Climate Letter #2099

Some final thoughts about 2021. During the past year these letters have been mainly devoted to explanation of the greenhouse energy effect of precipitable water (PW), with particular emphasis on the PW that is formed when water vapor and its by-products become mobile residents of certain places within the upper levels of the atmosphere. This volume of PW has lately been identified as nothing other than the material content of atmospheric rivers (ARs), which have just lately been given a broader public definition than they had before—ARs are now being identified as the entire body of sources of practically all of the H2O-based precipitation that falls from the sky, regardless of any difference in levels of size or intensity. I have found a way to show that all ARs have another important property, apart from precipitation—namely, that all of the material ARs of made of has a greenhouse effect. The strength of the effect is comparable to that of pure water vapor, a well-studied greenhouse gas, in terms of respective molecular weight of each within any given vertical column of atmosphere.

Moreover, I have sought to provide a reasonable explanation of how certain discrete bodies of PW in the upper atmosphere have significantly high concentrations, which have an uncanny ability to produce significantly high amounts of greenhouse energy to surfaces below as they travel across the sky. Thus, any future changes in the amount of material held by ARs, or in the way the material is distributed as set by the course of AR modes of travel, will be reflected as corresponding changes in the strength and distribution of the greenhouse energy produced by whatever the material content of an AR may be at any one time.

This is a subject the current generation of climate scientists has shown no interest in pursuing on its own accord, perhaps for lack of an introduction. For various reasons I have no personal means of presenting evidence or arguments beyond the writing of these letters. Nor do I have much more to say that has not already been said a number of times in these letters. Nor can I draw any conclusions that verify the importance of this subject. I really do believe this activity has already caused significant changes in climate behavior, especially in the Arctic region, and will add more to these effects in the future, but have no way to produce estimates of potential numbers about the size of those effects that would be of interest. This feat would require considerable effort on the part of properly trained scientists, including model builders, while I am limited to simply studying and comparing a favorite set of weather maps. This activity is fruitful in many ways but also suffers from a lack of one key source of information, not found on these maps. It pertains to historical averages for the total amount of PW content in place over any specific location on any specific day of the year. Having that information on hand would facilitate the best possible means of comparing known temperature anomalies with genuine PW anomalies anywhere, on any day, rather than just estimates of the latter.

In the coming year I plan to keep making timely updates to the PW greenhouse theory, if and when they appear, while spending more time evaluating various scientific studies that I think are high in credibility but not well-enough publicized. Human activities have made some pretty drastic changes to the atmosphere and to the environment as well, most of which appear to be adverse, but to what extent, and what can realistically be accomplished in the way of correction? What is the best we can hope for? I will be looking for information and ideas that might be helpful to anyone, like myself, who is bothered by these questions.

Carl