Collapse

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This is the place for discussing the potential collapse of modern civilization and the environment.

Collapse, in this context, refers to the significant loss of an established level or complexity towards a much simpler state. It can occur differently within many areas, orderly or chaotically, and be willing or unwilling. It does not necessarily imply human extinction or a singular, global event. Although, the longer the duration, the more it resembles a ‘decline’ instead of collapse.

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Earth's Albedo 1998–2017 as Measured From Earthshine (2021) (agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com)

submitted 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) by eleitl@lemm.ee to c/collapse@lemm.ee

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Abstract

The reflectance of the Earth is a fundamental climate parameter that we measured from Big Bear Solar Observatory between 1998 and 2017 by observing the earthshine using modern photometric techniques to precisely determine daily, monthly, seasonal, yearly and decadal changes in terrestrial albedo from earthshine. We find the inter-annual fluctuations in albedo to be global, while the large variations in albedo within individual nights and seasonal wanderings tend to average out over each year. We measure a gradual, but climatologically significant urn:x-wiley:00948276:media:grl62955:grl62955-math-00010.5 urn:x-wiley:00948276:media:grl62955:grl62955-math-0002 decline in the global albedo over the two decades of data. We found no correlation between the changes in the terrestrial albedo and measures of solar activity. The inter-annual pattern of earthshine fluctuations are in good agreement with those measured by CERES (data began in 2001) even though the satellite observations are sensitive to retroflected light while earthshine is sensitive to wide-angle reflectivity. The CERES decline is about twice that of earthshine.

Key Points

We report on two decades of earthshine measurements of the earth's reflectance made from Big Bear Solar Observatory yielding a large-scale terrestrial albedo

We find a decline in albedo between 1998 and 2017, corresponding to a radiative increase of 0.5 W/m2, which is climatologically significant

The CERES data show the same behavior, which is attributed to a reversal of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation reducing the Earth's albedo

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[–] eleitl@lemm.ee 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Between 2019 and 2023 the EEI (Earth Energy Imbalance) tripled, from +0.6 W/m2 to +1.8 W/m2. Source: Richard Crim.

This is probably at least a partial explanation for https://climatereanalyzer.org/clim/sst_daily/