Why are the numbers given in this article different from those given in the original source?

Question

An answer to another question referenced this source

http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/greenhouse_data.html

Table 1 refers to greenhouse gas concentrations from this source.

http://cdiac.ornl.gov/pns/current_ghg.html

The original source does not give any source attribution. The numbers taken from the original source are transcribed incorrectly. The article quotes a 5% greenhouse gas contribution from CO2. The original paper gives 5% in clouds and 12% overall. Can an article that misquotes its sources be taken seriously?

Answer 1

the geocraft page was written by Monte Heib.

who was and engineer for the coal industry.

http://neweconomist.blogs.com/new_econom...

<<Monte Hieb has worked as chief engineer for the West Virginia Office of Miner’s Safety. I hope you understand that the coal mining industry is not a reliable source for debate on climate change. Clearly, Monte Hieb is not a climate scientist (though he seems to be an enthusiastic amateur fossil-hound with a really nice web site on W VA fossils.>>

You've already posted Monte Hieb's position on water vapor.

Here are real scientists on water vapor. http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=1... (hat tip to Felix Salmon at RGE Monitor)

i know that you already know.

"look at the source."

however, although you do, there are lots of folks who don't care about the source, as long as it supports their prejudices.

[ and they all get to vote, unfortunately. :( ]

however, it would be good to point out that this is distraction.

even bush admitted that AGW is a problem, and should be addressed.

everytime we go back and revisit "is it a problem" it distracts forward progress.

but then the other side of the coin is, if we don't revisit these old myths, there will be people who still think they are/might be valid.

Answer 2

The point of the article is generally correct, in that the human portion of the greenhouse layer is minescule, but there are errors. It states in one section that most of co2 is man made, then later correctly states its around 3% of o2. There are varying figure banded about for co2 and man made co2, but they are always small numbers.

I have seen smaller figures for the co2% in the greenhouse layer of 0.054%. If they used this figure the man made contribtion would be even smaller.

Either way the concept that man made emissions are minescule is correct reglardless of what number they use. Hence why many people dont accept man made co2 is a major driver of climate

Answer 3

The site is clearly run by a person with an agenda who has little knowledge of the science.  Just look at Table 3 - it's also wrong.  Water vapor accounts for 36-66% of the greenhouse effect (66-85% if you include clouds) and CO2 9-26%, not 95% vs. 3%.  I like how the author doesn't just cite water vapor's contribution at 95% either, but 95.000%.  What precision!

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=1...

Most of the citations for the 95% are sources like Global Deception: The Exaggeration of the Global Warming Threat by Dr. Patrick J. Michaels, Personal Communication-- Dr. Richard S. Lindzen, etc.

No bias there!

Just goes to show, when you set out trying to prove a conclusion, you can cherrypick the information necessary to prove it.  Or just incorrectly cite sources to "prove" the point, as is the case in Table 1.  The website is titled "Plant Fossils of West Virginia" and doesn't give information on who runs it.

The site is also the host of the infamously misleading "global warming test" as well.

http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/GlobWa...

This is just a great example why you need to get your scientific information from valid scientific sources (i.e. NASA, NOAA, Hadley, AGU, etc.), not from random websites or blogs written by people with clear agendas and no expertise.