Summary of Ralph Ellis: Ice Ages modulated by ice-sheet albedo, not by CO2 | Tom Nelson Podcast #71

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00:00:00 - 01:00:00

Ralph Ellis explains his research that suggests ice sheet albedo, rather than CO2, modulates ice ages. He argues that while there is a correlation between temperature and CO2, it's not a causal link, as CO2 levels have lagged behind temperature changes. The primary feedback agent of interglacials and ice ages appears to be the reflectivity of the ice sheets, which is affected by dust settling on them. Ellis highlights the importance of CO2 deserts in cooling the Earth during ice ages and suggests that coatings of carbon dust on northern ice sheets may slow the advance of ice. He presents evidence that his proposed mechanism for ice-age modulation is more consistent with the available data than the dominant CO2-based model.

00:00:00 In this section, Ralph Ellis, a polymath from the UK, discusses his background and experience in meteorology and climate discussions. He explains his paper, "Modulation of Ice Ages via Procession and Dust Albedo Feedbacks", and the standard graph used in paleoclimate. Ellis argues that while there is a correlation between temperature and CO2, correlation does not imply causation, and there are problems with the idea that CO2 is the feedback agent controlling temperature. He suggests that ice sheet albedo, not CO2, may be the primary modulator of ice ages, with dust production before every interglacial due to a lack of CO2 causing CO2 deserts, which produce dust settling on the northern ice.
00:05:00 In this section, Ralph Ellis explains several problems with the standard interpretation of the relationship between CO2 and temperature. Firstly, the graph he presents shows that high CO2 levels appear during cooling periods while low CO2 levels correspond with warming, which contradicts what's commonly believed. He suggests that CO2 may be a weak or secondary feedback agent in modulating the ice cycle. Additionally, CO2 often lags behind temperature changes, indicating that it's not causing the warming but rather being released as a result of it. Ellis argues that the great summers triggered by orbital cycles, or Melankovic insulation, can independently initiate interglacial periods, raising the question of whether CO2 needs to be invoked as a feedback agent at all.
00:10:00 In this section, Ralph Ellis explains that CO2 cannot be the sole explanation for the presence of interglacials as some of them should have been caused by great summers in the Southern Hemisphere, but they are all Northern Hemisphere events. Furthermore, not every Milankovitch maximum causes an interglacial, and sometimes there is a small rise in temperature or nothing happens at all. This suggests that a regional and intermittent feedback agent is involved, which is not consistent with CO2, a global gas. Some have suggested that ubiquity, the tilt angle of the Earth, could be the forcing agent instead of Milankovitch insulation.
00:15:00 In this section, Ralph Ellis discusses the role of dust in the atmosphere as a potential feedback agent in modulating ice ages. Dust can have a big effect on climate, especially when it lands on ice sheets, because it affects the albedo or reflectivity of the ice. For instance, darker ice can absorb more insulation and sunlight than lighter ice and consequently melt more quickly. The hypothesis is that dust settles on the ice sheets and affects their reflectivity, leading to changes in energy absorption and melting rates. The poor availability of data on the possible effects of dust on ice ages has slowed down research efforts to investigate this idea, but Ellis argues that the connection is a promising one.
00:20:00 In this section, Ralph Ellis discusses how ice-sheet albedo, not CO2, modulates ice ages. By examining ice cores, scientists have found that every interglacial period is preceded by a peak in dust which comes from the Gobi plateau, not glaciogenic dust. This is important because the Gobi dust is intermittent and therefore explains why ice ages are intermittent. Ellis explains how the dust affects the reflectivity of the ice sheets and why it only affects ice sheets with dust on them by allowing insulation from the Sun to be absorbed, melt and ablate the ice. This explains the inconsistencies in the CO2 explanation of ice ages and why the interglacials only occur in northern hemisphere insulation maxima where the major ice sheets and dust production are located.
00:25:00 In this section, Ralph Ellis discusses the role of CO2 in ice sheet melting during the glacial maximum. He explains that during this period, CO2 levels dropped to a minimum due to the solubility of the colder seas. As CO2 is an essential gas for plant food, the reduction in its levels created a shortage of energy for plants, which could no longer complete a life cycle. This led to the formation of CO2 deserts, which led to a lack of precipitation and increased the occurrence of desert formation and dust. Ellis suggests that there is a relationship between ice sheet melting and dust as feedback agents, but that it is more likely a result of the lack of atmospheric CO2 rather than a lack of precipitation or humidity during the glacial period.
00:30:00 In this section, Ralph Ellis discusses the relationship between CO2 and dust production during ice ages. He presents a scatter plot showing the correlation between CO2 and dust production, which suggests that there is a relationship between them. However, Ellis argues that the relationship is causal because the dust was being produced in the high Gobi Plateau, which became a CO2 desert due to its high altitude. This caused the plants to run out of CO2, which resulted in reduced Albedo and led to ice sheet melting. He presents a graph that supports this argument and explains that understanding this relationship is crucial for accurately modeling ice ages.
00:35:00 In this section, Ralph Ellis discusses the correlation between CO2 and the death zone, which is the point where plants cannot grow due to the lack of CO2. During the ice ages, the death zone was caused by CO2, and as the death zone decreased with time, the land area available above it increased exponentially. Ellis also notes that the amount of dust in the atmosphere increased due to the lack of CO2, which caused CO2 deserts and allowed dust to settle on the Northern ice sheets. This dust, in turn, reduced the albedo of the ice sheets, which increased the absorption of energy by the ice during a great summer in the Northern Hemisphere.
00:40:00 In this section, Ralph Ellis argues that CO2 cannot be the agent that created and sustained ice ages as the increase in feedback from CO2 is very low, virtually negligible, compared to feedback from ice sheet Albedo which operates on a much larger scale resulting in a staggering 180 watts per square meter measured regionally in the high latitudes on the ice sheets anytime during the interglacial period. Ellis argues that rather than a global effect, it is the solar absorption on the ice sheets themselves that is significant. Ellis further supports his argument with the presence of dust on ice sheets from previous ice ages, such as a dust layer from Greenland ice sheet dating back to 25,000 years ago which caused melting.
00:45:00 not accurate in the paleoclimate modeling. In this section, Ralph Ellis discusses the discovery of how ice ages are modulated by ice-sheet albedo and not CO2. He explains that the Greenland ice sheet is stable and stays in position because it cannot slip off due to the dish-like structure underneath. Greenland tends to be stable because the melted water and ice have to be squeezed out from underneath over mountain ranges which is challenging. He then points out an error in the climate modeling for the paleoclimate and how scientists determine temperatures and humidity in the air by looking at sea temperatures and tree lines. The tree line data produced some odd results that were much too low, indicating the lapse rate between the Surface and the mountain was not accurate.
00:50:00 In this section, Ralph Ellis discusses the importance of CO2 deserts and how they affect the temperature during glacial periods. He argues that during the last glacial maximum, tree lines were determined by CO2, not temperature, and the red areas in the tropics on a climate map indicating low precipitation are in error. Ellis suggests that the high albedo of ice sheets in the northern hemisphere reflects all the sunlight back into space and can lead to a snowball Earth unless there is a system of getting out of the runaway cooling feedback cycle. He proposes that the system is colder temperatures leading to less CO2, creating more more CO2 deserts and dust, which lowers the albedo on the Northern ice sheets allowing for more insulation absorption from the Sun.
00:55:00 In this section, Ralph Ellis discusses his research on the causes of ice ages and concludes that the primary feedback agent during interglacials and ice ages is the Albedo of ice, not CO2, which is a weak feedback agent. Ellis explains that the ice sheets are ready to melt as soon as they receive more insulation from a great summer in the northern hemisphere and suggests that the more insulation, the more energy from the sun, which melts the ice sheets. Furthermore, due to low eccentricity, we have a very low eccentricity period with very weak great summers and low winters, making it uncertain whether hitting the next great winter in about one thousand to two thousand years will be enough cooling to force an ice age. However, Ellis states that he knows how to oppose it by coating the northern ice sheets with carbon dust, which promotes melting and stops the ice sheets from advancing towards the South.

01:00:00 - 01:05:00

Ralph Ellis presents a new theory for Ice Age modulation involving dust, rather than CO2 feedback, which explains every aspect of the Ice Age cycle. Though there has been little engagement from notable figures in the climate field on this theory, it is a significant discovery. Ellis also discusses the potential influence of Chinese industrial dust on modern warming and the uncertain causes of little peaks in temperature throughout the Holocene, which may be influenced by changes in obliquity. Additionally, he discusses the death zone caused by low CO2 levels during Ice Ages and notes that he has not seen any evidence that CO2 is causing deserts or death zones on mountain sites.