GSA Connects 2022 meeting in Denver, Colorado

Paper No. 169-35
Presentation Time: 9:00 AM-1:00 PM

SOLAR CONTROL OF GLOBAL TEMPERATURE OUTWEIGHED SINCE 1940 BY MAN-MADE WARMING (BY WASTE HEAT AND BLACK CARBON, NOT CO2?)


HIGGS, Roger, DPhil, Geoclastica Ltd, Coventry, CV1 2NT, United Kingdom

Over the last 2,000 years (2ky), world temperature changes (proxies; PAGES2k 2019 graph) closely mimic the Sun's magnetic output (Wu et al. 2018 graph), supporting Svensmark's theory. Simple visual cross-matching of major spikes (peaks, troughs; e.g. Little Ice Age 'triplet') reveals a 130-170y temperature lag (ocean thermal inertia?).

The graphs clearly decouple in the 20th Century: post-1940 temperatures are disproportionately high for the corresponding time-lagged solar output. Details of the mismatch are clearer on the NASA-GISS thermometer chart of annual average land-sea temperature since 1880 (NB 1942 warm peak equates to Sun's 1785 peak, i.e. 157y lag).

The 1940-onward excess warmth implicates one or more of the three main global-warming drivers produced by wood- and fossil-fuel combustion, i.e. carbon dioxide (CO2), black carbon and waste heat (relative contributions very uncertain). The period of excess warmth coincides with: A) oil consumption exponential growth 1942-1973 (WW2 to 'First Oil Shock'); B) coal consumption steep growth 1974-2013; and C) tripling of human population from 1950 (2.5 billion) to 2020. All of these factors entailed black-carbon surges (main sources: diesel engines, coal power plants, wood-fired home cooking).

Further implicating coal/black carbon, ~10y after coal usage suddenly doubled (1974, above), land-air started warming twice as fast as the sea surface (contrast pre-1985 lockstep behaviour; NASA-GISS land-sea charts). This land-warming bias cannot be blamed on CO2 as, even in heavily industrial regions, atmospheric CO2 is scarcely (<0.5%) above the global average (Zhang et al. 2019). Nor can rising CO2 explain two NASA-GISS temperature hiatuses (1957-75, 1998-2012); the 2nd one followed, again with 10y lag, an interlude of near-zero coal growth (1988-2002), likewise lasting 14y. Thus CO2's 'greenhouse effect' is apparently negated by feedbacks omitted from climate models (e.g. clouds and 'BVOC'). If so, (1) 'carbon capture' is misconceived and (2) simply reducing world energy growth to 0% would halt(?) man-made warming within ~10y (coal lag-time).

The exceptional 130% rise in solar-magnetic output from 1901 to 1992 (Lockwood et al. 1999), to its highest level in >2ky (Wu et al. 2018), means that strong Sun-driven warming will occur from ~2060 (~157y lag, above).