http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/04/090406132602.htm

I wondered why this route was chosen… now I know…

http://nsidc.org/images/arcticseaicenews/20090406_Figure5.png

I wonder if it’s working out like they expected… I don’t think so. Too bad they won’t man up and share the data…

http://nsidc.org/images/arcticseaicenews/20090406_Figure4.png

Steve G scaremongering again ! ;-)

Did Mr George Wills ever get proven right about reaching the 1979- average as Steve claimed would soon happen?

Nope.

Regards

Andy

“Having seen the BBC show Top Gear (Polar Special) where they drive with a truck to the north pole and following the Catlin Arctic Survey with there resupply flights and what have you.
I’m wondering who will have the smaller carbon footprint reaching the north pole.
One thing is for sure the Top Gear team was much better prepared for the trip.”

Top Gear drove to the 1996 magnetic pole, which is around a thousand miles short of the “north pole” Catlin is aiming for. A comparison of carbon footprints or anything else can’t be made of the Top Gear and Catlin trips.

But I estimate if all went according to plan with no additional trips to resupply, that just the fuel for the Twin Otter trips will be at minimum 5000 gallons. I’d call that about a size 15 footprint for a 1000 km jaunt.
In comparison though with a 2000km journey in a truck (1000 both ways and no air support) that got say 10 km per gallon using 200 gallons, Top Gear would win hands down.

http://www.catlinarcticsurvey.com/route_globe.aspx
http://www.catlinarcticsurvey.com/assets/downloads/RouteMap.pdf
http://polar.nrcan.gc.ca/about/manual/ch1/2_e.php

Yes. You know what Robert ‘Frost’ had to say about the end of the world:

that what he knows of ‘hate’ . . . Ice would suffice.

And yes. It’s ‘desire’ that he equates with heat/fire.

Cold bad. Warm good. Period ;-)

(I don’t think the poet intended his words as counters to global warming hysteria, but hey! the gloves are off)

If the ‘Catlin Clowns’ were really being scientific, don’t you think they would be recording and transmitting temperatures and positions as part of their ’scientific’ data? There is less science in this expedition than one would find in a kindergarten treasure hunt. Of course they do have their uncalibrated ice thickness radar and that doesn’t sound like real radar to me either… Colour me sceptical of any benefits from this foolish outing. “”"

Well I have a colleague at work who at one time was a Lieutenant in the US Navy; well specifically on a Nuclear Submarine (can’t tell me which one), and he spent a bunch of time underneath that Arctic sea ice; and he says they have all kinds of equipment for measuring the thickness of that ice and have done so; and no they aren’t likely to tell us what the data they have says. Well after he got out of the Navy he joined Scripps Inst; so he is a Degreed Oceanographer as well; and once degreed, he did some Arctic research for arctic ocean oil prospectors, and saw a lot more of that under the ice stuff again.

He tells me, that over most of that arctic ocean the ice typically runs about one metre thick; but of course with weather it can fold and crack and pile up so some smalls pots can be a lot thicker, but he says if you averaged one metre over the whole ice covered area you would about have the total ice about right. He also said that metre is about all that nuke commanders are comfortable about breaking through to surface. Can’t tell me the real limit but after one metre he says you better have a good reason. He also said that you could come up in total ice free water, and the next day find the same spot totally ice covered; which might then go away again.

The bottom of the ice is very briny and teeming with life from bacteria to shrimps and critters that eat them. Whales which can eat bucket loads of shrimp like to go to the arctic to feed, and they move around as the ice moves around because that’s how they find food.

Oh by the way; CO2 doesn’t dissolve in ice; so when that ice grows, as it does starting around mid September, (solstice) all the CO2 that is in the sea water which is about ocean maximum since that is the coldest (surface)water on earth; gets ejected from the ice just like the salt does; into that cold and CO2 saturated water; which immediately expels it to the atmosphere; which is why you get that 18 ppm CO2 cycle in the Arctic. Check back through recent archives to see that neat CO2 pole to pole movie that Anthony had here a few weeks ago.

So you take a typical minimum of 6 (six) million square km of September sea ice (except for the last two or three years), and you grow another 8 (eight) million square km of sea ice through to April to end up with 14 million square km of sea ice currently. That means that the extra open water went from 8 squ km down to zero; leaving the normal amount of “permanent” open water.

So now take 8squ km of sea ice growth times a mean thickness of one metre and you get 8000 cubic km of new ice grown each fall/winter. So now from Henry’s law data you find the concentration of CO2 in that cold surface water, and figure out how much CO2 is in 8000 km^3 of that water, and that is how much CO2 gets vented to the atmosphere.

Take 8 million sqare km of new ice surface, and figure out the total weight of atmosphere on that surface; then figure out how much of that is CO2 at 380 ppm roughly; compare that to the amount of CO2 forced out of the water that froze; and I believe you should end up with an 18 ppm increase in atmospheric CO2 over that part of the arctic.

Recent increases in the amplitude of the arctic CO2 cycle were often cited as evidence for global warming causing increased tree growth in the arctic so a greener earth.

But tree growth isn’t anywhere near the arctic ocean and that increased CO2 cycle amplitude, is simply proxy evidence for the fact that the last three years or so saw increased summer ice melting dropping the ice below the 6 million squ km to around 4.5; so that increased open water takes up more CO2 from the atmosphere, which is why the CO2 cyclic amplitude increased over the arctic in recent years. Nothing to do with tree growth at all.

I don’t know what the normal CO2 content of open arctic ocean water is; or else I would have done this calculation already; but if any of you practising climatologists want to do that; you can check out my thesis and report back to us here.

George

PS My ex Navy ex Scripps oceanographer agrees that because the coastline of Antarctica is way further north; than the southern perimeter of the Arctic ocean; and has warm surface tropical waters circulating and sloshing around down there, whereas the Arctic ocean is essentially landlocked, the seasonal sea ice growth around Antarctica is almost negligible, and most of that growth in thickness is from precipitation of water which evaporated from tropical and temperate oceans.

And that is why the CO2 cylcle amplitude over Antarctica is only about 1 ppm amplitude compared to 18 ove the Arctic; and of course it is six months out of phase.

Over most of the southern hemishpere there is almost no CO2 cycling like there is in the north, since most of the southern hemisphere is water; whose temperatures don’t change a lot seasonally , hence their CO2 content doesn’t change much either. In the northern hemisphere you have lots of land so lots of plant growth CO2 cycling, which happens pretty much at the same times as the Arctic ice melt,
So there’s no great mystery to that weird CO2 movie; it’s pretty obvious to me why it happens.

COLD…
Synonyms: apathetic, cold-blooded, dead, distant, emotionless, frigid, impersonal, indifferent, inhibited, inhospitable, joyless, passionless, standoffish, stony, unconcerned, undemonstrative, unenthusiastic, unfeeling, unimpassioned, unresponsive, unsympathetic

Antonyms: animated, ardent, eager, enthusiastic, excited, fervid, friendly, interested, sympathetic, warm, zealous

I wish people who draw straight lines on graphs, would append the Physics or other science, that argues that the function is supposed to be a straight line graph.
Absent that and all you have is wild guesswork.

I don’t see any hint of any staright linedness in that first RSS graph. Well I see the straight line graph is just for three years of data; which is weather I suppose, and not climate.
Speaking of climate; why would you average data from local climates; which seems to be what cycles like PDO and the like are about.

Averaging the local Antarctic climate with that from Saudi Artabia doesn’t seem to be instructional in any way.

George

(Please don’t “misunderestimate” the climatological significance of four years. According to the world’s preeminent climatologist Dr. James Hansen, four years is very significant…)

Here is a possible re-write:

“According to the world’s political strategists, four years is very significant.

Al Gore has only four years to save his thesis and his reputation, to say nothing of the political hay that he and his friends are making out of a theory that is rapidly melting. This is the stark assessment of leading climate expert ….. who last week warned that only urgent action by the new president to get mammoth destructive and expensive legislation in place could halt the devastating opinion shift among climate scientists that now threatens the mega-industry of Global Warming Fanatasism……
…..
In fact, it appears from the circumstances, that the next four years is the most significant time frame in the past 4 1/2 billion years in terms transferring wealth and power to fewer and fewer international hands.”

Nothing wrong with the original comment, but I thought this was one possible useful revision. :)

8. When they get a ‘cold’ they will not refer to it as such but instead use the term rhinovirus.

;-D

Those were good!

Back to the drawing board!