You asked how can we determine if the claim is "remotely true" well we can't because we are missing the decade savings/reduced emissions values. If I recall correctly not even the discredited IPCC can make an estimate of the actual foregone CO2 liberation. If anyone can come up with them I am al ears.
One caution to your volcano contribution disclaimer. Modern times have not seen the volcanism of the Southwest US and Middle East 20Kybp, Nor the Deccan and Siberian Traps. That could quickly change the whole game. Only in the past 10 years have we started inventorying underwater volcanoes and black smokers. I believe your data only addresses aerial volcanoes and some volcanic major eruptions can't even be dated by historical accounts and research goes on as to estimating eruptive volumes. I would argue that we still don't know all the sources and contributions. The IPCC nor any other body can state with scientific certainty a ball park number on human CO2 liberation. But I laud attempts to actually measure those emissions!
I do stand corrected regarding my assessment that it "seems about right" and may I suggest that you'll wade through the several 10s of millions of articles on the net and decide which ones you believe or do not believe.
I was commenting from memory regarding CO2 output and I recalled incorrectly that the Eyjafjallajokull volcano eruption produced 150-300 MILLION tons in total but that figure was 150-300 THOUSAND per day so around 1 million tons in 4 days give or take. I think it went on for several weeks but regardless it was not the 4 day volume tauted in the article in question. Where as the aviation/air travel reduction was about 300±K ton per day(?) so there was an almost even offset it seems.
One problem is that no one -not even the IPCC, can estimate the actual CO2 savings actually achieved by the Koyoto Protochol. All those billions spent and not a shred of quantitative measurement?( Cheating and double counting especially by China makes an estimate a paper exercise bearing no relation to the real world). Not that I would place any confidence in anyone's climate model, as so far there have been what 78(?) attempted Climate Prediction models and NONE of them has proved accurate when past climatological data was run back through them to check for validation. Some one pointed out that climate is not uniform and extreme highs and extreme lows of whatever is being measured make the scene look "average". Super computers coming on line each day will help isolate regional climates forcing on adjacent and ultimately world climate. Part of that will be identifying the true heat budget of the globe and how it moves about the environment.
I've no inclination to debate the un-debatable-- true unbiased research is buried in millions of pages of uninformed/parroted opinions so underpinning comments with "references" is futile more or less but I understand the obligation to do so If I were taking sides. I do know from my climate studies that CO2 in the environment doesn't behave simplistically like it does in the lab owing to unaccounted for feed backs/forcers. I've said before that we are only now getting the computing power to model the atmosphere GHGs--Of which water vapor and methane are far larger players than CO2. Once again is the issue stabilizing CO2 or is it stabilizing global temperatures and therefore climate specifically sea levels? Suppose we cut Atmospheric CO2 in half and we find ourselves under ice caps in 30 years or we find all the ice caps have still melted and Kansas is beachfront property--whomever was "right" has a hollow victory.
Human selfish interests and skepticism over bad science have tainted the "effort" and nothing effective will be developed in the next 50 years which will control "CO2 levels". period. While plants are "greener" and temperate regions are greening more (pro) ocean acidification is endangering coral reef communities( some of us think)( con). I think the biggest threat finding solutions is the "tunnel vision focus"- on CO2 for it stifles finding out how it really behaves in the environment--not simply the atmosphere -or lab or in the computer etc. Take a simple survey with all the pro or con AGW proponents by asking them just what is the mechanism of the "green house effect" and 99% of them will give you a wrong answer. ( Hint 99% of CO2's heat conversion contribution is within 3 -4 meters of the ground). Oceanic CO2 is an almost entirely different player but owing to the exchange of gas to and from the hydrosphere it has to be factored in. This is one of the reasons one cannot make a one on one calculation of a heat gradient attributable to atmospheric CO2.
My next to final thought is do your own research on research--that after you give up your day job, pay $10's of thousands for journal subscriptions and devote 24/7 to sorting through the noise-- pro or con and then you can speak with bona fide authority.
I have background in simulation and modeling and am probably the only person on this list that has helped count fossil tree rings. Ergo I have some insight into the limitations to modeling. Be it remembered that there are about 4(?) "standard" weather models in use in the US alone but no one is concerned that they have major failures--we just accept that weather forecasts are have a margin of inaccuracy, yet the public buys hook, line, and sinker invalidated climate models which forecast climate 100 years in advance.
I have my opinions as to which surrogate measurements are probably more accurate indicators of paleoclimate globally and locally but none are integrated. One of the problems I see in research pollution is researchers who make drastic inferences from localized data. Then there are those who commit outright fraud by the destruction of their "database" so that no other researcher can try to replicate their data. But the East Anglican University malfeasance is another topic.
Eman
From: fossrme <fossrme@yahoo.com>
To: geology2@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Friday, August 16, 2013 9:41 PM
Subject: [Geology2] Re: your opinions
How would we know if Plimer's claim that the a decade of CO2 reduction was wiped out in 4 days of volcanic eruption is even remotely true? He includes no figures in support, and from what I have read he is an untrustworthy source of information. He once said, "Over the past 250 years, humans have added just one part of CO2 in 10,000 to the atmosphere. One volcanic cough can do this in a day", when in fact fossil fuels emissions numbers are about 100 times bigger than even the maximum estimated volcanic CO2 emissions.
(http://www.skepticalscience.com/volcanoes-and-global-warming.htm)
The volcanoes are not even a significant part of the equation. The real question is how much reduction in emissions is needed and how do we get there. He implies we can't - an awfully big assertion without any numbers whatsoever to back it up, and totally untrustworthy. The IPCC with the backing of the great majority of climatologists, thinks otherwise. The problem is not that it can't be done but that we are not doing it, not that it costs too much, but that we are not willing to spend enough. It would take a coordinated long-term effort in a short-sighted world, that is continually less inclined to invest in government projects.
The chances seem less likely the longer it is delayed. We may have to just suffer the consequences until the cost becomes so high that we have to go to one of the alternative fixes like the sun-blocking orbiters. All of those alternatives are expensive too, and have their own consequences, including those we can't foresee. We can't really know how well they would work until we are forced to use them.
--- In geology2@yahoogroups.com, MEM <mstreman53@...> wrote:
>
> I believe the original point was that all the human efforts at CO2 reduction over the decade it was in effect, was wiped-out in 4 days worth of eruptions. It has been a while since I looked at the charts as to "carbon" savings(sic) but it seems about right. For all the talk and all the fervor there really has been a minuscule amount of CO2 reduction in 10 years when compared to the total CO2 levels. Be it remembered this was a ramp up over 30(?) years within the now abandoned Koyoto Protocol so it really hadn't come into broad active efforts of the long term goals.
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> Be it also remembered that this alleged letter supposed Op-Ed piece is not a peer reviewed scientific paper. It doesn't address any cumulative volcanic input, or weather extremes or overall temperature trends--just the balance sheet of human efforts to reduce atmospheric CO2 levels vs the occasional volcanic eruption.
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> The wisdom I would derive from this is that our efforts at reduction are ineffective and research and governmental policy should focus more on adaptation. The fact that the debate has become a religion by the largely uninformed activist prevents any meaningful research into adaptation. One of my favorites proposals which has languished in the waiting room of development, are the Mylar parasols placed in low orbit which can be expanded or contracted to match isolation levels which stabilize temperatures-- sort of like beach umbrellas for the planet.
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> Or we can keep spending money on the most expensive, least enforceable, least effective means at temperature control. In all the name calling, we tend to forget that the issue isn't controlling CO2 levels but stabilizing global temperatures in the long run.
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> Eman
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