In their seminal paper on the Vostok prodirect soccer Ice Core, Petit et al (1999) [1] note that CO2

Home About About Contact Compose story FAQs My Blog Spawn Policy Publications and Projects Climate FAIL Files Al Gore and Bill Nye FAIL at doing a simple CO2 experiment List of excuses for ‘The Pause’ in global warming The Gore-a-thon on WUWT Climategate Reference Pages Atmosphere Page CO2 Page Atmospheric Oscillation Page Climatic prodirect soccer Phenomena prodirect soccer ENSO Page ENSO Forecast Page Polar Vortex Page Northern Polar Vortex Page Southern Polar Vortex Page “Extreme Weather” Page Tornado Page Tropical Cyclone Page Geomagnetism Page Global Temperature – Climate Global Climate Page Global Temperature Page Glossary Ocean Page Oceanic Oscillation Page Paleoclimate Page Sea Ice Page Beaufort Sea Ice Page Great Lakes Ice Page Northern Regional Sea Ice Page Research Potential Climatic Variables Page The Spencer-Braswell & Dessler papers Solar Page US Weather – Climate US Climate Page US Weather prodirect soccer Page Submit story Test Tips & Notes Widget WUWT Stuff
In their seminal paper on the Vostok prodirect soccer Ice Core, Petit et al (1999) [1] note that CO2 lags temperature during the onset of glaciations by several thousand years but offer no explanation. They also observe that CH4 and CO2 are not perfectly aligned with each other but offer no explanation. The significance of these observations are therefore ignored. At the onset of glaciations temperature drops to glacial values before CO2 begins to fall suggesting that CO2 has little influence on temperature modulation at these times.
As discussed at the end of this post, consideration of the geochemical cycles of CO2 and CH4 in ice, permafrost, terrestrial prodirect soccer and oceanic biospheres and in deep ocean water during freeze – thaw glacial cycles suggests that it is inevitable that CO2 and CH4 are going to correlate with temperature prodirect soccer in a general way. This correlation shows that CO2 and CH4 are controlled by temperature prodirect soccer and so provides no evidence for CO2 or CH4 amplifying temperature signals that are linked to orbital cycles. Introduction
The Russian Vostok prodirect soccer Antarctic base lies 1300 km from the S pole, close to the centre of the Antarctica continent at an elevation of 3488 m. It currently receives 2.6 mm precipitation per year. Average temperature is -55 C and the record low is -89.2 C which is below the freezing point of CO2. Vostok is one of the most hostile places on Earth.
There is a history prodirect soccer of drilling various prodirect soccer ice cores at Vostok. The main ice core, the subject of this post, was drilled in 1995. The Vostok ice core is 3310 m long and represents 422,766 years of snow accumulation. One year is therefore represented by only 7.8 mm of ice. Vostok is a cold, cold desert and the very slow ice accumulation rate introduces significant uncertainties to the data.
In addition to ice cores, Vostok is famous for the sub-glacial lake that lies beneath that has been mapped as one of the largest lakes in the world covering 14,000 sq kms. It is clearly a lot warmer under the ice than on its surface.
In comparing the temperature, CO2 and CH4 signals in the Vostok ice core, it is important to understand that the temperature signal is carried by hydrogen : deuterium isotope abundance in the water that makes the ice whilst the CO2 and CH4 signals are carried by air bubbles trapped in the ice. The air bubbles trapped by ice are always deemed to be younger than the ice owing to the time lag between snow falling and it being compacted to form ice. In Vostok, the time lag between snow falling and ice trapping air varies between 2000 and 6500 years. There is therefore a substantial correction applied to bring the gas ages in alignment with the ice ages and the accuracy of this needs to be born in mind in making interpretations. Vostok data can be downloaded here .
Note that in all my charts time is passing from right to left with the “present day” to the left. The present day (year zero) is deemed to be 1995, the year that the cores were drilled. The GT4 time scale of Petit et al is used [1].
The methane concentrations in gas bubbles and temperature variations prodirect soccer in Vostok are incredibly well aligned, especially at the terminations and return to glaciation when temperature variations are at their greatest. (Figure 3).
The fit of CO2 to temperature is actually not nearly so tight as for CH4. There is a persistent tendency for CO2 to lag temperature throughout and this time lag is most pronounced prodirect soccer at the onset of each glacial cycle “ where CO2 lags temperature by several thousand years” [1] (Figure 4).
Figure 4 CO2 and temperature appear well-correlated in a gross sense but there are some significant deviations. At the terminations, the alignment is as good as observed for methane. But upon descent prodirect soccer into the following glaciation there is a time lag between prodirect soccer CO2 and temperature of several thousand years. Petit et al [1] make the observation but fail to offer an explanation and to take the significance into account p