Falsification Of The Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within The Frame Of Physics

G. Gerlich, R. D. Tscheuschner (2009) Falsification Of The Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within The Frame Of Physics. International Journal of Modern Physics B, Vol. 23, No. 3 (30 January 2009), 275-364 (World Scientific Publishing Co.)

see:

http://www.worldscinet.com/ijmpb/23/2303/S02179792092303.html

there is also the freely available post-print version 4.0 from the preprint server of the Cornell University: http://www.arxiv.org/abs/0707.1161v4

Abstract:

Any comments?

 

Re: Falsification Of The Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within The Frame Of Physi

Andre;

This is just another straw man argument.

First they suggest that the earth is in radiative equilibrium.
Equilibrium by definition implies no overall change.
Then they go on to "prove" that the earth isn't really warming.

So, no real surprise here. Misrepresent the science and then "prove" that it is wrong. Classical straw man.

Does the publisher require peer review or do they print everything that's "scientific"?

 

Re: Falsification Of The Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within The Frame Of Physi

Perhaps you need to rethink a little

http://www.worldscinet.com/ijmpb/ijmpb.shtml

 

Re: Falsification Of The Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within The Frame Of Physi

Suggesting that the earth is in radiative equilibrium is a straw man.

 

Re: Falsification Of The Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within The Frame Of Physi

From the beginning of the abstract:

Did I understand correctly, that these guys are claiming the atmospheric greenhouse effect to be violating the second law of thermodynamics? So they are not claiming, that the magnitude of atmospheric greenhouse effect would have been estimated incorrectly, but that the atmospheric greenhouse effect itself is impossible? Looks like extreme incompetence to me.

 

Re: Falsification Of The Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within The Frame Of Physi

A heat pump? NO, they have the concept of the greenhouse effect reversed. It does not produce heat, it slows the dissipation of heat to space. The atmosphere cools off more slowly by the presence of molecules absorbing terrestrial infrared radiation. The atmosphere is constantly radiating away heat energy in accordance with the Second Law. Without continued solar irradiance the atmosphere cools, greenhouse effect or not.

 

Re: Falsification Of The Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within The Frame Of Physi

It's incredible to me that this paper actually managed to get published; albeit in a low impact journal, and as an invited "review" article which apparently does not have the same peer-review procedures as research articles. The subject matter is a poor fit with the journal; I very much doubt that this paper could ever have survived a normal peer review process. But there you go. I'm speculating. All we can really know for sure is the content of the paper as given.

I claim it is riddled with errors. Rather than attempt a comprehensive rebuttal, I'll single out limited specific errors in the paper.

Here's my first.

From the arxiv preprint, top of page 65, we read:

According to the consensus among global climatologists one takes the -18^oC computed from the T⁴ average and compares it to the fictitious Earth's average temperature of +15^oC. The difference of 33^oC is attributed to the natural greenhouse effect. As seen in Equation (83) a correct averaging yields a temperature of -129^oC. Evidently, something must be fundamentally wrong here.​

What the authors describe as the "correct" calculation is bizarre. It comes from section 3.7.4.

First, they consider the energy per unit area for each part of the globe coming from the Sun. This is done correctly. Hence the portion of the Earth which is directly facing the Sun is given a full solar constant. Higher latitudes have this scaled by the cosine. The back of the globe (night) has no radiation at all.

They compute the solar constant as σ.5780⁴/215², which comes to 1369 W/m²; about correct. They use a factor of 0.7 for ε (table 12 on page 64) which corresponds to the effect of albedo. Hence the incoming solar radiation is treated as 958.4 W/m² for a plane surface facing the Sun; a reasonable figure.

They then contrast two ways to proceed. One way is to integrate the incoming energy of the surface of the globe, and then calculate a temperature which can be given to the whole globe that would radiate out that same amount of energy again. Another way to proceed is to take each point on the globe individually as having the temperature to radiate away what it receives from the Sun at that point; and then average this over the whole globe. They call this second method the "correct" method. Their so-called correct method gives a temperature of 0K absolute to the night of the planet, and a temperature of about 360K, or 87C, to the portion of the globe facing the Sun.

The authors' so-called "correct" calculation is indeed calculating an average temperature, obtained by integrating an imputed temperature over the whole globe. This integration over the surface gives a value of about 144K, or -129C for the average temperature imputed to the simple model of a globe.

The feature of this imputed temperature is that it is just what is required to radiate (as a blackbody) the radiation coming from the Sun at every point. Now this is of course not a physical model of the Earth. Points on a planet do not instantaneously achieve thermodynamic equilibrium with the Sun's incoming radiation; even the Moon, with no atmosphere and very little heat transport across the surface, does not instantly reach absolute zero on the night side! The calculation provided by the authors can be sensibly understood is a lower bound on average temperatures; assuming radiative balance with the Sun. With any sharing of heat energy around the globe, while maintaining energy balance with the Sun, will give a higher average temperature. (You can show this with Holder's inequality, also used by the authors on page 65).

Now the other extreme model is to calculate a temperature such that if every point on the globe has that same temperature, then the globe remains in energy balance. This is the calculation that the authors disparage as "incorrect". Here, you calculate the average amount of energy radiated per unit area, and find the temperature this corresponds to. This is also called the "effective" temperature. It is equal to 2^0.5*1.25 (1.768) times the authors' "physical" temperature. (Compare equations 81 and 83). This works out to about 255K, or -18C. You can see the numbers -129C and -18C compared in table 12.

The proper implication of these numbers is that if you integrate temperatures over the surface of a globe which is radiating away the same energy it receives from the Sun, you'll get a value more than -129C and less than -18C.

Of course, if you integrate over the Earth's surface in reality, you get a number that is substantially more than -18C! It really doesn't matter whether you integrate temperature, or the fourth power of temperature. Whichever is chosen, you'll get an average of more than -18. That is… the Earth's surface is radiating more than what is required to balance solar radiation. But this IS the effect called "atmospheric greenhouse"!

Physically, this is because we have an atmosphere, which is heated from the surface. The atmosphere is (by thermodynamics) cooler than the surface, and the radiation that escapes into space is mostly from this cooler atmosphere. This is (by the first law) in long-term balance with solar radiation. The atmosphere radiates in all directions, of course. It radiates out into space, and also down to the surface; and this means the surface gets more energy. There's the solar energy (most of which passes through the atmosphere just fine) plus also the energy radiated from the atmosphere. The surface is in balance with this total… which is more than what you'd have without an atmosphere. This is what is called the atmospheric greenhouse… a poor choice of terms given that the physics is quite distinct from a glass greenhouse; but it is certainly physically real.

At the end of section 3.7.6, page 66, the authors make two claims. The speaks of a physically incorrect assumption of radiative balance. That's ludicrous. By the first law, there is necessarily a long term balance between the energy arriving from the Sun and being radiated from the planet. It is a physically correct implication that the Earth radiates an amount of energy into space that is equivalent to that of a blackbody at -18C.

The second claim speaks of effective radiating temperature being higher than measured averages. That is correct, and the authors are the ones who do not take this into account. The measured averages over the surface of the Earth are much more than -18C. Therefore the surface is radiating more than what you would get from a globe at -18C! Therefore the energy being radiated from the Earth's surface is MORE than the energy you get from the Sun. That IS the greenhouse effect, right there.

Good grief. It staggers me that this got published, but so be it. I am pretty sure it was an invited paper which was not given the kind of thorough technical review that usually maintains the quality of a journal.

Cheers -- Sylas

 

Re: Falsification Of The Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within The Frame Of Physi

Maybe Gerlich and Tscheuschner forgot that the Earth rotates!

That would be one way to come up with absolute zero for the night time temperature.

 

Re: Falsification Of The Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within The Frame Of Physi

That, and also the assumption that there is no transport of heat from one part of the planet to another. Now of course, they know quite well that this is only a simplified model. They don't suggest that there really is an absolute zero of temperature on the reverse side, and that is not my criticism.

What they do has its own rather curious meaning. Effectively, what they are doing is to take the energy arriving from the Sun, and average the energy to the power 0.25 over the globe. With any redistribution of energy -- either by the fact that it takes a bit of time to heat up and cool down, or by the fact that heat transports from one region to another -- the average of energy to the power 0.25 will increase. The number they get is thus a strong lower bound on temperature of a globe with uneven temperatures, but radiating at each point as a blackbody.

The other approach is to average energy over the globe. (You can then get a temperature from this energy by Stefan-Blotzmann, which is called T_eff). The key point is that there is a very useful feature of averaging the energy. Because of the first law, any redistribution will continue to have the SAME average energy. It's not a lower bound, or an upper bound, but an invariant.

That's why T_eff is a far more useful quantity.

If you do take a simple mean temperature over the whole surface, you are bound to get a smaller value than T_eff. The authors correctly point this out as well, but completely fail to grasp its relevance. When you integrate temperatures over the Earth's surface, you get a value GREATER than the expected -18 of T_eff. That is, the surface is significant warmer than we should expect from the solar input alone. The difference is the effect of an atmosphere, and it is called "atmospheric greenhouse". But it's not like a glass greenhouse; it is a consequence of the fact that the atmosphere is warmed from the surface.

It up within the atmosphere where you find the temperatures corresponding to the effective temperature from solar radiation. This is cooler than the surface, because it is warmed from the surface. Hence, the surface is warmer than the effective radiating temperature of the planet... warmer than it would be without an atmosphere that absorbs energy from the surface. And no; that is not a contradiction of the second law, which appears to be another error made in the paper.

Cheers -- Sylas

 

Re: Falsification Of The Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within The Frame Of Physi

Lunar Surface Temperatures
Temperatures on the Lunar surface vary widely on location. Although beyond the first few centimeters of the regolith the temperature is a nearly constant -35 C (at a depth of 1 meter), the surface is influenced widely by the day-night cycle. The average temperature on the surface is about 40-45 C lower than it is just below the surface.

In the day, the temperature of the Moon averages 107 C, although it rises as high as 123 C. The night cools the surface to an average of -153 C, or -233 C in the permanently shaded south polar basin. A typical non-polar minimum temperature is -181 C (at the Apollo 15 site).

The Lunar temperature increases about 280 C from just before dawn to Lunar noon. Average temperature also changes about 6 C betwen aphelion and perihelion.

From:
http://www.asi.org/adb/m/03/05/average-temperatures.html

Without the atmosphere effect this is what the earth would be like. That is from the solar input alone. So the atmosphere effect restricts the incoming and outgoing warmth.

 

Re: Falsification Of The Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within The Frame Of Physi

That's a great example, Mike!

The moon rotates much more slowly than the Earth, and so the temperatures should actually come fairly close to those given by what Gerlich and Tscheuschner prefer.

The solar constant is about 1370 W/m². The albedo of the moon is roughly 0.12, and so the surface face on to the Sun should tend to absorb about 1205 W/m².

Using Stefan-Boltzmann, these correspond to temperatures of 394K (121C) and 381K (109C).

That's pretty dashed close to the daytime numbers you have quoted of 107 (av) and 123 (peak)! The peak would be a dark spot face on to the Sun, with near complete absorption. The 107 is about right for the central daylight region, given albedo 0.12.

The night side does not drop to absolute zero. But since the energy varies as the fourth power of temperature, we have the radiation from the lows you have mentioned as follows:

-153C radiates about 12 W/m². -181C radiates about 4 W/m². And -233C radiates about 0.15 W/m².

Cooling tails off, of course, as the rate of energy radiation drops; and these temperatures have fallen so far that the radiation is less than 1/100 of the peak full daylight value. So in fact the Moon is pretty dashed close to the distribution that is used by Gerlich and Tscheuschner. This is no surprise. If the Moon was made of iron (conducts heat well) and rotated rapidly, then we should expect all the temperatures to equalize or close to it, which would lead to temperatures around -3 C. (The T_eff for albedo of 0.12). The value calculated by Gerlich and Tscheuschner's method would be around -120C. However, because the darkside of the moon has temperature significantly above absolute zero, their method works out as a very strong lower bound. The average lunar temperature should be between these values of -12OC and -3C, as there is no greenhouse effect to warm things up.

The page you have cited is not consistent on mean surface temperatures. It speaks of -35 below the regolith, and a surface that is 40 to 45 cooler. That's a mean surface of -75 to -80. But the related page at the same site http://www.asi.org/adb/02/05/01/surface-temperature.html specifically gives -23C as a mean surface value. I don't know what's wrong there. But theoretically, -3C should be an upper bound on the mean surface temperature obtained by integrating temperature over the surface. -23C sounds like a credible value for an average surface temperature. It is equal to mid point of the average day and the average night temperature as given by another page: http://www.solarviews.com/eng/moon.htm.

Since there is such variation in temperature from point to point, we should expect the average value, whatever it is, to be significantly less than T_eff of -3C. And because the night side is well above absolute zero, we should expect the average to be substantially more than -120C.

This is in contrast to the surface of the Earth, which (fortunately for us!) has an atmosphere to keep things warmer. The effective value of the planet of -18C is actually expressed high in the atmosphere, while the "atmospheric greenhouse" effect keeps things on the surface with a much warmer average of about 15C.

 

Re: Falsification Of The Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within The Frame Of Physi

Sylan:
You made the statement that the atmosphere warms the earth. This article proves that the atmosphere restricts the incoming heat from reaching 123C. The atmosphere also restricts the loss of warmth keeping the low temperatures from reaching -233.

That was the points I was bringing up. The oceans and land heat the atmosphere not the other way around.

 

Re: Falsification Of The Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within The Frame Of Physi

No, I most certainly did not say that the atmosphere warms the Earth. I said precisely the opposite, just as you have noted. It is the ocean and land, or the surface, which warms the atmosphere. Here again is what I actually said, and note especially the first sentence, which I have placed in bold for emphasis.

It is precisely because the atmosphere is being warmed by the surface that the surface has to be hotter than you would have without an atmosphere! Think about it. Because the atmosphere is absorbing energy from the surface, the energy that eventually escapes into space is mostly emitted from the atmosphere. Therefore it is in the ATMOSPHERE (not the surface) where you have the temperatures that correspond to what is needed to radiate away what we receive from the Sun.

The effective radiating temperature of the atmosphere is T_eff. You can get this by averaging a fourth power. If you average the raw temperature, you'll get something a bit less, depending on how much variation there is in temperature across the globe. This is noted also by Gerlich and Tscheuschner; though they apparently don't understand the implications.

In any case, the atmosphere, at altitudes where most radiation is escaping into space, must have an average temperature of about -18C or less. This is the T_eff for the Earth.

Now... because the atmosphere is being heated from the surface, the surface has to be hotter than than the atmosphere. And it is. This is the greenhouse effect.

Note the difference. When you add an atmosphere, you get a warmer surface than you would have otherwise. This is NOT because the atmosphere is a source of energy. It is because the atmosphere has to be warmed up by the surface, which results in a surface that is warmer than the atmosphere. The atmosphere is what takes up the temperature required to balance solar input.

Pretty much the same thing happens when you cover yourself with a blanket. YOU warm the blanket. So you are warmer than the blanket. But the blanket is what has to match up with external temperatures, which means you end up warmer than you would be without the blanket. NOT because the blanket is a source of energy to warm you, but because it is absorbing energy from you, and then passing it on to the cold outside.

Cheers -- Sylas

PS. Think about your lunar example again. It's a really good one. The Moon is (on average) COLDER than the Earth. This despite having a lower albedo and absorbing more of the light from the Sun! Why? The conventional physical explanation is that the Moon has no atmosphere, and so radiation from the surface has to balance with the solar input. On the Earth, however, it is radiation from the atmosphere which has to balance the solar input. The Earth's surface has to heat up its atmosphere, and so has to be warmer than the atmosphere... which means it has to be that much hotter again than what is required to balance the solar input.

 

Re: Falsification Of The Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within The Frame Of Physi

I would think that the surface temperature would oscillate greatly between day and night, becoming both hotter and cooler than with an atmosphere. What are you talking about?

 

Re: Falsification Of The Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within The Frame Of Physi

I am talking about the substantial increase in average surface temperature than results from an atmospheric greenhouse effect; since this is the topic of the paper.

The Moon does indeed oscillate greatly in temperature, much more than the Earth, and this is because of our atmosphere... and the ocean... and our shorter day/night cycle.

Any oscillation, of course, goes above and below the average.... and just as Gerlich and Tscheuschner say, the average has to be less than T_eff, in the absence of a greenhouse effect. On the Moon, with its low albedo, T_eff is -3 C (on Earth it is -18 C) and the average is something like -23C. The oscillations are about -153C to 107C; a range of 260C.

On Earth, there are two major differences with the Moon. First, we have much more uniformly distributed temperatures, or much smaller oscillations, as you note. The largest swings are inland away from the ocean, and get up to as much as 50 or 60C between day and night. Second, the average surface temperature is substantially higher than T_eff, because the surface is heating up the atmosphere. On Earth, T_eff is about -18C, but the average surface temperature is about 15C. This latter effect is called the atmospheric greenhouse effect. Both effects are real, both are measured, and both follow from conventional thermodynamics applied to each situation.

As far as damping out oscillations is concerned: the ocean is crucial in this regard because of its large heat capacity, which damps out the oscillations a lot. Indeed, the extremes of day and night are comparatively small on the coast, or out at sea. The atmosphere helps to distribute heat between land and sea as well. It's a basic thermodynamic principle that any dynamic process increases entropy... which means it tends to equalize temperatures. The atmosphere and air movement help to shift heat energy from ocean to land, and back again, transferring heat energy from the ocean to the land and night, and from the land to the ocean in the day. Our short day/night cycle also helps.

Now all of this effect of the atmosphere in damping out the oscillations is independent of the greenhouse effect. Consider a hypothetical case, in which our atmosphere was simply oxygen and nitrogen, which are transparent to infrared and to solar radiation. The energy escaping to space would be nearly all radiated direct from the surface. The surface, therefore, would have an average temperature of around -18C (which is T_eff for the Earth). There would be oscillations both above and below this mean; but still damped by comparison with a Moon having no atmosphere to help move heat around.

The other effect, of course, is the greenhouse effect, where the atmosphere absorbs energy from the surface, and where most of the energy radiated into space is from the atmosphere. This means that temperatures which correspond to a radiative balance with the Sun (a consequence of the first law) in the atmosphere must be cooler than the surface temperatures (a consequence of the second law).

That's what I am talking about. The surface heats the atmosphere, on average, which means the surface has to be warmer than the atmosphere, on average. The end result is an average surface temperature significantly greater than -18C, which means that the surface is warmer than it would be without an atmosphere. Without an atmosphere the oscillations, whether large or small, would be about a mean at -18C or less. With an atmosphere such as ours, which is heated from the surface, the mean temperatures are much greater.

Cheers -- Sylas

 

Re: Falsification Of The Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within The Frame Of Physi

"There's the solar energy (most of which passes through the atmosphere just fine) plus also the energy radiated from the atmosphere. The surface is in balance with this total… which is more than what you'd have without an atmosphere. This is what is called the atmospheric greenhouse… a poor choice of terms given"

This statement about energy radiated from the atmosphere. I took as meaning the atmospere warmed the surface.

With an atmosphere such as ours, which is heated from the surface, the mean temperatures are much greater.

This statement ,which I argree with, shows that the atmosphere restricts the loss of heat.

I guesss I jumped when I read the first statement. When you rewrite your statement it is more acceptable.

Thank you for explaining what you meant.

 

Re: Falsification Of The Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within The Frame Of Physi

No problem. I'm currently working on trying to make a basic and comprehensible account of this, and you've been really helpful for cleaning up my wording. Keep pointing out anything that looks wrong. It helps a lot.

Just to underline what I mean above, the second law means that the flow of energy from a hot object to a cold one must be greater than the flow of energy back from the cold object to a warm one. It does not mean there's no flow at all from cold to hot. So even though the atmosphere is warmed from the surface, there is still some energy flowing back against the overall flow.

By the second law, the flow from Earth's surface into the atmosphere has to be more than the flow from the atmosphere into the surface. Typical numbers on Earth are that about 470 W/m² go from surface to atmosphere, while about 340 W/m² come back. Added to this is solar energy flowing from space into the surface, and into the atmosphere. Typical numbers are 160 W/m² to the surface, and 80 W/m² to the atmosphere. For the energy flowing back out into space, typical numbers are 210 W/m² going into space from the atmosphere, and about 30 W/m² coming direct from the surface.

[tex]\begin{array}{l|c|c|c|c}
(W/m^2)& \mbox{to space} & \mbox{to atmos} & \mbox{to surface} & \mbox{total} \\
\hline
\mbox{from space} & & 80 & 160 & 240 \\
\mbox{from atmos} & 210 & & 340 & 550 \\
\mbox{from surface} & 30 & 470 & & 500 \\
\hline
\mbox{totals} & 240 & 550 & 500
\end{array}[/tex]​

These numbers are roughly average values, to about single figure accuracy. It's intended as a simple first order picture, not a fully accurate account. You can drill down into endless further details for what goes on in different latitudes, in the ocean or the land, in day or in night, or in different seasons and weather conditions. But over all, the following very basic features are not in any doubt at all, and follow easily from basic thermodynamics. Any credible estimate of energy flow on Earth must have these features.

• The flux of energy inwards is the same as the flux outwards, Drilling down into more detail, there are small imbalances as heat gets absorbed, but physical measurement has the net imbalance as small. For example, there is at present a small net flux of energy into the ocean which is of the order of magnitude one W/m² or so. It's an open research question to measure this more accurately, to measure the variations from place to place and from season to season. From day to day, there is a quite substantial flux into and out of the ocean, with the ocean taking up heat in the day and giving it back at night.
• The surface gets more of its energy from the atmosphere than from space.
• The energy received from space is mostly absorbed at the surface.
• The majority of energy radiated into space comes from the atmosphere.
• The atmosphere gets most of its energy from the surface.
• There's more energy flowing from the surface to the atmosphere than there is coming back from the atmosphere to the surface.
• The total flux at the surface is substantially greater than the total flux from space. This is why an atmosphere leads to a warmer average surface temperature.

 

Re: Falsification Of The Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within The Frame Of Physi

It is easy to find fault in areas of minor detail in a paper as long as that of Gerlich. The point of his paper is that he has shown the "classic" atmospheric greenhouse model as depicted by the IPCC, to be utter nonsense.

Here's the IPCC atmospheric greenhouse model:
https://www.msu.edu/course/isb/202/ebertmay/drivers/ipcc_greenhouse.jpg
(IPCC 2001)

We may describe this as:

1. A warm body (the earth) radiates heat to a cool body (the atmosphere)
2. The cool body "back-radiates" (IPCC term) heat to the warm body.
3. This process continues perpetually, with heat flowing round and round in a continuous cycle.
4. The result of this perpetual process is that the warm body becomes warmer.

What is most amazing is that both alarmists and skeptic scientists have taken the above blatant 2nd Law of Thermodynamics violation at face value for so long.

Many will shout that all bodies radiate ... yes they do but NETT heat flow is always from hot bodies to cool bodies (without the input of work), not the reverse. Note also that the 2nd Law does not care about the wavelength of radiant heat.

Atmospheric gases do absorb radiation from the sun and the earth. NETT radiation from the cool daytime atmosphere is to space. The Sahara desert in daytime has a very low "greenhouse gas" concentration above it, yet contrary to greenhouse theory, it is a hot place rather than a cool place.

Night time, rotation of the earth, convection, conduction, latent heat all add greatly to the complexity of climate model. However the basic daytime atmospheric greenhouse model as presented by the IPCC and most textbooks, is nonsense.

 

Re: Falsification Of The Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within The Frame Of Physi

No, instead they have shown that they don't understand the simplest things about physics.

adb, let me repeat your argument with winter jackets: "When I go outside in winter wearing a thick jacket, the outer layer of the jacket will be cooler than the inner layer. Therefore there will not be heat flow from outer layer to inner layer, but instead from inner to outer. Therefore the hypothesis that the jacket would keep me warmer violates the second law of thermodynamics."

Do you see how wrong that is? And how same it is with your greenhouse effect denying deduction?

 

Re: Falsification Of The Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects Within The Frame Of Physi

2. The cool body "back-radiates" (IPCC term) heat to the warm body.

Have you considered the possibility that at night over land the surface can become cooler than the atmosphere? This in fact occurs as a result of "radiational cooling". This loss of thermal energy from the surface at night is reduced by a humid atmosphere. One of the "fingerprints" of greenhouse warming is warmer nighttime temperature over land.