evolution, tracing the origin of the modern concerns about climate. The notion (and the scientific term) of climate has been established during the Greek antiquity in a geographical context and it acquired its statistical content (average weather) in modern times, after meteorological measurements had become common. Yet the modern definitions of climate are seriously affected by the wrong perception of the previous two centuries that climate should regularly be constant, unless an external agent acted. Therefore, we attempt to give a more rigorous definition of climate, consistent with the modern body of stochastics. …… Indeed, a historical investigation reveals that the aim in using that term is not scientific but political. Within the political aims, water issues have been greatly promoted by projecting future catastrophes while reversing the true roles and causality directions. For this reason, we provide arguments that water is the main element that drives climate and not the opposite.
Koutsoyiannis — Climate terms, sec.2 ff : Of note is Koutsoyiannis ‘s effort to promote greater clarity and usability in climate definitions. Both with the term weather and climate, it is not a little necessary to adhere to the principle that defined are a necessary element of the scientific method. This applies in particular to weather, without to clarify its meaning, merely noting that it represents a popular notion, often used with respect to its effects upon life and human activities, rather than a rigorous scientific one. We agree fully with Koutsoyiannis saying: the term climate change which appeared in literature only after the 1970s, serves nonscientific purposes (p.17), and the objective of using the term is not scientific but political (p.2).
Koutsoyiannis — Climate and Water, sec 5: After mentioning the most substantial influence of the global system, solar, volcanic and Earth orbit oscillation, he emphasizes that water is the most crucial element determining climate “Water is the main player” (section .5) justified by reasons as (text strong shortened):
· Abundance of water in the oceans.
· Heat storage capacity of ocean water which determines the climate of the Earth. He explains that in the last forty years, accumulated heat in the land and atmosphere combined is estimated to be a small percentage of about 5% of that accumulated in the oceans. The point is concluded with the reference: “water has been called the climatic thermostat of the Earth”.
· Heat exchange. For the average temperature of Earth, the specific latent heat of water evaporation is 2.47 MJ/kg, much higher than in other common substances… …Compared to the human energy production (0.612 ZJ/year for 2014), the total energy of the natural locomotive is 2100 times higher than that of the human locomotive.
· Shortwave radiation regulation. An interesting property of water is the dramatic differences, among the different phases and formations, in the reflecting properties of the incoming sunlight, or else the albedo.
· Longwave radiation regulation. Even though in the common perception it is the carbon dioxide (CO2) that determines the greenhouse effect of the Earth, current studies, attribute only 19% of the longwave radiation absorption to CO2 against 75% of water vapour and clouds, or a ratio of 1:4. According to other estimations, the importance of CO2 as a greenhouse gas is even lower and that of water higher.
· Large-scale fluctuations. The rhythm of coupled ocean–atmosphere fluctuations, such as ENSO, AMO, and IPO significantly influences the variability of global mean annual temperature.
Human interventions on water bodies may have much more substantial effects on the entire Earth than the infamous fossil fuel burning and the resulting CO2 emissions. For example, considering the sea level rise, the most prominent anthropogenic signal is the increased (and unsustainable) exploitation of groundwater, which transfers to the sea huge masses of water earlier stored in land.
The points are a very significant step in the right direction, but not nearly energetic enough. Climate science will not move and will be ready for serious discussions as long as they are not forced to delve deeper into the water issue in the sense of Leonardo da Vinci: “Water is the driver of nature”. That includes also the weather, and what is made of it by putting it in statistics, the climate.
For example, Prof. Koutsoyiannis should have pointed out that
__The water ratio between the oceans and the atmosphere is 1000:1.
__The global average temperature of the atmosphere is at 14°C., and that the ocean is at +4°C.
___that the ‘human interventions on water bodies’ can have many facets that have so far been completely ignored by science, such as world trade shipping, the navies with underwater operations (e.g. submarines and depth charges), the entire fishery, but also industrial offshore installations. Not even considering these activities as potential components of global warming over the past 150 years is scientific indictment, but also Prof. Koutsoyiannis still has a lot to catch up on and work through on these points.
