Adding CO2 to the atmosphere can have no significant climatic effect when rising above the threshold of about 300 ppm. Due to saturation, higher and higher concentrations do not lead to any further absorption of radiation.
If one were to paint a white surface black so as to allow it to absorb as much heat as possible, it is well known the first layer of paint has the most dominant impact on heat absorption. A second coat covers up any remaining grayish color and perhaps a few spots missed on the first layer. By the third layer, there is effectively no more heat absorption that can be attained with the additional coat, as the surface is saturated in black. It cannot become blacker.
Three Polish physicists have focused their attention on this saturation principle as it applies to CO2 in three recently published papers (Kubicki et al., 2024, 2022, and 2020). Their latest (Kubicki et al., 2024), published in Applications in Engineering Science, summarizes the experimental evidence from their 2020 and 2022 publications substantiating the conclusion that “as a result of saturation processes, emitted CO2 does not directly cause an increase in global temperature.”
“From the conducted considerations, it follows that both in Eq. (4) and Eq. (6), the value of absorption is limited. In the first case, it cannot exceed 1, and in the second case, it cannot exceed the value of ψ less than unity. Therefore, for a sufficiently large mass m, saturation must occur, and further increase in mass will result in a negligible increase in absorption.”
This research adds another layer to more than 50 years of research on the CO2 saturation principle.
“Schack (1972)…demonstrated that for a concentration of 0.03% of carbon dioxide in the air, the absorption process in the troposphere is saturated.”
The authors are concerned about the recent push to rely on modeling and assumptions about CO2’s capacity to drive changes in global temperature rather than observational evidence. They point out the current CO2-is-the-climate-control-knob zeitgeist is no more than a hypothesis.
“This unequivocally suggests that the officially presented impact of anthropogenic CO2 increase on Earth’s climate is merely a hypothesis rather than a substantiated fact.”
Image Source: Kubicki et al., 2024
In their 2022 paper the authors showed that at 400 ppm the CO2 concentration can no longer cause any increase in temperature, as no more absorption of thermal radiation can occur due to saturation.
“…the experiment described in articles [5] an [6] was carried out, where it was shown that thermal radiation from the hot surface of the Moon, after passing through the Earth’s atmosphere, is not absorbed in carbon dioxide. Thus, it was shown for this radiation there is a complete saturation of the process.”
“It can be seen that practically with the mass of carbon dioxide of about 1.5 kg/m², the process of absorption of thermal radiation goes into saturation… So, for the current concentration of 400 ppm for which the mass of CO2 in the atmosphere is ~6 kg/m², the limit is four times exceeded.”
“Thus, it can be presumed that the carbon dioxide additionally emitted into the atmosphere does not absorb thermal radiation and thus is not a greenhouse gas.”
Image Source: Kubicki et al., 2022
In their 2020 paper the three physicists reported their experimental evidence can “disprove [the] general theorem” that increasing the concentration of absorbing gases will “cause strong increase of the absorption of the infrared radiation.”
In their experiment they found that there was no difference (120.9 vs. 121.0 μW) in the power of air, with 0.04% CO2, to absorb infrared radiation versus the capacity of 100% CO2 to absorb radiation due to the saturation effect.
Image Source: Kubicki et al., 2020
Recently, other scientists (Chen et al., 2023) also reported that CO2 has a severely reduced effect on atmospheric transmissivity due to (a) absorption saturation (CO2 can have no effect beyond a pre-industrial concentration), and because (b) water vapor and cloud forcing overlap and thus dominate absorption in CO2’s band.
“[Transmissivity] in the CO2 band center is unchanged by increased CO2 as the absorption is already saturated…”
“[T]he water vapor and CO2 overlapping at an absorbing band prevents absorption by additional CO2.”
Image Source: Chen et al., 2023
Physicist Dieter Schildknecht (2020) also reported on the saturation of the CO2 impact once it reaches 300 ppm concentrations, concluding that because of this saturation further CO2 increases “cannot affect the earth’s climate.”
“The absorption reaches values close to 100% for a realistic CO2 content of 0.03%, [so] it is concluded that any further increase of (anthropogenic) CO2 cannot lead to an appreciably stronger absorption of radiation, and consequently cannot affect the earth’s climate.”
Image Source: Schildknecht, 2020
Dr. Easterbrook also illustratively referenced the saturation effect in research published in 2016, calculating the effect of a 80 ppm increase in CO2 as only about 0.01°C.
Notice on the pie chart there is almost no detectable change after the CO2 concentration has reached ~240 ppm.
Image Source: Easterbrook, 2016
In the 1970s, before the anthropogenic global warming narrative had evolved into what it is today, it was common for scientists to admit the CO2 radiative impact is already saturated.
According to Weare and Snell (1974), doubling of the CO2 concentration was thought to lead to a global surface temperature increase of 0.7 K, but a six-fold increase (~2,000 ppm) would only raise temperature 1.0 K more “due to saturation of the 15 μm band.”
Per Rasool and Schneider (1971), increasing the CO2 concentration 10-fold (over 3,000 ppm) would not increase temperatures more than 2.5°C “because the 15 μm band ‘saturates’.”
Image Source: Weare and Snell, 1974 and Rasool and Schneider, 1971
Other scientists at the time estimated that when increasing CO2 “seven times the normal concentrations, the average temperature increase is about 1°C” (Zdunkowski et al., 1975), or that doubled CO2 concentrations lead to 0.30°C warming, but quadrupled CO2 (~1250 ppm) leads to just 0.48°C warming (Gates et al., 1981). Again, this is due to the saturation effect.
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