[walnutclose]

Given the topic focus being about water vapor increase and it's feedback relationship to warming, can you provide any similar insight on how "additional" water vapor from combustion and atmospheric thermal expansion might play a role in base thermal increase from additional water vapor itself and again the forcing feedback effect / increase that might have on the currently increasing CO2 values?

Water is a challenging topic.

First, though, it's important that the CO₂ effect is largely independent of the H₂O effect.   That is, increasing CO₂ concentrations results in increased retention of radiation as heat in the CO₂ absorption bands, and atmosphere heating relative to historical values, regardless of whether the atmospheric water cycle changes as a result.  (However, some of the important effects of atmospheric warming wouldn't occur, if the water cycle didn't change.    Atmospheric water is an enormously important driver of weather.)

Water is a challenge for a couple of reasons.   Fundamental to all is the fact that at atmospheric temperatures and pressures water persists in the atmosphere in three separate phases (ice, liquid water, and water vapor), and moves dynamically between these phases all the time.  This results in continuous movement of water in different phases into and out of various atmospheric layers and regions on multiple time scales - water evaporates into the atmosphere, condenses as clouds, freezes as airborne ice crystals, and back and forth, and precipitates out of the atmosphere as rain and snow.  All of this happens differently at different temperatures and pressures and water vapor concentrations, and differently over water than over land.  Note too that the phase transitions are hugely important thermal events, releasing or absorbing the latent heat of vaporization and fusion, and transporting heat energy across the surface/atmosphere boundary promiscuously.   This further complicates understanding the impact of water on warming.

Because water in the solid and liquid phases have entirely different effects on radiation dynamics than water in the gaseous phase this constantly shifting picture of water vapor, water clouds, and ice clouds has profound effects on the radiative balance.   Roughly, clouds reflect insolation back into space before it is absorbed and transformed into heat energy, whereas water vapor "traps" heat in the atmosphere through a mechanism like that described for CO₂ (but even this is an approximation - different clouds behave quite differently).   But because the relative proportion of vapor and clouds changes all the time, calculating how that impacts the overall radiative balance is very difficult, and one of the biggest challenges in climate modeling.

So, short, answer, there is no simple answer.   You have to model the entire surface-atmosphere system, including to a painful degree the differential effects on the water cycle at different altitudes, and over different surface topographies, and integrate the whole, to get an answer.   The answer may not be the same at 1^oC warming as it will be at 2^oC, or 3 or 4. We can say with certainty though that the overall effect of the changes in the water cycle do not cancel CO₂ forcing, because we can observe that the atmosphere and oceans are warming significantly due to that forcing.   We can predict, but only with increasingly large error bars as the warming gets greater, what happens in the atmospheric water cycle through global modeling, but there is no "coefficient of effect."   Water is just too complicated.

[mikewonders]

So, short, answer, there is no simple answer.   You have to model the entire surface-atmosphere system, including to a painful degree the differential effects on the water cycle at different altitudes, and over different surface topographies, and integrate the whole, to get an answer.

Thank you Walnut,

That makes sense with many varied responses the forum topic here has evolved like a moving target.  It also makes sense with how it appears NASA has turned greater attention in this direction to re-tool additional sensors to more recent satellite designs, balloon data and ground based evaluations in increase diversified data collection.  For those who feel CO2 is a driver whether primary, secondary or some mix thereof, the concerns of water vapor don't negate CO2's role or the potential value of mitigation.

It may make sense to consider water vapor emissions solely on the basis that there is an awareness of even just lesser fractions from human impact, in the light of the rate of change we're seeing in warming trends. That theory approaches the consideration of reversing some measure of human impact back toward lowering total impact given the known increases and the degree which water vapor in increased volume, dimension and density play a role as a warming influence alone.  However, if there is also an additive cooling property in a critical part of its contribution, the uncertainty of effect in mitigation can hold further risks itself, without understanding the net effect.

My personal concern is actually less focused on the dynamics of mitigation as it is on the enormous economic impact risking damage to the current energy sector and fossil fuel industries as governance seeks to shut down fossil fuel.  The impact of that initiative has fall out in many ares not being considered with the same urgency aside from if the targets of mitigation are even attainable in the time frame considered.  This suggests to me the replacement of energy source provisions and real-time on demand power, need to enable the energy and fossil industries to be transitional benefactors to sustain those balances.

Added to this is the risk that wind and solar are not truly sustainable solutions due to resource depletion over time and additional waste streams they ultimately account for in historically failed recycling initiatives.  The efficiencies in solar still remain relatively low as well on cost / longevity / returns.  The down sides of wind in the huge turbines and blade costs and maintenance is also significant.  There seems to be a vacuum on this concern in the current agendas, due to other underlying financial windfalls tied to these initiatives. 

One cannot deny the possibility that the total entropy dynamics of warming effect which has previously limited prehistoric peaks and valleys of extremes won't have an overriding potential in corrective compensation.  The current Rate Of Change would speak against this along with the concerns of increased slew rate delays during compensation after peak.

Water in any phase is a huge component.  We've only recently begun to understand the increased values of super-saturation in the stratosphere threatening a recently discovered quantum side effect among increased distribution to polar regions having a destructive affinity on Ozone at that altitude.

It would seem for now, the topical question asked here really cannot be answered reliably unless and until the data required can be gathered and organized sufficiently to suggest a more reliable assessment.

[mikewonders]

With respect to identifying raw data and / or defined studies the following link provides a plethora of specific data analysis methods and a number of very interesting results quite in deapth, especially relative trend analysis on a short term observation scale.

https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/2016JD024917 [nofollow]

I can't say the source of the data is peer reviewed however some of the data in reference collected I'm sure has been.

The article in its summary, further admits the myriad of data and trends remain too complex to draw a reliable conclusion from but does suggest further analysis which may help.

At present, the respective contribution of natural and anthropogenic forcings to PWV changes remains unclear.

Future studies could be carried out on weather regimes and joint probability distribution of PWV and surface temperature to understand processes better.

Still, the various summations the article offers are impressive.

[mikewonders]

There has been a lot of information raised in this topic, taken from several inputs, opinions and findings, some polar, some skeptical, some in the middle and some seeking further fact.  The topic approaches what has become a hotbed in recent decades where scientific fact, opinion and then government influence impacts the opinions of those less informed, but also those more empowered.

With the advent of refined internet connectivity, there has been a steady trend of those more capable in technology, bending the nature of instant connectivity, something on the order of human perception engineering and AI influences which has driven media organizations to seek revenue by inflaming debate in some very divisive ways.  Climate and "Green New Deals" are no exception.  I use the term divisive loosely only due to how the reorganization of factual information can be slanted in order to "herd" public perception in a way to redirect both influence and financial gain toward select agendas.  There was a time when media held dedicated value to reporting facts backed by demonstrated and peer reviewed evidence having become ever-more diluted to distorting partial facts to "stir the pot" for ratings, given the potential of global impact in real time connectivity injecting influence very quickly.  At a point where the peer review groups also come under influential bias, the notion of "empirical" itself suffers.

Controversy over climate is no exception and may be one of the best and earliest examples of a global human phenomena.  Literally speaking, many climatologists, scientists, engineers and physicists have been displaced for speaking out in one direction or another.  The trend appears to have shifted from academic assembly of empirical fact from consulting specialists to reassignment under government advocacy.  This trend tends to disarm science and silence fuller factual findings toward silencing those who divert from governance agenda.  As cancel culture creeps in both the validity of data and the sanctity of academic excellence come under strain of intentional re-direction away from the empirical.

This later trend may be more threatening in the long run than climate change itself forming a nasty circular effect of public dissolution with growing momentum and skepticism.

Ant colonies and Bee hives are a great example of nature at work when total cooperation absent political ambition leads to the colony successfully altering the design of their domain, to compensate climate conditions.  By altering the activity and / or geometry and hence air flow through their structure, they affect the internal environment to remain stable at the optimal conditions for survival, despite external factors to the extent practical.

Most climatologists (before consensus became more rigid) warned that "Climate Change" does not necessarily result in "Catastrophic Global Warming".  In other words water vapor being twice the greenhouse impact than CO2, may provide a stabilizing bias and damping effect on the extent with which CO2 might cause as a long term threat.  The more recent vertical spike in CO2 and temperature along with increased water vapor production may be creating compensatory effect being overlooked since the damping effect is hidden within the rate of change.

Thayer Watkins, PHD at San Jose University, holding four masters degrees in economics, physics and related, (now long since retired), was one of the first outspoken to provide factual concern to pump the brakes on climate fears.  He among numerous others were ostracized by those advocating the fears of climate and government re-calibration of silencing / tweaking factual findings in favor of leading agendas focused on fear of climate warming.

Thayer and others also highlighted the motivations and means by which NASA was being aimed and retooled in similar ways to increase the evaluation toward the notion of global warming to up the stakes on the climate fears aspect.  If that has changed in years since these early debates it remains to be seen as further data  accumulates.

The motivation I had in posing the questions on water vapor has mostly to do with finding a more common sense approach to a debate having become long term divided if not even publicly delusional in some respects.  I would hope to take a page out of nature's play book and understand what the Ants and Bees know that we don't seem to hold to as well in recent times...

The physical activity of the insects changes both the heat and humidity caused in the colony as part of altering and optimizing the heat and humidity in the colony.  That is a net compensatory mechanism of regulatory behavior.  They don't argue that they are partly the cause of warming due to activity, they simply alter their overall behavior to compensate both external and internal factors for net stability, center of the bell curve of stability and survival.  They do this as the most effective and efficient means possible.

My personal inclination is there is no lack of evidence pointing to anthropogenic changes, despite the fact those changes cannot be summarized as impending doom with demonstrated reliability.  Lacking the ability to make a 100% informed and accurate judgement, it makes sense that we might find the most efficient means to counter the out of band portion of change to seek the stability under the center of the curve affording higher probability of sustain.

We know from past examples, insects and most of nature will not fully consume essential resources outside the bounds of nature's compensation.  If they do, the compensation shows up as malnutrition leading to disease which reduces their numbers by starvation and predation if they cannot migrate to a more sustainable collection of resources.  This effect may already be affecting humanity among continued population increase.

Using up fossil fuel resources makes no more sense than destroying the energy sector financially if and when a transitional process can form the most efficient means of sustainable preservation on an arc to reverse human impact.  Overreaction can be as destructive as under-reaction.  What may be missing from the formula that nature provides is the essence of cooperation toward the most rational outcome, sensible compensatory behavior.

Some may find that giant wind turbines decorating huge oceanic shores is a measure of sufficiency, but a lack of long term analysis of potential outcome suggests the negative effects may well be more serious than we know.  The same is true of hoping to rely on the inefficiency of solar conversion as it remains to date.  Maybe some find that replacing hundreds of thousands of acres with non-sustainable photo arrays looks nice.  The disruption of foliage, food potential, hydraulic and geological stability and wild life aspects likely don't see it that way.  The cost of making either of these sustainable is not economically viable long term, which is being mostly ignored.

It's not to say these and even hydro and improving designs in nuclear don't satisfy a segment of stability.  The question is if we are weighing the consequences fully versus the effects of media inclination and fear mongering dictating over-reaction, when the necessary knowledge to develop sustainable solutions has been with us throughout all of human history during evolution.  American Indians in the US mid west own what has been deemed the "greenest footprint on earth" viewed from Google Earth satellite assessment.  Their conservation influence on grooming thousands of acres of contiguous forest has resulted in the most productive, healthiest and most efficient density of perpetual wood harvesting ever produced.  By means and method they not only exceed the wood harvest potential on an industrial scale but produce the greatest amount of yield known by first preserving the core ecological basis.

Every opinion provided in this topic has held some value of reason and rationale.  What seems to have been missing is that Ants and Bees thing where we might seek to make the most efficient change with the best compensating efficiency without destroying our economic basis, depleting our resources or continuing to over-populate without measuring our own impact.  There may not be a solid scientific determination of cause and effect before we either waste far too much without justification or we under-compensate to a growing demise otherwise.

If we can refine crude oil, we can refine biomass.  There is no question the energy sector made many intentional efforts to make it appear that biomass could not provide a stable means to retain the values of combustion being a 24/7 robust potential.  After all, they were being asked to sacrifice the golden calf fossil fuel has been for Energy.  If the efforts to develop clean biomass combustion to a net negative heat, carbon and water emissions profile succeeded as we've sought to do for crude oil and gas, (we already know it's possible to grow more biomass than we consume) it's possible for organization and cooperation to provide the stable means and method.  If we refine to also uptake existing pollution streams as an enhancement of energy density, we further compensate the destructive curves we know are occurring there as well.

I entered here curious about water vapor, yet I'm not an advocate to climate change ignored or global warming catastrophe.  I think what were missing is awareness how technology, communication and media today are causing division absent moderation, steering us away from letting nature guide our decisions to move back toward cooperation.  Forced mandates of government intervention are NOT cooperation. 

I have to wonder if we curb the divisive nature of the current media and tech revolution, would we see a return to cooperation and trust leading to a sensible direction for longevity?  Can we even unplug to the degree necessary to incentivize these changes if marketing division is the Internet's fossil fuel cash cow we feed by ingesting advertisements?  For all our collective wisdom, is there a way to improve not jumping to conclusions or ignoring the trends, but rather to stop defending the unproven and refusing to find a balanced and sensible common goal?

Or... are these just more questions that are again too complex for us to answer among the collective intelligence we share?  Is intelligence still too far from wisdom to become real common sense?

It's another new year... Maybe we find out this year if there might be synergy to alter our course.

[alancalverd (OP)]

The economics of biomass haven't been favorable until now: the energy cost of harvesting, transporting and preparing flammable material exceeded the energy of any electricity generated therefrom. But fermentation into liquid and gas fuels seems to be a profitable use of inevitable waste - at least according to one local farmer friend who flies his plane on the profits, and hopes to fly it on the biofuel itself. 

It's seriously worth reading "Without the Hot Air" (David McKay) for a look at he underlying physics of energy generation and use. With no political or economic agenda, he shows that the UK cannot sustain its population at the current standard of living without importing energy, and imports mean politics, economics, and effective loss of sovereignty. Whilst cooperation is always preferable to competition, I see the western standard of living as a universal aspiration, and there just isn't enough fuel of any sort to give everyone 5 kW of  power on  tap.

All of which is a bit off topic, but it's encouraging to meet fellow-skeptics, and to remind dogmatic  believers that there's a difference between denial (idiocy) and saying "yes, but..." (science - or skepticism).

[Bored chemist]

and effective loss of sovereignty. Whilst cooperation is always preferable to competition,

If only we had seen that coming; realised that loss of sovereignty was inevitable  and stayed in a forum that promoted cooperation, rather than trying to compete with it.

Now, if you can just let us know why any significant amount of water decided to evaporate in the first place, you might show that water vapour is a credible cause for climate change.

[alancalverd (OP)]

Now, if you can just let us know why any significant amount of water decided to evaporate in the first place

Sunlight, unobscured by cloud. As observed this morning and indeed every anticyclonic morning.

Woke up this mornin' with frost on ma wing 
When sun come up ah made the engines sing

I'll write the rest of the song one day!

Pedantic postscript: it's really sublimation until the metal heats up a bit, but it still gets water back into the air.

[Bored chemist]

Well, the Sun has been coming up every morning, so, if that's the cause, there's no global warming.
Now, remind me what you said about denial.

[mikewonders]

With respect to identifying raw data and / or defined studies the following link provides a plethora of specific data analysis methods and a number of very interesting results quite in depth, especially relative trend analysis on a short term observation scale.

https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/2016JD024917 [nofollow] [nofollow]

The trend analysis on the link noted, identifies increased water in various phases.  Not sure but if you wanted to absolutely track source causes and distribution it might require a family of stable carbon trace component added as a unique tracer to each major form of contribution suspected of increasing volume trending.  The tracer(s) would need to survive the process involved and not end up liberated freely.  Kind of like effecting a PET scan tagging used in medical tracing, where the patient is the atmosphere.

With any luck the trace might have a relatively short half life and not be another contribution to increased toxic emission.

[mikewonders]

The economics of biomass haven't been favorable until now: the energy cost of harvesting, transporting and preparing flammable material exceeded the energy of any electricity generated therefrom.

This is true mostly, but also falls in the consideration of localizing resourcing and the commercialization of fuller refinement like we provide to crude and frac gas today.  Past efforts lacked terribly in any real efforts of real-time refinement stream, (versus batch) at points where power generation tested gross clear cutting and then jammed green, wet wood into combustion units, then reported biomass to be a failed concept.  Hardly a valid concept evaluation, more intended to maintain the status quo.

Part of the trick is to get the energy density per unit of biomass elevated to help offset cost.  Picture a cousin something on the order of synthetic coal from biomass that would "look" like charcoal briquettes but have a higher energy and mass density as a refined product from renewable and sustainable sources.  If it were formed to be water resistant and cured from evolving CO emissions in storage, you could see rail cars full of it feeding generating facilities yet be essentially emissions neutral if not emissions negative.

It won't work with mid section conventional flotation bed gasification, but would benefit from a newer combustion design which makes better use of relative mechanics, thermal transfer and fluid dynamics.  CFD simulation has gotten pretty good at this game for modeling.

What we know so far is that good old wood pellets can't meet those goals on several levels yet they continue to be a source of energy production having gained popularity in the UK for central energy, last I knew.  I think those might be co-generation of natural gas with pulverized pellets, flotation bed combustion.