Sniff Test to Refute Claims of Low Climate Sensitivity
There is no shortage of contrarian claims that equilibrium climate sensitivity (or ECS) is so low that global warming can't be considered a threat to human civilizations. Sometimes you'll find them using simple math to "prove" that this is the case. Almost always these "proofs" involve calculations of Planck sensitivity along with assertions that positive feedbacks are impossible (a common refrain is that they violate Le Chatelier's Principle, which they don't) or that they are trumped up lies to create scare stories about global warming. What I want to do here is share what should work as an effective "sniff test" for most (if not all) of these claims using the energy balance equation. First I'll show how the energy balance equation works for a rough estimate for ECS. Then I'll show how you can rearrange terms to show that low sensitivity claims simply don't account for empirical data. To begin, let's start with the fact th...