{"id":261539,"date":"2023-06-10T21:24:22","date_gmt":"2023-06-10T19:24:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=261539"},"modified":"2023-06-10T21:24:24","modified_gmt":"2023-06-10T19:24:24","slug":"europes-climate-suffers-from-lack-of-clouds-and-rainnot-from-a-co2-increase","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=261539","title":{"rendered":"Europe\u2019s Climate Suffers From Lack Of Clouds And Rain\u2026Not From A CO2 Increase"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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From NoTricksZone<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

By\u00a0P Gosselin<\/a>\u00a0on\u00a0<\/em>9. June 2023<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The higher temperatures are clearly attributable to a reduction in cloud cover, not CO2<\/mark><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The DIY way to demystify \u201cgreenhouse gas\u201d claims<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rapidly rising temperatures and drought in parts of central Europe are caused by a long-term trend of receding cloud cover. Fewer clouds result in increased solar energy influx and reduced downpour. Both factors lead to higher temperatures. By comparison, the influence of CO2<\/sub> levels is minimal at best.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Fred F. Mueller<\/strong>
Preceding chapters see part 1<\/a> 1)<\/sup>, part 2<\/a> 2)<\/sup>, part 3<\/a> 3)<\/sup>, part 4<\/a> 4)<\/sup>, part<\/a> 5 5)<\/sup>, Part 6<\/a> 6)<\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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<\/a>Fig.1. Bad weather clouds during a spring storm<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Clouds: Unwilling slaves of CO2<\/sub>, or climate drivers of their own right?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to official sources (NOAA<\/a> 7)<\/sup>, DWD<\/a> 8)<\/sup>), the net long-term cooling effect of clouds is about -20 W\/m2<\/sup>. It thus is much stronger than the so-called back radiation effect exerted by increased levels of \u201cgreenhouse gases,\u201d which is assumed to be just +3,222 W\/m2<\/sup>. And since common sense tells us that a warming climate should result in more evaporation of water, this should in turn ultimately form more clouds \u2013 resulting in a cooling effect on earth\u2019s climate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But as we have seen in the past chapters, the IPCC and its followers stubbornly insist on pretending that CO2<\/sub> and the other \u201cnon-condensing greenhouse gases\u201d \u2013 mainly methane and N2<\/sub>O \u2013 are the only relevant \u201cforcers\u201d of climate change. Water vapor and clouds \u2013 the other aggregate conditions of water in the atmosphere \u2013 are declared to be simple amplifiers who slavishly obey the directives given by the \u201cforcers.\u201d The short average lifetime of water molecules in the atmosphere is forwarded as the reason why water vapor should be unable to exert a sustainable long-term influence on the evolution of the climate by itself. This is the core of the untruth the IPCC disseminates about the reality of climate control. In the previous parts of the article, we have already seen that clouds are the only climate drivers that are able to prevent solar radiation from reaching earth\u2019s surface by reflecting noticeable proportions of it directly back into space. No other \u201cgreenhouse gas\u201d can produce such an effect: at best, they are just slowing down the re-emission of energy into space after it has reached and warmed the surface. It is really remarkable that the \u201cofficial\u201d climate science has succeeded in negating this unique feature of water in the form of clouds while attributing the role of \u201conly climate control knob\u201d to CO2<\/sub> and its minor allies methane and N2<\/sub>O, see Fig 2.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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<\/a>Fig. 2. \u201cHockey stick\u201d Michael E. Mann and his followers have succeeded in selling to the public the story of the (CO2<\/sub>)-tail (red) that wiggles the (cloud-) elephant in the room.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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To put it clearly: in terms of climate system influence factors, CO2<\/sub>\u00a0is (if ever) just the tail and clouds are the elephant in the room. Fantastic job how Michael E. Hansen and his followers have been able to sell to the public a story that literally turns reality upside down.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The death knell for all \u201ctipping point\u201d and \u201crunaway process\u201d allegations<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Understanding this decisive role of clouds also implies another far-reaching recognition: clouds \u2013 as an inevitable consequence of water evaporation into the atmosphere \u2013 can and will act against and eventually stop any overheating of the planet. We may therefore forget all that talk about \u201ctipping points\u201d and \u201crunaway overheating\u201d of the planet that is disseminated to raise panic among our population. If temperature levels rise significantly, so will evaporation. More evaporation automatically means more clouds, who are the instrument of a powerful negative feedback mechanism. This self-readjusting control circuit has protected our planet for more than 3.5 billion years \u2013 and will continue to do so for a very, very long time to come, no matter what \u201chockey stick\u201d Mann and his brethren pretend.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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CO2<\/sub> should be urgently acquitted<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although the basic interrelationship of water\/clouds\/temperature is easily understandable, the reality of climate evolution is of course way more complicated. All weather and thus climate phenomena are energy-driven. The storage, transportation, dissemination and ultimately disposal of solar energy having reached the surface back into space is very complicated. It involves short-term just as well as long-term processes that may last dozens, hundreds or several hundred thousand of years. Just look back into Earth\u2019s history, from the brutal swings between floods and droughts in recent decades to desertification processes such as the one transforming a lush region in northern Africa into the Sahara, or the ice ages that repeatedly engulfed large swathes of our countries under ice sheets of sometimes several kilometres in height. We still haven\u2019t been able to identify, let alone to understand the long-term processes that govern the evolution of our climate. That is, there\u2019s one factor that we can exclude with near certainty: CO2<\/sub>, accused by the IPCC to be the culprit of climate change, should be acquitted since its level in the atmosphere has been largely within a rather narrow bandwidth for several million years before present.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of course, water molecules in the atmosphere will continue to have a quite short residence time. In order to find explanations for the counter-intuitive evolution of local climates in the near past, we will have to look for other driving forces such as e.g. the El Ninjo\/La Ninja temperature swings in the southern Pacific or the famous Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO) or other, still undiscovered mechanisms. IF water evaporates, it will form clouds. But what governs its evaporation? It seems that the temperatures determined by the currently preferred methods of meteorology do not explain why in Europe, we are experiencing a longer-term deficit with respect to clouds stemming from the evaporation of water.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The facts: less rain, more sun and higher temperatures in Germany<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The complexity of climate mechanisms is highlighted by the fact that at least in large parts of northern Europe, we have a persistent lack of cloud cover and downpour for the past two decades. This accompanied by a higher-than-normal rise in temperatures. We have seen in part 4 of this article that in Germany, rainfall statistics show that after a slow but quite steady 120-year rise, the positive rainfall trend suddenly reversed after the year 2000, ushering in a longer-term decline, see Fig. 3.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Fig. 3. Germany\u2019s national rainfall statistic for the years 1881 \u2013 2022 with a 5-year moving average. Graph established with data from the\u00a0German Weatherservice DWD<\/a>\u00a09)<\/sup><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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In search for a reason for this recessive trend in downpour over Germany, one hasn\u2019t to go further than to the German national statistic for global solar radiation, see Fig. 4.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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<\/a>Fig. 4. The global solar radiation over Germany shows a remarkably steady increase over the past ~50 years (Graphic established using data from the\u00a0DWD<\/a>\u00a010)<\/sup>)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The graph in Fig. 4. shows that over a time period of 50 years, the solar energy input over Germany has been steadily increasing with a decadal rate of around 3.5%. For the past 20 years, the information of both graphs fits perfectly together: the cloud cover over the country has been steadily receding, resulting in both less rain and more solar irradiance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In order to check the effect of this increase in global solar radiation input, it was only logical to include a graph showing the evolution of temperatures over Germany, Fig. 5.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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<\/a>Fig. 5. Evolution of the temperatures in Germany from 1881 \u2013 2022 with a moving 5-year average (using data provided by the\u00a0BMU<\/a>\u00a011)<\/sup>)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The temperature graph exhibits a slightly choppy evolution between 1881 until around 1988, followed by a marked upwards trend with a sudden boost of some 1.7\u00b0C over a time period of about 35 years. Taking the information from these three graphs together leaves one puzzled. Let\u2019s recall that during the 63 years between 1959 and 2022, the atmospheric level of CO2<\/sub> has soared from 315 to 421 ppm, an increase of some 34%. Over the same time, temperatures in Germany have risen by some 1.7\u00b0C, a value largely exceeding even the most pessimistic forecasts of the IPCC. The temperature levels of a Wikipedia\/Berkeley earth graphic<\/a> 12)<\/sup> for Germany extending from 1743 to 2013 show a stable temperature level of about 8\u00b0C for the years around 1750, Fig. 6.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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<\/a>Fig. 6. Land surface temperatures in Germany from 1743 to 2013 (Graphic:\u00a0Phrontis<\/a>\u00a013)<\/sup>,CC 3.0)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Looking at Fig. 6 and taking into consideration the increases of the last 10 years, it seems that in Germany, not only the 1.5\u00b0C limit but even the 2\u00b0C limit of the Paris climate deal is in acute jeopardy. Be it as it will, and recalling the well-established law of atmospheric physics that a 1\u00b0C temperature increase should result in a\u00a07% higher water content in the atmosphere<\/a>\u00a014)<\/sup>, one can\u2019t but wonder why Germany is currently experiencing a prolonged period of markedly reduced downpour and an equally unusual reduction in cloud cover resulting in a strong increase in global solar irradiance. This does not really harmonize with the usual IPCC narratives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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And Germany is not alone<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now one might be tempted to think that Germany, which covers only some 3.4% of Europe\u2019s total surface, has been experiencing an unlucky combination of chance factors. So let\u2019s look at Sweden, the largest of the four Nordic countries (Sweden, Norway, Finland and Denmark) who together make up some 12.5% of Europe\u2019s surface area. The Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute (SMHI) is monitoring the yearly global solar irradiance with eight stations since 1983, see Fig. 7.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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<\/a>Fig. 7. The Swedish meteorologists monitor global solar radiation at eight locations since 1983. The black line shows the 5-year running average (Data:\u00a0SMHI<\/a>\u00a015)<\/sup>)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The global solar radiation figures provided by SMHI show a steady increase over the whole period with only one exception in the year 1998. The decadal increase is about 3% and thus corresponds well to German value. In its explanations, the SMHI states that \u201cThe trends in global radiation cannot be explained by variations in the sun\u2019s radiation. The main reasons for the observed increase since the 1980s are partly a reduction in cloudiness and partly a reduction in the amount of particles in the atmosphere thanks to greatly reduced emissions of air pollution both in Sweden and the rest of Europe\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The attribution related to cleaner air might be taken with some caution. Of course, nobody will deny the Swedes their tradition as role models when it comes to pollution prevention and nature protection. But it is nevertheless worthwhile to take note of the fact that there has been an extended period of time in the 40s, 50s and 70s when, if we dare to trust the \u201ccleaner air explanation\u201d, the air over the Swedish capital Stockholm seems to have been much cleaner than during the past 40 years, see Fig. 8.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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<\/a>Fig. 8. This recording of global solar radiation input over Stockholm shows that it has been way higher in the fifties and seventies, at a time when vehicles and chimneys were not fitted with filters (Graphic:\u00a0Weine Josefsson, SMHI<\/a>\u00a016)<\/sup>)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Two interesting statements from the text presented by SMHI are that:<\/p>\n\n\n\n