The Flawed Science in Al’s book, spelled out in detail:
“The most vulnerable part of the Earth’s ecological system is the atmosphere. It’s vulnerable because it’s so thin.” (p. 22)
Other parts of our environment are arguably more vulnerable and are clearly thinner: the hydrosphere (oceans and rivers), for example. Whatever is meant by “vulnerable”, it probably is poorly described as being a consequence of “thinness”.
“In particular, we have vastly increased the amount of carbon dioxide–the most important of the so-called greenhouse gases.” (p. 25)
Mt. Kilimanjaro
While “most important” is a subjective term, the implication that most of the existing greenhouse effect is due to CO2 is false: water vapor is the source of most of the existing greenhouse effect.
“The Sun’s energy enters the atmosphere in the form of light waves and heats up the Earth. Some of that energy warms the Earth and then is re-radiated back into space in the form of infrared waves.” (p. 26)
Solar energy reaching the Earth is about 42% visible light and 50% shortwave infrared. Some is reflected; only the absorbed portion heats the Earth. “Re-radiate” is a an incorrect and misleading term and should not be used; rather, the Earth and its atmosphere radiate longwave infrared as a function of its temperature, with the balance between this radiation and temperature mediated by the presence of greenhouse gases.
“The greenhouse gases surrounding Mars are almost nonexistent, so the temperature is far too cold.” (p. 26)
Mars’ atmosphere, although much thinner than Earth’s, is almost entirely CO2. The partial pressure of CO2 at the surface of Mars is 6.1 millibars, compared to 0.38 millibars at the surface of Earth. The greenhouse warming on Mars due to CO2 is greater than that due to CO2 alone on the Earth (but not that due to H2O). Mars is colder because it is further from the Sun and receives less than half the sunlight the Earth does.
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