Arctic Sea Ice Melt Season Officially Over; ice up over 9% from last year

As expected…..

Well, yea, but this is young ice and tends to stick closely with its family, what about next year when as an adolecent it rebells – then ur gonna have problems!

BTW isn’t it spelt Arctic not artic?

How do you like the title of the article?
Arctic sea ice settles at second-lowest, underscores ACCELERATING DECLINE
Maybe it’s just me but somehow an increase does not seem like it should be called an “accelerating decline”.
http://www.nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/

I wish the stock market was doing as well……………
(NSODC).
(NSIDC)?
Sorry Anthony……pet peeve.
(I’m one of those weirdos.)

I bet $6 there’s another increase in 09.
The earth will keep changing whether we want it to or not.
http://noconsensus.wordpress.com/2008/09/17/the-changing-earth/

I agree completely with Mike Bryant. A decelerating decline and very likely an acceleration into early and higher ice levels as NH moves into winter. I prefer the non politically tainted web site:
http://www.ijis.iarc.uaf.edu/en/home/seaice_extent.htm
from Japan.
Why such biased language is deemed necessary from NSDIC is a mystery.

Please correct to NSIDC

This is great news. As 2007 resulted in the loss of most of the “mature” (several seasons old) ice, the 2008 ice would melt much easier. Had conditions in 2008 been anywhere near conditions in 2007, we might have seen a total melt. The 2008 melt season began with thinner, newer ice than 2007 did. New ice has a high salt content and melts easier and is less dense. Each summer that ice is exposed to sunlight causes the brine to work out of it causing its melting point to rise so it takes more heat to melt it. So that 2008 finished ahead of 2007 with a more “fragile” ice pack is significant.
The real test is going to be 2009. 2009 will start with a much larger base of second year ice than 2008 did.
Hooray for the baby ice!

The problem with this comparison is that we have not yet reached the date of the 2007 minimum, which occurred late in September.
http://www.ijis.iarc.uaf.edu/seaice/extent/AMSRE_Sea_Ice_Extent.png
The 9% number will likely be significantly larger by then.

Here is a number NSIDC isn’t advertising – the average daily extent for January 1- September 16 from AMSR data for each of the last four years.
http://www.ijis.iarc.uaf.edu/seaice/extent/plot.csv
2005 – 10,914,719
2006 – 10,689,056
2007 – 10,647,319
2008 – 11,074,703

So why does the Jet Propulsion Laboratory site still highlight ‘historic sea ice changes’ and recent major melting that are clearing arctic ice routes on its home page???

Lack of oxygen at high altitudes.

Here is a number NSIDC isn’t advertising – the average daily extent for January 1- September 16 from AMSR data for each of the last four years.
2005 – 10,914,719
2006 – 10,689,056
2007 – 10,647,319
2008 – 11,074,703

MattN:
Here ya go.
One for the Northern Hemi
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/current.area.north.jpg
and one for the Southern Hemi
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/current.area.south.jpg
Mark Nodine:
I don’t think there is much to worry about with the Southern Hemi. The overall ice area is less than last year in gain, but so is the loss too. In other words, the curve is not as deep (or steep) as in preceding years. It is simply smaller and less extreme. The last summer bottomed out at 2.1 or 2.2. The three preceding Antarctic summers bottomed out below 2.0. In fact, since 1978 only 2001 and 2003 bottomed out higher than 2008 . We will have to see how this summer goes to see what the right half of the curve is like.
Plus, as has been well noted here, temporary trends do not equal an inevitable runaway trend that should incite panic. Not that you are saying that. Until something lasting and consistent happens, however, I am not going to lose sleep over it. So far all we have from comparison the historical data is a lot of not-so-well understood oscillations, and there may be other factors (ocean currents, wind, and volcanic activity for example) contributing that we do not yet understand how they fit in to math and the behavior of the ice. Factor in, too, that this is probably the first time in history where large segments of the population, and the media, are paying attention to every little dip and rise in the ice measurements. Thus when something is expected to happen, even little changes can seem big when, overall, they are just business as usual.

James S
You got it!

Time to revise them computer models and take the Polar Bear off the threatened list.

How can anything about ice extent which is restricted to the last few years, or the satellite era possibly point to a ‘tipping point’, or serve as the basis for conclusions on anything other than those few years?
I really don’t get it.

Am I missing something about the multi-year ice vs single year? Surely only the areas that melted last year and subsequently refroze over winter are single year ice and the rest (the vast majority) is multi-year? Thus the ratio of multi-year ice to single year ice must be quite high.

I think everyone should pay attention to Ray’s wise words… try not to ‘forecast’ anything… remember the person who said, at the beginning of June, that only 11 weeks of melting remained? Or just 2 weeks ago when another person said the melting season was over, it had leveled off and even started to refreeze? Both look pretty foolish now.
As the article correctly cautioned, although the melt season *appears* to be over, you really can’t definitely state that until there has been a sustained upturn… there just haven’t been enough days yet, or a strong enough upturn (in fact, to me, the chart looks pretty darn flat). For that matter, if you think the IARC-JAXA has better data, take a close look at both 2006 and 2007 – they had a slight additional reversal downward after the first ‘minimum’, with what appears to be a new lower minimum in late September of 2007.
There’s just too much unpredictable weather behavior to call the minimum until well after it has occurred. And, even assuming the minimum so far this year stands, year-to-year variability really does not make a trend in just one year… if you think so, and that a 9% rebound from 2007 to 2008 will indicate continued rebound to 2009, what would you have said in 2006? That year ALSO saw about a 10% rebound from the record low in 2005… I’m curious, does anyone here know what was said in those days, were there any predictions for continued ice growth in 2007? And how did that look after 2007 had come to pass?
Predictions of ice growth then would have been foolish; not because 2007 took a sudden downturn – that was due to unpredictable weather anomalies – but because you just can’t predict any particular year AT ALL, much less on a erroneously-labeled one-year ‘trend’.
And the same goes for this year, about any next-year predictions…
I wouldn’t dare make any predictions about what next year will BE; I might venture an opinion that IF next year shows at least 10% ice growth from 2008 to 2009 or, even better, if it climbs above the infamous ‘average’, that we are pretty definitely in no danger of an arctic ‘tipping point’ any time in the next few years. And, also, that IF 2009 takes a dive like 2007 did, I would take a more serious look at what kind of tipping point we would be likely approaching, and where it might actually be, and what could be done about it.
But this year can’t ‘prove’ anything by itself, either one way or the other.

It would be courteous to the the guys at NSIDC to reference their website when making a quote from it.
http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/
This is the 9.4% figure in its full context:
“Despite overall cooler summer temperatures, the 2008 minimum extent is only 390,000 square kilometers (150,000 square miles), or 9.4%, more than the record-setting 2007 minimum. The 2008 minimum extent is 15.0% less than the next-lowest minimum extent set in 2005 and 33.1% less than the average minimum extent from 1979 to 2000.”
Is there any particular reason why you cherry picked the 9.4% figure but omitted the others?

OK I have just noticed that you have included the other figures lower down. You aren’t quite as bad as I was suggesting 🙂
But how about some more graphs like this one?
http://nsidc.org/images/arcticseaicenews/20080904_Figure5.png

Some of you may be interested to read what the Department of Climate Change in Australia has said to me in response to my query on how they viewed Christopher Monkton’s paper on the falsification of the “Hockey Stick”. I was interested to know whether it affected the government’s plans for an Emmissions Trading Scheme. The reply came to me from an e-mail address [Climatescience@environment.gov.au]. I am not sure how to show the quoted section and hope I have done it correctly. However, the response argues that the melting ice sheets is “unequivocal” evidence of the recent warming not being within historical bounds. The other thing to note about the response was that it came with two different fonts. It was simply a cut and paste job. Probably from the deparment’s FAQs guide. It reads:
“A number of scientists have tried to dispute the findings of others, including the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate (sic) – the world authority on climate change reporting – that the warming the globe has experienced is within normal limits. This is not the case, global warming is unequivocal, the evidence being in melting ice sheets, warming oceans and comparison with climate records.
“The most recent research has been published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the pre-eminent science body in the USA. This research confirms that surface temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere were warmer over the last 10 years than any time during the last 1300 years, and, if the climate scientists include data derived from marine and lake sediment cores, ice cores, coral cores and tree-ring records, the warming is anomalous for at least 1700 years. Their study used methods that are more sophisticated than others used previously.
“Thank you for your query.”
Perhaps others may wish to comment on the quality of the science at the esteemed Department of Climate Change in Australia.

As yet, I have not had any response to emails sent to the BBC. Still, I am not downhearted and here’s another one.
Dear Mr Black,
From Anthony Watt’s website, wherein he explains the unvarnished truth about global temperatures.
“Though it appears NSIDC is attempting to downplay this in their web page announcement today, one can safely say that despite irrational predictions seen earlier this *year, we didn’t reach an “ice free north pole” nor a new record low for sea ice extent.”
http://wattsupwiththat.wordpress.com/2008/09/16/artic-sea-ice-melt-season-officially-over-up-over-9-from-last-year/
* I wonder who was doing that? Was it Richard Black, Environment Correspondent?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6610125.stm
BTW, I read your latest contribution this morning. Spin as much as you like Mr Black, you and your contacts are fighting a losing rearguard action against the reality that our planet’s temperatures are ultimately controlled by the warmth from the sun. It occurs to me that you personally should now be publicly reconsidering your position on AGW, don’t you?
Yours truly,

NOAA:
“The combined global average land and ocean surface temperature for summer 2008 was the ninth warmest since records began in 1880, and this August was the tenth warmest, according to an analysis by NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, ”
NSIDC:
“Despite overall cooler summer temperatures, the 2008 minimum extent is only 390,000 square kilometers (150,000 square miles), or 9.4%, more than the record-setting 2007 minimum.”
So could NSDIC and NOAA make up their minds? Is it an unusually cold or warm summer?
It looks like there is some kind of agenda hiddien behind those statement, both want to blame it on AGW.
It seems like NOAA want to make a point that we have had very high temperatures (between the lines: AGW is causing it) and NSDIC want to make a point that the reason why the ice didnt shrink more is because it was a colder summer. (Betweem the lines: Natural cooling saved the ice from decreasing more)
Is that all it takes, a few tenth of a degree C to make the ice grow in Arctic?
My interpretation of that statement is(very simplified I guess but still…) that if global temperatures stay around 0C anomaly based on UAH/RSS the summer ice will grow in Arctic.
If it is colder than normal it is natural cooling and if the temperature rises it is AGW. What happened to the natural warming? Did it cease to exist? Can natural cooling exist without natural warming.

The True Believers(tm) at Climateaudit are already pointing out that that 2008 was the most ice area melt in the satellite area.
When you can’t win, just change the rules….

Jerker Andersson (02:51:54) :
“So could NSDIC and NOAA make up their minds? Is it an unusually cold or warm summer?”
What is not in agreement between the two statements? In the long term it is a warmer than average summer, in the short term it is colder than last year.
“If it is colder than normal it is natural cooling and if the temperature rises it is AGW. What happened to the natural warming? Did it cease to exist? Can natural cooling exist without natural warming.”
Typical disinformation, it has never ‘ceased to exist’ and has always known to be a part of natural climate. The whole AGW argument is that these natural cycles alone do not account for the rapid rise in temperatures in recent history.

Lets be fair here, the claims of new ice melting faster were completely valid based on how they measure it. The NSIDC would have been right if the conditions had been identical to 2007 melt season. Well since we all here know that climate conditions change year to year, that did not happen.
What we saw was in the range of predictions they published earlier in the year, and I actually think they hit the predicted melt. While some researchers with a AGW taint were metaphorically out there with hair dryers hoping for a dramatic event to lead into the UNFCCC 2009 meeting, it just did not happen.
My real problem with the spin on temperatures and ice is simple, when you look at a curve the points are equally allocated on both sides, so saying things like 10 of the last 12 were the warmest or second lowest in this case is ridiculous because I would not expect anything else.
Recorded here for posterity.. This year will see an even greater increase than last year in sea ice in the arctic during the freeze and we will have the third lowest ice extent in the Summer of ’09. So not quite back up to 2005 levels.

I agree with Tom in Florida’s idea .Why cherry pick your years unless you want to get a particular reading.One thing i’m wanting to know is how thick is this ice in the artic and when they talk about thin ice are they saying the ice is an inch thick or 5 in. or 10in. ???? I know it’s all in the wording.

are you people serious? It was only the second largest recorded melt in since recording began so it’s no cause of concern? are none of you capable of looking at a graph and seeing a trend line? How does it feel to go through life being functionally illiterate when it comes to math and science?

In my view sea ice extent is not a leading climatic indicator – rather it is a lagging indicator. With the present cooling, I expect sea ice extent to increase in the years ahead.

The ice level in the 1920’s, 30’s and early 40’s was at a similar low level. The St. Roch went easily through the Northern route of the NW passage which is closed this year and that was in 1944. The HBC had many other boats freely navigating the southern route of the NW Passage.
Gjoa Haven(1930) and Cambridge Bay(1929) pictures showing low ice level. A lot more info in that link.
http://www.kitikmeotheritage.ca/Angulalk/hudsons/hudsons.htm
This little boat the Aklavik also made it through the NW Passage in 1937.
http://iain-cameron.blogspot.com/2007/07/test.html
Nascopie and Aklavik meet from East and West in 1937
The Nascopie commonly travelled through the passage in the 30’s.
http://iain-cameron.blogspot.com/2007/07/aberdonians-arctic-feat.html
This evidence is ignored by science, and it shows the conditions in the Arctic in the thirties were similar to today. And then in the late 40’s the Arctic froze up and the HBC shut some of their posts due to the increased ice.
What is called science has become an embarassment.
Shawn Whelan,
Windsor, Ont
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,801448,00.html?promoid=googlep

If this 10% increase per year trend continues, it will only be 10 years before there is no melt at all in the Arctic in the summer.
In fact, according to the 10% increase per year model constructed by BIDC, the ice pack could reach the equator within 50 years.

SOG said: “are you people serious? It was only the second largest recorded melt in since recording began so it’s no cause of concern? are none of you capable of looking at a graph and seeing a trend line? How does it feel to go through life being functionally illiterate when it comes to math and science?”
My Reply: First, it does no good to insult people on this blog. Second, pay attention to your own words – “since recording began.” And how long has that been, pray tell? Oh, about 30 years. A breathtakingly short time for most any natural trend. And a trend does not mean an inevitable continuation towards imminent catastrophe. If the trend were in the opposite direction, would you be calling us functional illiterates for not panicking about the death of the world in the Great Freeze? And if you had been reading this blog with any great regularity, particularly in comments, you would see that from the anecdotal evidence alone of cooler-than-normal weather we are quite aware of “trends.” The problem with people who put their hopes and fears in trend lines is that they think they know enough about the so-called trends to forecast the future upon which they make present decisions. In some cases we do, but in this case we only have a scant 30 years of measurements to go on, far too little to base good judgements upon. And if you were really paying attention, you would have seen Anthony’s post about 1922’s Arctic voyage and how the melting was “worse” then than it is now, yet the world somehow survived.
Lighten up and show a little more courtesy, please.

When sea ice melts it cools things off. Most of the cooling is done by the sea water beneath it, not the air above. When the sun goes down, open water and first year ice radiate more thermal energy than multi-year ice does. Multi-year ice contributes more to global warming than first year/open sea water does. Multi-year ice is about 3 meters thick while the Arctic sea water is hundreds of times thicker.

You do like your short term trends don’t you! Don’t forget that this year was actually the largest melt recorded as the maximum ice extent in March 2008 was, as you have mentioned above, was quite a lot more than in 2007. http://www.ijis.iarc.uaf.edu/en/home/seaice_extent.htm
Also note that we are not quite finished in the seasons melt, there is probably another week or so left.

You do like your short term trends don’t you. Don’t forget that we have exploration evidence of at least as little ice in the 1920s, 30s, and 40s. And let us not forget times in the past which were at least as warm as now (MWP, RWP) for which we have no polar data. Of course, you believe in the bogus hockey schtick, so I don’t expect to change your mind, not with your blinders on.

Isn’t this the same group that predicted the ice would be 30% less than last year, due to the fact there was so much new ice ? Instead, the ice this year is 10% greater than last year. So, They are only off by 40%.

Why am I suspicious that all the AGW proponents are focusing on arctic sea ice mainly because recent global temperatures aren’t fulfilling their expectations. When global temperature’s tick upward, as they inevitably will, they will change their focus. And they will also forget their arguments that short-term changes aren’t statistically significant.

Jeff Alberts (8:22:35)
“What’s really interesting about the Franklin Expedition is one of the main reasons it failed. Lead used in the cans of their canned food caused dementia, which is why they dragged a piano across the ice and tundra after their ships were abandoned.”
Some believe that but it is in dispute. Personally I believe it is more likely the food was not properly canned and they were poisened. They quit eating the canned food and eventualy resorted to cannibalism even though there was large quantities of the canned food left.
It is worth noting that it was very common not to long ago to supply drinking water to the cities via lead pipes and much of this pipework is still in use. And until very recently the solder used in the pipes contained a large amount of lead.

For the alarmists who can’t believe we do not see the the TREND toward a hot house world.
Consider that this TREND is measured since the satellite era, about 1979. This is less than 30 years. 30 years that covers ONE POSITIVE PDO cycle. This does NOT cover a matching NEGATIVE PDO cycle. It only covers THREE solar cycles. Based on sunspot data we have “SEEN” virtually nothing of the possible variations in the Sun with modern instrumentation.
Am I to panic over every single observation that is new and doesn’t fit short term theories and observations???

But Mark… the Antarctic is less than last year but wasn’t last year a “all time” high in the antarctic? And doesn’t a loss of 1million square km barely bring that back into the normal range?

Mary Hinge (02:44:45) :
“Also note that we are not quite finished in the seasons melt, there is probably another week or so left.”
[snip] Have an open mind and look at the evidence. Enough has been given to you over the past few days for you to realise that there is logically something wrong with the AGW hypothesis.
[REPLY – Let’s keep it civil, folks. ~ Evan]

150,000 square miles more is a chunk of ice the size of Montana.
That’s not a small piece of real estate . . .
[I had to de-spam that one. You used the magic words: “real estate” ~ Evan]

Przemysław Pawełczyk (P2O2):
There was an unusual heat wave in northeastern Siberia in August. The unusual melt in August was essentially all in that area.

Sorry Evan. I’ve got to stop reading Mary’s posts – bad for my blood pressure.

evanjones (12:06:56) :
So here we sit, watching ice melt and getting all bent out of shape over it.
Hmmm . . .
(Almost as interesting as watching ice freeze.)
…and if we get bored, we can all go count sun spots…..
cdl

jonk (12:13:50) :
Sorry Evan. I’ve got to stop reading Mary’s posts – bad for my blood pressure.
jonk
I have been reading Mary’s comments long enough to know that it doesn’t take much for Mary Hinge to become unhinged and go on a commentary binge that makes me want to cringe!
[REPLY – Health first! But bear in Mind that Mary is deep in the heart of what may fairly be described as “enemy territory”. She therefore draws a lot of fire, and, like all of us, gets fed up at times. I can sympathize with that. Furthermore, she’s sharp and smart and I find her to be honest in her beliefs and serious about the debate. If I believed AGW was nearing a tipping point, I know I’d be positively frantic. ~ Evan]

I wrote: “If the natural rise and fall were of the same magnitude then the observed temperature would stay level rather than falling.”
Sorry, got that a bit wrong. The observed temperature would still rise, but at half its previous rate.

Hi folks,
This interesting website was thrown up by a google search I’ve set up. I’ve got no personal opinion on the retreat or advance of the ice, or really on global warming, but I have just suggested the overturning of another scientific orthodoxy.
I was very interested to read the comments about the Franklin Expedition and how the members of it were poisoned by the lead in the tinned food they took with them. The eminent palaeo-pathologist Dr. Owen Beattie autopsied the bodies of three Franklin Expedition members and found them to have very high lead burdens. This was also the case with bone fragments from other Expedition members too. Dr. Beattie and his collaborators concluded that this lead had come from tinned food.
I am an independent British archaeologist who has researched the Franklin Expedition extensively. Every one told me as a fact that the lead poisoning was caused by tinned food. This puzzled me because tinned food only made up about 16% of their provisions, and there simply wasn’t enough on the Expedition to account for the very high levels of lead seen in Expedition members’ remains. Also, tinned food was quite widely used elsewhere by the 1840’s, yet didn’t seem to have caused lead poisoning. So I analysed the contemporary records and found that the ships were fitted with a large scale steam heating and desalination system which, given the materials in use at the time, was almost certain to produce water with a truly massive lead burden. Unlike the tinned food, which was used on lots of other Expeditions, this distilled water and steam heating system was unique to these ships for this voyage only. So for the first time we have evidence of a really massive and UNIQUE source of lead pollution on this Expedition.
I’ve attached a link to this comment to the paper I’ve just published on the Hakluyt Society website and if you’re interested I’d be most keen to hear your views.
The reason I’m posting is that the ‘lead from tins’ thing is almost an urban myth. It’s the ONE THING that everybody knows, or thinks they know, about the Franklin Expedition. But I think my paper shows that, as it turns out, this is actually wrong. Just shows how a scientific orthodoxy can be overturned.
Hope you find this interesting
William

Overall sea ice has been trending down from 1978 to now. Between 2000 and 2007 this trend looks like it may have accelerated. Using Cryosphere Today’s area chart, 3 of these 8 years from 2000 to 2007 have seen increases in ice compared to the previous year.
Since 1990 there have been 3 other years where area has increased by around half a million or more square kilometres from one year to the next.
The most recent run with 3 consecutive years of increasing sea ice minimum was 2003 to 2005. Other 3 year runs of increasing sea ice happend 82-84 and then 85-87 (84-85 was a big decrease)
I cannot find a run of 4 consecutive years of increasing sea ice between 1979 and 2008.

(I wish we could edit our own posts after ‘posting’ to get rid of the typos that you inevitably only see after you’ve hit the ‘submit button!)

Re: Lloyd Graves (19:13:20)
Lloyd Graves refers to the IARC-JAXA Information System (IJIS) (http://www.ijis.iarc.uaf.edu/en/home/seaice_extent.htm) as a data source. The IJIS provides satellite daily measurement of Arctic ice extent from June, 2002. Rather than comparing year-over-year measurements, it is interesting to compare the cumulative change in ice extent for the 2002:2008 interval. Coincidentally, I suppose, the IJIS data file actual begins on 06/22/02 which is approximately summer solstice in the NH. If you plot the cumulative change in ice extent, you will notice some interesting features, (I haven’t learned how to incorporate Excel graphs into WordPress!!)
1. The cumulative maximum ice extent occurs around March 10 each year and the cumulative minimum occurs around September 21 each year
2. The cumulative maximum ice extent decreased each year from 2003 until 2006 but increased in 2007 and 2008
3. The cumulative minimum ice extent decreased from 2003 until 2006 but increased in 2006 and decreased again in 2007
4. The changes in slope of the ascending and descending phases of the cumulative curve are quite interesting, e.g., the Jun:Sep 2007 slope is the steepest but the Jan: Mar slope changes too. I suppose this indicates that seasonal shifts are occurring in the Arctic but it appears to me that they are not anthropogenic-related.

Craig D.,
I have written about this “perverse situation” on before on here. My training is philosophical and theological, with a strong amateur talent for politics, so if nobody else consciously noticed it I did.
There are two camps; this is obvious to everyone. There is the pro-AGW crowd, whom I shall call the Hot Heads. And there is the anti-AGW crowd, whom I shall call the Cooler Heads. This is of course in respect to where each camp believes the actual temperatures are leading the scientific data. This seems pretty straightforwards until politics enters the mix. Then very strange, I like to call it perverse (as in unnatural), things start happening.
The run-away global warmists, the Hot Heads, desire to see a modest global cooling while giving us a constant stream of warnings of how AGW is going to destroy the planet. Meanwhile, the Cooler Heads, desire to see a modest global warming while leaning towards the idea that so far the data shows us we are heading into a period of cooler global climate. So each camp is wanting the opposite of what it believes is happening; yet if each somehow received what it wanted, its reason to exist would disappear. Because of the money involved in “fixing” man-made global warming, there is ample reason not to want to have that reason for existence taken away for the Hot Heads. Not so for the other side. Take a look.
Let’s do some hypotheticals of our own. Imagine the unified scientific consensus was that it was not happening and that we were not significant contributors to it. What would people like Al Gore and James Hansen, companies like Lehman Brothers (the self styled future “primary broker for emissions permits”) and GE (makers of energy efficient bulbs) and action groups like Greenpeace do then? Their interests, their purpose, their monetary fortunes and popularity are all put at substantial risk. Point of fact, a large part of the reason for doing what they do is made void. Depending on the depth of their involvement in AGW, it might be a death sentence.
Now, flip it around. If AGW is true, what do people like Anthony, like you and I, or even like Lord Monckton lose? We were wrong about the phenomena, but that’s it. Whether we could then actually do anything to affect global temperature in the opposing direction (i.e., cool the Earth) is a whole other argument. But even if we could you and I still lose relatively little. Sure we might wonder how we were so dead wrong, and yes it might cost us a lot economically, but we’d have the certainty that this was the right step for us and our childeren and grandchildren, etc., to have a future here on the Earth. And that is something that the AGWers will never have in the same sense. Regular folks who have been fooled to buying into it will have that, sure, but the committed, the faithful, they will never have that sense of a future back if they are wrong. They have staked too much on it.
Why do you think Al Gore no longer allows the press into his AGW stump speech meetings? It is because he wants to peddle the same old broken down so-called science without criticism of his efforts. He has a movie, a book, and numerous economic ventures as well as personal reputation riding on this. He has put himself so far into this that he cannot afford to be wrong. Nobody would ever listen to him and most would not want to even associate with him. He might live but in a very real sense he would be destroyed, if AGW were scientifically debunked.
A lot of companies, similar to Lehman Brothers, are in the sway of the Hot Head leadership, such as James Hansen and Al Gore. They are betting future economic enterprises such as carbon emissions certificates markets set up by cap-and-trade government mandated policies (which BOTH presidential candidates endorse by the way – betcha didn’t know that! See the link at the bottom). They stand to make a pile of money with very little risk to their investments. Energy companies will feel the pinch, particulary electricity generators, as they are forced to “clean up or shut down” their power plants, which will raise consumer prices of course. Other companies whose CO2 footprint is smaller, according to proposed guidelines, can sell their leftover certificates at enormous profits. Imagine, you get paid to do literally nothing, and you make a huge PURE profit. Sign me up for that!
Only the trick to this scheme separates the interests of business, which are supposed to be focused on the customer, from the customers interests. The customers’ interests are, of course, receiving said service at the best price available. When your “carbon footprint” increases the cost of business because you may have to buy ECs (emissions certificates), you just pass that on to the customer. If customers leave you because of your pricing, you can shut down your places of business (factories, stores, etc) and make profit off of selling your unneeded ECs because of your now smaller footprint. Again, pure profit for doing nothing.
Now you see why I call this perverse. This is the opposite of what businesses should want. Customer interests and loyalty are supposed to reward shareholders. Not with cap-and-trade. You can make more money by actually working less. The European economy is actually largely based on cap-and-trade policies which have made some companies billions of dollars by selling them to companies in need of them. Allocation of the ECs is determined by the government contingent on what industry you are in. But if you need more you need more. A company will get fined for going over its allotment without buying more ECs.
So now maybe you can see why so much of the establishment, so many otherwise seemingly normal people, are so invested in AGW being true. And why debate must be stifled! And the really perverse thing is that it will all be legal, so rewards and punishments will be backed up by the law. And guess what? It’s already happening. We already have government mandates to “green” up our fuel by adding ethanol and other biomass-derived fuels. So this is not without precedent in our nation.
It is the politics of AGW that make AGW so dangerous, and it is the psuedo-science that gives credibility to it. And that more than anything is why it must be stopped. Let us hope and pray Cooler Heads prevail.

“How does it feel to go through life being functionally illiterate when it comes to math and science?”
I’ve got used to it, but will struggle on regardless.

Good point, Steve! Nice conception.

I’m left with the simple understanding.
The recent predictions, (sorry “projections”) of an ice free North Pole were WRONG.
The situation is a lot more complicated than merely Man made CO2 emissions,
these incidentally do not correlate at all well, if at all, with ice “amounts”….
For example,
New or multi year ice.
Volcanic activity.
Ocean current phases / regimes.
Wind patterns.
Solar activity.
etc, etc, etc..
The list of natural factors is quite exhausting…..

Michael (01:54:07) :
“How does the WWF report this and not get taken to task?”
So you deny that this summers melt has not been the largest melt recorded? If you don’t deny this what’s your problem?

Warning: Please remember what Anthony mentioned to you about playing nice in the sand box just two days ago in this post. – Anne

“Warning: Please remember what Anthony mentioned to you about playing nice in the sand box just two days ago in this post. – Anne”
Sorry Anne, just asking what I thought was a reasonable question. The article is about the highest recorded ice melt recorded in the Arctic, denying this fact makes his statement valid to him, accepting the fact means his ‘taken to task’ context is totally wrong and an attempt to mislead.
If you can explain why a warning is merited, fine, I will take it on board.
Reply: 1) Your tone in your wording was highly confrontational, boarding on insulting and quite unnecessary. I have observed that this is a near continuous problem with your comments while most others only make the occasional gaff. 2) Two wrongs don’t make a right. If you observe a trend in the behavior of a fellow participant on this blog that is less than acceptable and which the moderators seem to have missed, feel free to post a comment to us. We will take the necessary steps to correct the problem. In the mean time, don’t let every challenge to your opinions/comments be taken as a personal insult. Treat people as you wish them to treat you. – Anne

Anne,
Can I just give the meaning of ‘Taking to Task’:
take someone to task
to criticize someone angrily for something that they have done.
My point was that the WWF (who are actually very close to my heart and one of my chosen charities) was being heavily criticised by Michael for responding to the facts as they are. The only thing I can find that you might deem ‘insulting’ is the word ‘deny’. I can understand why you might be so sensitive to the Noun form ‘Denier’ with the historical connetations, however to deem that using the word as a verb is insulting is perhaps a little extreme. However if that is what you mean then I shall not use deny, let alone denier.
If I am wrong in this assessment then let me know, otherwise I will take it as is.
Reply: But you are not the WWF and therefore the comment ‘taken to task’ was not directed at you and negates any justification on your part for your confrontational attitude. If the WWF wants to rebut that comment officially, they are as welcome here as anyone else. FYI, my understanding is that ‘taken to task’ implies to censure severely or angrily someone’s actions when they have done something perceived to be wrong (ie. Sally was taken to task for fighting in the schoolyard during recess by her teacher). – Anne

OMG, we’re all gonna die from global cooling!!!!

I am impressed with level of science and explanation in this blog. It is definitely heartening to know that more ice is forming when the media is giving the opposite story. That said, the whole thing is obviously very vulnerable and needs a lot of urgent action to maintain/improve the situation.
Melting ice and rising sea levels have caused many problems, especially for many small islands where people have nowhere to go. They are therefore petitioning the UN Security Council to take serious action on Climate Change. Can I ask you take a minute to check this out and maybe support it:
http://blog.advancedsilversolution.com/2008/09/18/rising-sea-levels-action-needed-now/
Thank you

I’d say “increased 9.4%” is about as misleading a spin as you could put on this data, given the very large interannual variation year to year measurments have.
http://scienceblogs.com/illconsidered/2008/09/sea_ice_reaches_minimum_extent.php
(Please take special note of the last graphic at that page)
It is also worth bearing in mind that extent is only half the picture.

Once again I bring your attention to the very same graph you use to harald the huge melt. Look at the extent of ice recovery from minimum to maximum this past winter and compare that to any other winter season. It was COLD last winter and for a very long time. Thus the rather large amount of ice that formed. There have been other years where the extent ended further up the graph scale, but the ice freeze didn’t have as far to go from minimum either. The only way that much ice could have reformed is that at least for last winter, whatever forcings were active, they allowed the Arctic to be colder than in recent years.
If you want to talk about the significance of the current huge melt and hypothesize about why it occurred, and I agree that it did occur, I get to talk about the huge recovery this past winter on the same graph and hypothesize about why it occurred. I noticed that the length of the rise was greater than all the others on the graph. Did you notice that? Of course it may just be an odd cold year. But if, and I do mean “if”, this winter is just as bitter cold as last year, and then the next summer season is just as hot as it was this summer, there will be slightly more ice left at the end of the next melt season, just like this time there was more ice left than in 2007. If the ice recovers again, I hypothesize that the recovery to average will be slow, just like the trend of loss of ice from year to year was slow. If my version happens, I will be thinking about possible reasons for it, just as you would if it continues to warm and melt.
Scientific observation isn’t about who is right. It is about describing what one sees and then developing open-minded hypotheses about the event. That is all I have done. I don’t know yet if my view will be the correct one. Scientific conversation should never jump to early conclusions about right and wrong. Out of respect for opposing hypotheses and in the interest of science, I believe both sides should continue the conversation with open minds. So if your mind is open here is what I could say: Last winter’s long freeze could be an early sign of recovery. It could also be a sign of just a pause along the road to continued warming and an ice free Arctic. I will not begrudge you if you lean towards the ice-free Arctic version.

To respond to some points above:

The simplest way to figure out a trend is to run a linear regression (Excel has this function). The result is significantly affected by the number of data points (years), particularly for small samples (30 years in this case). Thus, for example, although 1998 had a much higher global temperature than 2000, if you calculate the linear trend from 1998 to present you get a warming trend, whereas if you run the trend from 2000, a colder year, you get a flat or slightly cooling trend. Statistics often defy intuition. The trend in sea ice decline over the satellite period has increased from this year’s minimum (I think the melt is over). that’s a statistical fact – a function of looking at all the years and weighing them comparatively. If you select a two point sample – comparing two consecutive years – you are not talking about a trend.

Keeping the baseline constant makes it easier to compare anomalies. Changing it greatly complicates comparative study. It doesn’t really matter which baseline you choose as long as you keep it constant (it must have statistical significance – a baseline established of two data points is not useful). There needs to be a good reason to change it.

Like Arctic variability, weather plays a dominant role over smaller time scales. It’s not certain that the ice growth season is over yet. If it is, the Antarctic sea ice has shrunk more than the Arctic has gained and currently sits below the baseline.
This is a good graph for combined hemispheric ice area (different to extent vis NSIDC) over the satellite period.
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/global.daily.ice.area.withtrend.jpg
Sea ice has been in decline globally for a number of years, and has recently accelerated. The large increase of Antarctic sea ice area in 2007 would appear to have been wiped out in 2008 (but we should wait a couple of weeks to be sure). This will not much effect the overall trend for Antarctic sea ice area, which has been very slightly positive over the satellite period.
In previous passage crossings, small boats made it through because they could steer around the ice, and large boats would sit in the flow until they emerged again into open water. This year large boats could comfortably make it through, and it marks the first time both the east and northwest passages were navigable without getting stuck in ice for a day or two. The previous circumnavigation of the Arctic took 4 years, while the ship waited for favourable conditions and for the ice surrounding it to move it forward.
If one WAS to make a year-to-year comparison between 2007 and 2008 (and 2005) Arctic sea ice extent, I’d do it like this.
March sea ice extent maximum for the Arctic was greater in 2008 than for 2007 owing to a very cold winter in the NH, most likely a consequence of a very strong la Nina. Despite this, 2008 sea ice minimum fell to the second lowest on record, which was previously 2005. 2005 was the equal hottest year in the instrumental record and 2008 has so far been significantly colder. Also, there was slightly more sea ice extent melted in 2008 than 2007: although 2008 finished with more sea ice at minimum, it began with even more sea ice at maximum. It also had a shorter melt season than 2007. The relatively greater melt in a colder year is probably a result of there being more first year ice, which melts more quickly.
Despite 2008 seeing slightly more sea ice extent at minimum than last year, the overall trend of decline has accelerated.
finally, a few people commented that this year’s ice extent indicates a new trwend of flobal cooling. There is no way to establish any kind of statistically signficant climate trend with just two, or even five or ten years. Interannual variability dominates climate trends in the short term. Any trend extrapolated from 208 data can only be assessed with any validity in relation to the long term, just as weekly or monthly record melts say little about the long-term trend. That is a discussion of weather, not climate.

Anne: “The same standards should apply to all parties, present or otherwise, with the following exceptions as noted below…”
Thanks for taking the time to offer your views, Anne. I think you have presented some valuable guidelines, especially the distinction between attacking views and attacking persons. That said, may I seek further clarification? Below is a list of statements that I think summarise this situation and your views.
1. Watts Up With That subscribes to a ‘civility principle’.
2. Your comments relate to your role as moderator on this forum, but are not necessarily forum policy.
3. Attack the opinion, not the person.
4. Poster-to-poster personal insults are unacceptable.
5. Occasional gaffes are forgiveable.
6. Insults about the publicly expressed views of third-party public figures are OK.
If this list fairly summarises your views, I’m fine with that. However, I would like to clarify the status of another class of comments: those that are directed towards third-party categories/groups of people rather than specific individuals.
For example, if I were to claim that ‘AGW sceptics are nut-jobs’, that would not be a direct insult against any particular poster, yet some individuals might take umbrage because they consider themselves to be part of the category of AGW sceptics.
What would your ruling be on this class of comments? Is it OK to make insulting comments about categories/groups of persons, or do you think they should also be subject to the civility principle?
Reply: I think that each moderator should rely on their own judgment in this sort of situation upon receipt of a complaint from a member of the ‘offended’ group, taking into account the context of the comment within the discussion, as well as the past behavior of the poster and the complainer. Remember, this is Anthony’s blog and he gets the final say. – Anne
[FURTHER REPLY – Aye, aye! Arrr. ~ E]

Hi Ric.
I was talking to Mike86. I hadn’t read to the bottom of the thread when I first posted, and then replied to posts that came after mine. I’ve seen your post now – appreciate the stats. Would you mind posting the link to them?
I’m no statistician either. I just know the right buttons to press in Excel. I learned some basic stuff to discuss global temperature trends elsewhere.
I ran a simple regression for September minima from 1979 – 2007, and then another from 1979 – 2008. Sure enough, the trend at peak melt seems to have ‘accelerated’ when you include this year’s data point. The opposite is true using the May figures.
I suppose another way of doing it would be to take the Jan – Dec average rather than picking months, but the minima seems like the most vital because of potential tipping points.

I guess saying “nutjobs” is ok since it wasn’t snipped.
Reply: It was a vague reference with no defined target at a specific person or entity. – Anne

OK Brendan it’s a case by case basis… Thanks Anne
Reply: Pretty much. As I suspect that the Mayan-calendar subscribing members of the Internet don’t frequent WUWT, the comment stands. – Anne

Found monthly data sets for the satellite series at NSIDC (Arctic sea ice), with figures for area and extent side by side.
ftp://sidads.colorado.edu/DATASETS/NOAA/G02135/
Maximum (March) is here.
ftp://sidads.colorado.edu/DATASETS/NOAA/G02135/Mar/N_03_area.txt
Minimum is here.
ftp://sidads.colorado.edu/DATASETS/NOAA/G02135/Sep/N_09_area.txt
Listed under ‘area’ (top file each month listing). September 2008 hasn’t been included yet. As I’m a rube with the formatting here, I’ll leave it to others to post tables. Hope this is useful.
I ran a linear regression for maxima over the series and the declining trend has decelerated as a result of maximum last March, emphasising in a different way the remarkable melt season this year.

Including this year, it’s closer to -2.5 mil sq kms linear trend, five times the variability of minimum year to year.

In the last hundred years there were two thirty year trends of temperatures rising. They both stopped. http://www.cru.uea.ac.uk/cru/info/warming/

It means that a trend is only a trend. It does not follow that the trend will continue until there is no sea ice.

When the sun kicks in again, all of the ice on the planet will melt and costal cities will be under water for 10,000 years.
I have no idea what you people are thinking. Bush told NSIDC to fudge that graph before the election so Obama can get the real graph in November and the Feds can spend trillions to replace all of our Coal generation plants.
We can borrow the money from China to pull this off. Once China owns the US, they use us for mining more coal.
yes, that’s it…..

how much ice is left in the arctic?