Measuring Downwelling Long Wave Radiation by Ghost Detector

In previous posts I have shown that CO2 alarmism is based on the idea that the atmosphere is warming the Earth surface by Downwelling Long Wave Radiation DLWR or Back Radiation as the physics of the Greenhouse Effect, the existence of which is supposed to be documented through measurements with various instruments such as pyrgeometers and radiometers reporting data of the typical form (with clear skies in the beginning and end of the period and cloudy in between):

We see here depending on cloudiness measured DLWR ranging from 280 to 400 Watts/m2, to be compared with around 200 Watts/m2 from Short Wave Radiation from the Sun, thus very substantial, about two extra Suns. The conclusion from measurement is thus that the atmosphere depending on cloudiness is warming the Earth surface more than the Sun, and from that discovery send an alarm message that just a tiny bit of change of the atmosphere like doubling of the concentration of the trace gas CO2 can cause catastrophical global warming of up to 3-5 C. The argument is that if you can measure something (DLWR) with some instrument (pyrgeometer) that something which your are measuring must exist. But is this a valid scientific argument?

No, it is not necessarily so without looking inte the functioning of the instrument: In earlier posts (compare with Wikipedia pyrgeometer) I have shown that a pyrgeometer is a ghost detector, which reports massive DWLR from a formula of the form 

• DWLR = pyrgeometer measurement + OLWR   (1)

where OLWR is assumed to be Outgoing Long Wave Radiation from the instrument into a background of zero Kelvin according to Planck's Law. But OLWR is a fictional massive ghost radiation since the instrument is communicating with the atmosphere and not the zero Kelvin outer space. What the pyrgeometer actually measures is in fact the temperature difference between the warmer Earth surface and the somewhat colder atmosphere (but not outer space at zero Kelvin), which is of moderate size and according to Stefan-Boltzmann's law scales with the heat transfer from the Earth surface to the colder atmosphere. 

The pyrgeometer thus measures a moderate heat transfer from Earth surface to atmosphere, which together with the massive fictional non-physical OLWR of size 390 Watts/m2 at mean Earth surface temperature around 15 C, becomes massive fictional non-physical DWLR of size 280-400 Watts/m2 as reported by (1) as the postulated physics of a fictional non-physical Greenhouse Effect.

Recall that a pyrgeometer measures (as a voltage) the difference between the end temperatures of a thermopile with one end in contact with a dome/window directed to the atmosphere and the other with the instrument itself together with a thermometer measuring the instrument temperature. Although apparently a temperature difference de facto is measured, calculated DWLR according to (1) is reported with OLR postulated (but unphysical).  

We may compare with a situation where you have hired a plumber or lawyer to do a certain job and after completion the net work accomplished is recorded and you are presented with a bill of the form

• total cost = net recorded result  + claimed invested effort by plumber/lawyer    (2)

and where the claimed invested effort can be anything and the net recorded result can even be negative, which is the analog of (1), while the total cost to pay is big. This can be the case if you have not agreed on a total cost for the job ahead, and just hope that you will not get ripped off in an open-ended contract (current account) like (2). 

But in climate alarmism you do get ripped off by the use of a ghost detector reporting a DLWR, which does no exist because it is the Earth surface which warms the colder atmosphere and not the other way around. 

Why should you allow to get ripped off, if it is not necessary? By getting fooled about a fictional non-physical Greenhouse Effect recorded by a ghost detector? But the cheating is so simple that it may be difficult to discover. More details in this presentation from Climate Sense 2018.

Note that the above picture reports more warming from cloudy skies at night, which fits with experience and so deceptively can be used to sell the idea that DWLR is real.  

For physically correct versions of Planck-Stefan-Boltzmann's Law see Computational BlackBody Radiation. 

If you are not convinced about the role of DWLR/Back Radiation in selling CO2 alarmism, take a look at the following energy budget diagram presented by NASA:

See (with support from slides and hand-out to innocent students) that the Earth surface absorbs 48.0% of incoming sunlight (yellow) and an additional 100% (two extra Suns) from Back Radiation (brown), while the Earth surface emits 117.0% more the twice what is absorbed. How do you react when you understand that you are being fooled?