Heavier Global Precipitation Not In Our Lifetime – Postponed To 2100, U. Of Leipzig Study Finds!

I had to chuckle when I read the following press release on a study that found that global precipitation has not risen after all. Models and media reports wrong again!
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Leipzig meteorologist studies effects of climate change on worldwide precipitation

Regenschauer über dem tropischen Atlantik, aufgenommen vom Forschungsschiff Polarstern.<br />Foto: Jun.-Prof. Dr. Bernhard Pospichal/Institut für Meteorologie

Rain over the tropical Atlantic. Photo taken from the Polarstern research vessel, Jun.-Prof. Dr. Bernhard Pospichal/Institute for Meteorology.

Warm air can hold more water vapor than cold air. Does this mean that climate warming leads to more precipitation on average than it did a few decades ago? Dr. Marc Salzmann of the Institute for Meteorology at the University of Leipzig looked at this question. In a study he found that climate change so far has not had an impact on the average global precipitation amount. This could change by the end of this century. The meteorologist published his findings in “Science Advances”.

“The Arctic is melting, temperature and sea level are rising, and every year a new record is reached with CO2 in the atmosphere. Only the global average amount of precipitation has not changed measurably,” says Salzmann. Indeed precipitation has increased in some regions of the earth, but at the same time it has decreased in others. It is also known that as a consequence of climate change, there are heavy rainfalls more often. “With the worldwide average precipitation, however, neither computer models nor observations show significant changes,” he explains.

This is due to tiny particles called aerosols that float in the air and are created, for example, by sulfur dioxide. They have a cooling effect on the climate. But according to Salzmann, they do not suffice to offset the global temperature warming that is caused by greenhouse gases. Yet the affect of aerosols on precipitation has still been strong enough to offset the affect by greenhouse gases on the global average precipitation.

“My study shows that the global precipitation amount on average falls an estimated 3 to 4% per degree Celsius of cooling by aerosols, while the already known value for greenhouse gases is only 1.5 to 2% precipitation increase per degree of warming,” says the meteorologist. These different “hydrological sensitivities” is the reason why we can be thankful that the average precipitation amount has changed very little worldwide even though the global mean temperature has risen.

However for the future – already at the end of this century – Salzmann expects a significant increase in global precipitation amount. Because greenhouse gases stay in the atmosphere for a long time, the concentration rises even if emissions remain steady. Aerosol particles on the other hand get washed away by rain rather quickly.

Original in “Science Advances”: “Global warming without global mean precipitation increase?”

 

45 responses to “Heavier Global Precipitation Not In Our Lifetime – Postponed To 2100, U. Of Leipzig Study Finds!”

  1. sod

    So you really like how he is using the climate models?

    and you do understand that the same aerosols would also explain a lack of temperature increase? (aka: the pause)

    And you do understand, that the people that got a serious regional increase will not care about a global average not increasing significantly?!?

    http://www.dwd.de/DWD/klima/national/gebietsmittel/brdras_rrr_06_sh.jpg

  2. Kenneth Richard

    sod: “the same aerosols would also explain a lack of temperature increase (aka: the pause)”

    Are you referring to natural aerosols (e.g., volcanic) or anthropogenic? Because the latter have been decreasing in the last 20 years, or during “the pause” or “lack of temperature increase”.

    In fact, scientists have determined that aerosol forcing is predominantly natural, with anthropogenic particulate pollution playing only a very minor role.

    Do you have any other reasons for explaining why there has been a “lack of temperature increase” while CO2 concentrations rose from 360 ppm (late 1990s) to 405 ppm, or during the time that anthropogenic CO2 emissions exploded by several billion tonnes per year? Why hasn’t CO2 been doing what the models say?

    1. sod

      “Do you have any other reasons for explaining why there has been a “lack of temperature increase” while CO2 ”

      i personally do not see such a lack. But there might have been a small slow down, which could either have natural causes or might be a side effect of AGW.

      Both things are not good, because unknown effects could work both directions (we could either be saved by such an unknown side effect or it could make things much worse)

      1. DirkH

        Warmunist modelers have used the aerosol forcing wildcard for AGES by just filling up all model deviations by assuming an according aerosol concentration history.

        So you should be very thankful to the intentionally unexplored aerosol forcing for papering up all inconsistencies in the warmunist models, keeping the Warmunist charlatan priests well financed by the state with *MY* money – for which I worked, and which I demand back.

        Warmunist fanatics! Give back the money you have stolen! Whether subsidies or research grants! You owe us trillions!

      2. AndyG55

        “i personally do not see such a lack.”

        You personally don’t see your own nose !!!

        1. No warming in the UAH satellite record before the 1998 El Nino

        2. No warming between the end of that El Nino in 2001 and the start of the current El Nino at the beginning of 2015.

        3. No warming in the southern polar region for the whole 38 years of the satellite record.

        4. No warming in the southern ex-tropicals for 20 years.

        5. No warming in Australia for 20 years, cooling since 2002

        6. No warming in Japan surface data for 20 years, No warming from 1950-1990.. zero trend

        7. No warming in the USA since 2005 when a non-corrupted system was installed, until the beginning of the current El Nino.

        8. UAH Global Land shows no warming from 1979 1997, the no warming from 2001 – 2015

        9. Iceland essentially the same temperature as in the late 1930s as now, maybe slightly lower

        10. Southern Sea temperatures not warming from 1982 2005, then cooling

        11. Even UAH NoPol shows no warming this century until the large spike in January 2016.

        That is DESPITE a large climb in CO2 levels over those periods.

        There IS NO CO2 WARMING effect.

        The ONLY warming has come from ElNino and ocean circulation effects.

        1. yonason

          But let us not forget, AndyG55, that “the science is settled.”

          Talk about laughter that brings tears to the eyes.

        2. yonason

          “The ONLY warming has come from ElNino and ocean circulation effects.” – AndyG55

          And now that it’s over, and LaNina is kicking in, we appear to be returning to the pause.
          http://www.drroyspencer.com/2016/07/record-warm-2016-what-a-difference-one-month-makes/

          1. sod

            ““The ONLY warming has come from ElNino and ocean circulation effects.” – AndyG55

            And now that it’s over, and LaNina is kicking in, we appear to be returning to the pause.”

            Can you really not spot the contradiction in those two sentences?

            If you dismiss el nino, you also have to dismiss la nina. you can not dismiss one and keep the other.

            “all cooling that we ever saw in satellite data was caused by la nina. can you spot the problem?

          2. yonason

            “If you dismiss el nino, you also have to dismiss la nina. you can not dismiss one and keep the other.” – sod (AKA ‘source of disinformation’)

            What ever made you think I was dismissing anything. El Nino is over and La Nina is beginning, or about to.

            “…can you spot the problem?”

            Yeah, and it calls itself “sod.”

        3. sod

          “1. No warming …”

          you do understand the major problem with your approach?

          you are looking for no warming, and you find no warming. You do so, by cherry picking datasets, start and end dates and regions.

          basically every on of those points can be directly contradicted by simply changing one of those aspects.

          BREAKING NEWS: Even a much warmer globe will have places and time periods that show no or little warming. But these places do not matter, as all the people living in places with big changes will tell you!

          1. yonason

            Classic psychological projection.

            And when you use a term like “breaking news” it should refer to contemporary events, not demented future warmist fantasies.

          2. Hugs

            There is some warming.

            The small amount of probable CO2 related warming is so much overwhelmed by daily, weekly, yearly, and local, regional and global natural variation, that is has barely a separate measurable effect.

            The assumed anthropogenic global warming of 0.01..0.02 K yr⁻¹ is so small it is overwhelmed by difference between distances smaller than one metre and timewise distance of a few minutes!

            You don’t actually need to cherry pick because there is no much CO2 warming to talk about. But by cherry picking you can clearly show “global” warming doesn’t even really happen in under 30 year periods, but rather there is a very tiny signal inside the normal yearly variation.

          3. DirkH

            sod 3. July 2016 at 11:29 AM | Permalink | Reply
            “BREAKING NEWS: Even a much warmer globe will have places and time periods that show no or little warming. ”

            So explain. CO2 is well-mixed. According to warmunist theory, IR backradiation should rise everywhere. You say some places will be spared. Why? How?

            I’m just trolling you, of course. You can’t explain anything because you refuse to think.

  3. tom0mason

    Alarms noisily sound and the WARNING sign flashes as the BS-o-meter bangs at the end-stop when phrases such as “Because greenhouse gases stay in the atmosphere for a long time, the concentration rises even if emissions remain steady. ”

    Greenhouses do NOT require special gasses to work, using this phrase reinforces the idea that a gas can heat the atmosphere, that the atmosphere is some kind of greenhouse, and that a greenhouse, or glasshouse, gets warm because of a gas within it. Utter BS on all three counts!

    Yes some gases are IR active so why not call them the ‘IR active’ gases.
    As to these ‘gases stay in the atmosphere for a long time’, what 10 minutes, 1 hour, a million years?

    “the concentration rises even if emissions remain steady” obviously he’s referring to the emissions from the relentless farting of the ever increasing population of trillions of termites. http://www.meteor.iastate.edu/gcp/studentpapers/1996/atmoschem/brockberg.html

    1. Ron C.

      Dr. Salby figures that 10% of the CO2 washes out of the atmosphere each year and is replaced by natural sources. So in 10 years, all the CO2 has been recycled.

      1. Hugs

        Well it has been “recycled” (meaning the CO2 in air consists of gas that have visited the sea and plants), but the amount has not been reduced. Plus Salby can’t be taken very seriously. See Wuwt for comments on his work. Even sceptics find him very odd.

        Salby’s statements are either very misguided or a red herring, not sure which one would be a nicer conclusion.

  4. Ron C.

    This is a theoretical result that has to be assessed against real world precipitation. Here’s a data rich study of measured rainfall, and guess what? They conclude that warming since 1850 has not led to actual changes in the distributions.

    https://rclutz.wordpress.com/2016/05/07/data-vs-models-2-droughts-and-floods/

    1. Kenneth Richard

      http://www.nature.com/nclimate/journal/v4/n2/full/nclimate2068.html
      The hydrological cycle is expected to intensify in response to global warming. Yet, little unequivocal evidence of such an acceleration has been found on a global scale.

      http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/02626667.2013.857411#.VLGv6ysjKSo
      It has not been possible to attribute rain-generated peak streamflow trends to anthropogenic climate change over the past several decades.

  5. oeman50

    This is another prediction that cannot be verified until we all, including the author, are dead. Is an unverifiable “fact” really a fact? Classical logic says not.

    1. John Silver

      In the Orwellian world we live in, it is.

    2. Mindert Eiting

      Classical logic does not say that facts must be verified by us humans. If a fact is implied by a true theory it must be true too. For that reason we may believe that after a few billion of years our sun will collapse into a neutron star. We cannot prove that a theory is true but a true theory cannot have false consequences. Because of its failed predictions AGW is false. Therefore, it implies everything, more and less rain in 2100 and all sense and nonsense we can imagine. It is a zombie theory spooking around as a collective psychosis (lost contact with reality).

      1. yonason

        You forgot ‘driven by greed and lust for power’, but otherwise, yeah.

  6. Mindert Eiting

    Is there an influence of the percentage of witches in the world population on the amount of precipitation? This is a legitimate question but first the factual part. There is no increase in precipitation which is the same as saying not yet an increase. The rest is model work. If around 2100 the percentage has become twenty, we may expect a lot more rain. Of course, it is up to politics to do something about witches in order to save our planet.

  7. AndyG55

    “This could change by the end of this century”

    roflmao..

    Any paper that makes that sort of statement holds itself up to RIDICULE.

    Anything COULD change by the end of the century !!!!!!!!

  8. sod

    “Any paper that makes that sort of statement holds itself up to RIDICULE.”

    Please read the paper. Your making fun of something that is pure science and simply the result of several studies.

    “Conversely, reduced aerosol emissions help to “unmask” the precipitation increase by GHG warming (35). Eventually, the global mean aerosol effect on precipitation will almost completely be overwhelmed by GHG warming as expected on the basis of previous studies (32, 33, 36).”

    http://advances.sciencemag.org/content/2/6/e1501572.full

    1. yonason

      “Your making fun of something that is pure science and simply the result of several studies.” – sod

      OK, I looked.

      “Keywords
      Climate modeling
      ….
      ….”

      I.E., it’s pure science fiction modeling BS. And “several studies” my foot! It doesn’t matter how often he has run the program, garbage in as still garbage out.

      1. Hugs

        Sir, science may be wrong, but criticizing it requires that you actually understand something of the same science done right. This is a thing most of us can’t do. I’m afraid Sod has the best mathematical skills here to actually say something about the paper.

        I’m sure there is a lot of scathing words to say about climate modeling, more than just gigo.

        1. yonason

          “Sod has the best mathematical skills here to actually say something about the paper.” – hugs

          You’ve got to be kidding! sod has any number of times shown how weak his math and analytical skills are. As to climate models, they can’t work because climate is a chaotic system, and they are impossible to model.
          https://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/10/16/a-simple-truth-computer-climate-models-cannot-work/
          You might as well be using a “magic eight-ball.”

        2. yonason

          PS – if sod is so good at math, maybe he’d like to try his hand at winning this prize
          http://motls.blogspot.com/2015/11/find-global-warming-win-100000.html

          Pretending to model a chaotic system which science tells us can’t be modeled cannot be called “science” by any honest and knowledgeable person. Climate modeling is more like reading chicken entrails. It is NOT science.

        3. DirkH

          Hugs 4. July 2016 at 12:08 PM | Permalink | Reply
          “I’m afraid Sod has the best mathematical skills here to actually say something about the paper.”

          What, because he is able to use the word standard deviation, and because he claims he’s smart? Well then ask him for the power spectrum of the temperature time series of Potsdam, Telegrafenberg over the last 300 years and see what happens.

    2. AndyG55

      ASSumptions built upon ASSumptions and TOTALLY UNTESTABLE..

      NOT science. ! Crystal ball gazing.

      I can get that down at the local fair from the rather cute tarot card reader.. !!

  9. dennisambler

    “Because greenhouse gases stay in the atmosphere for a long time, the concentration rises even if emissions remain steady. ”

    http://www.co2science.org/articles/V12/N31/EDIT.php

    “Sundquist (1985) compiled a large number of measured RTs of CO2 found by different methods. The list, containing RTs for both 12CO2 and 14CO2, was expanded by Segalstad (1998), showing a total range for all reported RTs from 1 to 15 years, with most RT values ranging from 5 to 15 years. Essenhigh (2009) emphasizes that this list of measured values of RT compares well with his calculated RT of 5 years (atmospheric bulk 12CO2) and ~16 years (atmospheric trace 14CO2). Furthermore he points out that the annual oscillations in the measured atmospheric CO2 levels would be impossible without a short atmospheric residence time for the CO2 molecules.”

    1. yonason
      1. sod

        “Do you think sod can spot the outlier?”

        I do. What is the definition of “residence time” in the different studies?

        Individual CO2 molecules “reside” for only a few years. But the question is, how long does it take to reduce CO2 concentration?

        Where do you think that massive amount of additional CO2 will end within a short timespan of, let us say 5-10 years?!?

        http://blog.ucsusa.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/mlo_full_record.png

        1. yonason

          “Massive amounts of additional CO2?” You’ve got to be kidding!
          http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/PageMill_Images/image270b.gif

          The residence time of a bad idea in what passes for sod’s “mind” is indeterminable, since none has ever been observed to leave it.

          1. sod

            “The residence time of a bad idea in what passes for sod’s “mind” is indeterminable, ”

            The simple truth is, your graph is utter garbage. It is mixing up 5-10 year periods (residence time of individual molecules) and the 100 years number, which is the realistic estimate of the CO2 concentration falling back to pre-AGW levels.

            Again, your graph is utter garbage and insults are not arguments.

          2. David Johnson

            Consider how you drive people to insults by your wilful misrepresentation of the facts, as you struggle to fit them into your pre-conceived agenda

          3. Hugs

            David, I think it is not Sod that misrepresents anything and it is jonason who does the insults gratuituosly.

            Just my 5 cents. I believe there is little hope to get a common understanding when people are so hot.

          4. yonason

            “…insults are not arguments.” – SOD

            Sorry if you find the truth insulting. Too bad. As Evan Sayet so astutely observes:

            “The Modern Liberal will invariably side with evil over good, wrong over right, and the behaviors that lead to failure over those that lead to success.

            Now, as to the hogwash you call science, I doubt these will help you, but they may help others.

            http://www.klimarealistene.com/web-content/Bibliografi/Goldberg2008,%20CO2.pdf

            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=poi8YLUIgVs

            The effect of adding CO2 on temperature can’t be measured, but other parameters can, and they show CO2 to be essentially irrelevant.

          5. yonason

            Hugs 4. July 2016 at 12:13

            I’m only “insulting” sod by telling him truth about him. He, on the other hand, insults everyone with the nonsense he spews. The policies and people he admires are some of the worst on the planet, which makes him one of them.

            https://nofrakkingconsensus.com/2016/01/28/carbon-taxes-real-misery-imaginary-results/

            https://nofrakkingconsensus.com/2016/02/16/the-wwf-thugs-guns-against-pygmies/

            https://nofrakkingconsensus.com/2016/02/08/david-suzuki-enemy-of-free-speech/

            If you want to be nice to him, go right ahead. But I assure you my “insults” are NOT “gratuitous.” They are very well deserved.

          6. sod

            “Sorry if you find the truth insulting. ”

            The truth is, you did link a random graph that you found somewhere on the internet. You linked it, without understanding it.

            http://jennifermarohasy.com//wp-content/uploads/2009/09/Carbon-dioxide-residence-time.jpg

            Shall i add another outlier? One that says that residency time is rather 40 years and not the 5 years that your random assortment of sources from the 60s says?

            Check this out:

            https://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/11/24/co2-residence-time-said-to-be-40-years-not-1000-as-noaa-claims/

          7. yonason

            @sod the impervious to reality

            Here’s one that makes a good case for 33 years.
            http://euanmearns.com/the-residence-time-of-co2-in-the-atmosphere-is-33-years/

            But my point in my last post here is that IT DOESN’T MATTER, because there is no CO2 “fingerprint.” As Fred Goldberg shows, WITH DATA not meaningless blather, any CO2 effect is meaningless compared to other natural effects.

            They are not a “random links.” They are totally pertinent to the topic at hand, unlike your unfounded assertions. Your refusal to acknowledge that means you are either a dunce or a liar (or both).

            “by calculating the product of the adjusted CO2 contribution to greenhouse gases (3.618%) and % of CO2 concentration from anthropogenic (man-made) sources (3.225%), we see that only (0.03618 X 0.03225) or 0.117% of the greenhouse effect is due to atmospheric CO2 from human activity.
            ——————————————
            http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/greenhouse_data.html

            to sum up:
            1. the IPCC lied about CO2 residence time.
            2. human contribution of CO2 to the atmosphere is INSIGNIFICANT. Even if the IPCC were correct, it would be irrelevant – lost in the background noise.

  10. Svend Ferdinandsen

    This study somehow shows that the warming must be very small.
    The water content in the air is 2.5cm and the evaporation and rain is 100cm yearly. All water evaporated must come down again, so maybe we have no warming or the evaporation is constant of other reasons.
    The aerosols can not explain if it should rain more or less.
    On the other hand will changes in RH influence the evaporation, and in that way the rain.

  11. Marc Salzmann

    You posted your own translation of a German press release on your website. It says:

    “It is also known that as a consequence of climate change, there are heavy rainfalls more often.”

    In other words, the frequency of heavy rain events has already increased. The translation also says that “the Arctic is melting, temperature and sea level are rising, and every year a new record is reached with CO2 in the atmosphere” and that “precipitation has increased in some regions of the earth, but at the same time it has decreased in others.”

    Yet, none of this worries you. Instead you take comfort in the finding that the global mean precipitation has not changed much. But you just hear what you want to hear and see what you want to see. In a few decades from now people like you will probably say that nobody had told them.

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