Do you think our knowledge of Venus' atmosphere, climate, and greenhouse effect...?

Question

...has tainted our understanding of our own planet? I mean, my dad who is an engineer tolds me today, I've been told ever since I was a little kid that CO2 is a greenhouse gas that is keeping Earth warm. Where did this idea come from? Was it the discovery of CO2 in Venus's atmosphere combined with the discovery of Venus's wildly hot temperature? Has mankind been so focused on Venus that we are totally missing what the differences on Earth are? Seriously. Venus has an atmosphere 90 times thicker than Earth and it is made almost entirely of CO2, and so, Venus has a greenhouse effect going on. So what? Earth has a paper thin atmosphere and has almost no CO2. CO2 is considered a trace gas in our atmosphere. Earth's greenhouse is caused by water vapor, and by the way, water vapor is a much more powerful greenhouse gas.

I am just curious if anyone else sees the possibility that our knowledge of Venus has clouded our judgement of our own planet.

Answer 1

The short answer is no.

Here is the long answer. Our knowledge of the greenhouse effect and how it works is entirely based on how various gases are known to absorb various wavelengths of light. It is understood on a very deep level. The way gases and other molecules absorb photons including light was instrumental in the development of quantum theory. This was all well understood around 1900 or so. Our knowledge of greenhouse gases enabled us to predict conditions on the surface of Venus well before we ever visited it. As for the way greenhouse gases work on Earth and how they are impacting global warming I have copied one of my answers from another related question. I hope it interests you.

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Water causes most of the greenhouse effect but only a very small part of global warming. The reason is that the amount of water in the near surface atmosphere is controlled primarily by the temperature of the oceans, which is quite stable. Adding water vapor to the atmosphere near the surface just causes a bit more rain. Carbon dioxide has no such control. And so it is much more important to the recent global warming.

There are two separate issues:

1) What are the greenhouse gases?

2) What are the greenhouse gases that are responsible for the recent global warming?

Just looking at the gasses that are responsible for the greenhouse effect in general the rankings are:

Water vapor, which causes about 36–70%;

Carbon dioxide (CO2), which causes 9–26%;

Methane (CH4), which causes 4–9%; and

Ozone, which causes 3–7%

There are a number of other greenhouse gases that while not making much contribution to the total greenhouse effect do make an important contribution to global warming.

If you look at which of these gases are causing global warming then the ranking is:

Carbon dioxide (CO2), which causes 87%;

Aerosols, which causes -64% (negative because they reduce warming)

Methane (CH4), which causes 23%;

Halocarbons, which causes 21%

Ozone (near the surface), which causes 18%

N2O, which causes 10%

Water vapor (stratospheric), which causes 5%

So here is the answer, water vapor is the primary greenhouse gas but carbon dioxide is the primary cause of global warming.

Answer 2

I don't know that Venus has caused the problem.. I think it's more a political decision to avoid any objective science that's driving the chicken littles today.

CO2 is a tiny percent of greenhouse gas, and despite what Al Gore will tell you.. it probably is not the cause of global warming.  If you look at the charts showing historical CO2 levels and temperature.. the temperature increase happens BEFORE the CO2 increase.   The theory just doesn't work.

Answer 3

You may have a point there.

I'm not versed on the atmosphere of Venus, but it's the layer of "greenhouse" gases that keeps the planet Earth from freezing, so that's a good thing.

Our climate is beyond our control, and we're on a warming trend right now.  History shows much more prosperity planet-wise when temperatures are warmer.  And the latest advances in science show that the warming trend actually decreases the number of hurricanes and tornadoes, and that's another good thing.

Oh, and Mars is warming too, so perhaps Venus is warming as well.  Most scientists think the warming has been due to sun spots, so it makes sense that it would affect all planets in our solar system.