By Steve Goddard
July 4, 2010. Celebrating independence from traditional sources of polar ice news.
Last week we discussed the importance of wind in determining the summer minimum. In 2007, the winds blew consistently from the south and compacted the ice towards the North Pole. This led to a tremendous amount of news coverage claiming that the Arctic was heating and melting. In fact – the spring and summer of 2007 was slightly cooler than normal for about half of the melt period north of 80°N, according to DMI (below)
http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/plots/meanTarchive/meanT_2007.png
Around mid-June of this year, the winds in the Arctic set up in a similar pattern – spiraling inwards and pulling the ice away from the coast. This led to an early decline in ice extent inside the Arctic Basin.
Towards the end of June, this pattern reversed and now the winds are circulating counter clockwise – pushing the ice towards the coasts. As a result, there has been very little change in extent inside the Arctic Basin over the last week.
You can see the changes in extent in the modified NSIDC map below. Areas marked in red show extent loss since June 27, and green shows extent gain.
Most of the ice loss over the last week has been in the Hudson Bay, which nearly melted out a few days ago. As a result of the Hudson Bay being depleted of ice and the changes in wind, we have seen the JAXA and DMI graphs take a break in slope.
http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/icecover.uk.php
http://www.ijis.iarc.uaf.edu/seaice/extent/AMSRE_Sea_Ice_Extent.png
Since July 1, there has been almost no ice loss in the Arctic Basin, as seen in the modified NSIDC image below.
The video below shows the wind and ice patterns over the last two weeks, culminating in a strong counterclockwise flow.
The modified NSIDC image below show differences between 2010 and 2007. NSIDC still shows 2007 ahead of 2010, but the differences are mainly in the Hudson Bay and other areas that normally have little or no ice in September. In the Arctic interior 2010 has more ice (green.)
Last week I made the forecast below for the remainder of the summer.
The image below shows current JAXA in pink vs. my forecast. So far, the forecast is right on track.
Temperatures north of 80N have been running slightly below normal for several weeks. The summer melt season is nearly half over. There are less than 60 days remaining of possible melt in the high Arctic.
http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/meant80n.uk.php
Temperatures in Barrow have also been running below normal. It appears quite possible that the landfast ice breakup date at Point Barrow will beat the record for the latest ever (July 10.)
Meanwhile down south, as Anthony pointed out, Antarctic sea ice is at a record high for the date.
Global sea ice is close normal.
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/global.daily.ice.area.withtrend.jpg
So what do the experts tell us?
The North Pole has become an island for the first time in human history.
Leading ice expert says entire Arctic Ocean sea ice may be gone sometime between August 8th and September of this year. (H/T to Tom Moriarity.)
Hopefully Lewis Pugh is waxing up his kayak to take advantage of the clear paddling to the North Pole next month.
On this July 4th, we celebrate the freedom provided by the Internet to propagate the accurate information which governments apparently don’t want us to know.
Happy Fourth!
“The North Pole has become an island for the first time in human history.”
Or in-human history for that matter. When did we get land up there?
Washington:
“Conditions this year have been difficult for our growers across Washington, from Clark County to Okanogan,” Gregoire said. “Cold temperatures have harmed our tree fruit crops, while excessive rain made it difficult for bees to pollinate strawberries and other berry crops. A declaration will help our businesses absorb a difficult year and look forward.”
The request includes disaster declarations for Adams, Benton, Chelan, Clark, Columbia, Cowlitz, Douglas, Franklin, Grant, Grays Harbor, Island, King, Kitsap, Kittitas, Klickitat, Lewis, Mason, Okanogan, Pacific, Pierce, San Juan, Skagit, Skamania, Snohomish, Thurston, Wahkiakum, Walla Walla, Whatcom and Yakima counties.
Idaho:
As the dawn of last Saturday unfolded, the light fell upon mealy apples still clinging to trees whose leaves had turned blackish-brown, ready to fall without glorious fall colors.
Mother Earth had struck again, with record low temperatures reaching the low 20 degrees Fahrenheit, and down into the teens and lower in the subsequent nights.
Wayne Shull, a Washington State University agricultural research technician, said the Tukey Horticulture Orchard on Airport Road in Pullman saw temperature get down to 12 degrees Fahrenheit.
off topic (but vaguely arctic related):
I’ve been checking activity near the Katla volcano (under the myrdalsjokull icecap) every day for the last month, and it seems to me that activity under the western edge of the crater has been increasing a lot in the last week:
http://en.vedur.is/earthquakes-and-volcanism/earthquakes/myrdalsjokull/
Steve, Anthony and all at WUWT, HAPPY 4th!
You just keep posting up that great information, there are so many who greatly appreciate it. (hope you even got a chance to look at that de-sine waved data and graph, it’s a real eye opener, maybe you could include some in a future post (but careful how you word it!). It’s amazing what the same data looks like when you remove all unnecessary information from it, that’s proper science though some will disagree who tend to obfuscate.)
It would be more fun if you could provide use with an Anu-Phildot-Gates forecast alongside yours. Do you think they play along?
ditto
Happy 4th. Here is a more informed overview of Antarctic climate:
http://www.pewclimate.org/global-warming-basics/antarcticfactsheet
If these polar experts don’t stop digging there could be serious climatic changes. Don’t they know it’s millions of degrees down there?
robert says:
July 4, 2010 at 11:45 am
‘off topic (but vaguely arctic related):
I’ve been checking activity near the Katla volcano’
If that scares you, take a look at the Tjornes fracture zone – large or the Reykjanes ridge. Many more and much stronger quakes in those areas.
You know, by that video of 2007, did that reversal of circulation just move much of the ice into open sea where the extent or concentration was less than the XX percent cutoff? You know, same ice quantity but spread thin enough that it was then below the cutoff percentage and therefore ignored?
I guess I’m asking whether the actual data values you download and the drawn maps handle thinly-spread-out ice differently.
But but but …. I was told that you don’t talk about the Arctic ice because it is too inconvenient.
Nice presentation, Steve. Every time I read one of these presentations, however, I keep asking myself what the contribution of ice-breakers is to the “melt”. I’m a lazy kind of guy and keep hoping someone else will take an interest in the topic and dig out the data, which does not seem to be readily available. Using arctic sea-ice as a proxy for global warming is a bit disingenuous when the Northern Nations are busy keeping the sea lanes open. Just how successful are they?
Another nicely done update Steve. I think your freedom from traditionally sources of information is a great way to celebrate the 4th. Well done on your forecast for the trend line– it certainly looks good for the time being, and I think the actual sea ice may track your trend for a few days at least. I do however, feel the the actual extent will start to fall below your forecast later in the month, and then well below in August. Forecast SST’s and land temps in the Arctic region look to be running high for the rest of the summer:
http://iri.columbia.edu/forecast/sst/10/glbbld_JAS_jun2010.html
http://iridl.ldeo.columbia.edu/maproom/.Global/.Forecasts/.Temperature/
And these, more than a possible developing La Nina in the tropical Pacific, will help to dictate the pace of the melt, along with the seemingly persistent dipole “anomaly” in the Arctic, that looks to be very strong later this month and into August. (partially the reason why the SST’s in the Arctic area will be higher).
If the DA does persist:
http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2009/2008GL036706.shtml
Later in July and into August, strong meridional winds will blow from both the N. American side and the Siberian side to cause the melt.
Be that as it may, no matter whose forecast is closer, mine or yours, we are all still well below what the bulk of AGW models were predicting for summer minimums just a few years ago:
http://www.wunderground.com/hurricane/2009/stroeve.png
And so, afterall, what we are really talking about here on these time scales is weather, which is interesting of course, but nothing that happens this summer will indicate in any way that the Arctic sea ice is recovering on a longer term basis– as you so eloquently pointed out in one of your previous posts.
July 3 – snow overnight on the top of the Adam’s Plateau (melted before noon, but still). It’s the first time I’ve seen it since moving to the Shuswap Lake area of the south central BC interior. It’s been very cool this spring and early summer. Normally the strawberry season in this area is nearing it’s end and this year it hasn’t even hit peak yet. Everything is late. Just too cool for good growing.
Mike
“Slower” warming is the opposite of cooling. That article had the standard climate science weasel words.
Hansen forecast near symmetrical warming at both poles.
http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/docs/1988/1988_Hansen_etal.pdf
Plate 4
robert says:
July 4, 2010 at 11:45 am
Dont say that, Robert! I’m going on vacation shortly, and I plan to go by air.
Ash is not included in our plans.
R. Gates
The actual trend line is tracking slightly above mine. I am concerned that my forecast is too conservative, given the change in wind patterns.
Wade
Yea, people normally complain that I ignore Antarctica. The problem with Antarctica is that the ice just keeps growing. That is why some climate scientists mumble nonsense about ozone and “slower warming” and “collapsing ice shelves” and “collapsing WAIS.”
Since they have nothing intelligent to say about the consistent asymmetry between the two poles, they pull explanations and whacky theories out from where the sun never shines.
wayne
The video is of 2010.
R Gates,
During the winter of 2007-2008, most of the multi-year ice out into the Atlantic. Under any circumstances it would have required a few years for ice thickness to build back up.
So long-term model forecasts from prior to 2007 are based on the wrong boundary conditions.
wayne
I don’t modify any data. The PIPS videos are made by combining and animating maps taken off the PIPS web site.
R. Gates says:
July 4, 2010 at 12:28 pm
In this case, it works the other way. Nothing that happens up there in the summer detracts from the cooling globe.
Winter, and the persistence of that season, will decide.
The Swiss Cheese is not the Arctic Ice, but the whole bandwagon of AGW.
Robert E. Phelan says:
July 4, 2010 at 12:23 pm
Nice presentation, Steve. Every time I read one of these presentations, however, I keep asking myself what the contribution of ice-breakers is to the “melt”. I’m a lazy kind of guy and keep hoping someone else will take an interest in the topic and dig out the data, which does not seem to be readily available. Using arctic sea-ice as a proxy for global warming is a bit disingenuous when the Northern Nations are busy keeping the sea lanes open. Just how successful are they?
Last I read some of the ice breakers (U.S. I think) are actually iced into their harbors and will not even be able get out this season! (to some that’s just local weather since it includes no heat… ROTFL, it’s a holiday! 🙂 )
“On this July 4th, we celebrate the freedom provided by the Internet to propagate the accurate information which governments apparently don’t want us to know.”
AGW is the perfect topic in which to observe that the progressive agenda is intolerant to freedom, and the free, honest, rational exchange of ideas and opinions. God Bless America. May she always be free.
I think you got something pretty solid there Steve. Often we are proposing maybes or subtle correlations but this is more solid based on real phenomenon that we can monitor. Good stuff.
The forecast though depends on the forecast of conditions (and the winds in this specific case). And I also wonder if there is something similar for the Antarctic ice – it should be even more succeptible to wind directions/conditions.
Mr/Dr/Prof Goddard (apologies for not knowing your proper salutation)
This clearly will not do. You are not creating newsworthy copy.
How can the world keep going if all Prime Ministers are not sex-crazed incompetents who will murder a million people to earn a few million dollars in their retirement?
How can climate scientists carry on their profession if there’s not too much to worry about?
How can polar bears mate if a high percentage of them don’t die each summer due to lack of ice? I mean: you gotta keep them hungry and that means making sure the nearest woman is 1000 miles away!
And all this stuff about wind: this is only useful if it’s hurricanes, tornados and newsworthy disasters. All this wind causing a return to normality isn’t what the Press want to hear.
You gotta understand man: Wimbledon just had 13 days without rain. The end is nigh! It can only be global warming man…….
It’s just rained in Scotland. This is bad news man as it might mean we can’t report a disastrous drought soon. It’s also rained in NW England to break the drought there, which is bad news for the doomsday merchants, although I’m sure the farmers aren’t complaining……..
Can’t you just be like the rest of the nice folks who feed the Press what they want?
I mean, life would just be SO MUCH MORE COMFORTABLE FOR YOU IF YOU DID!!
I seems to me that if you add up the Arctic sea ice at over 8 sq. million km and the Antarctic at over 15 sq. million km you get a total of 23 sq. million km. The global sea ice chart says 20 sq.million km. Were is my math mistake?
I’ve never quite understood the fascination with arctic sea ice extent. Even if all the ice melts, so what? It doesn’t confirm the AGW hypothesis. The arctic ice cap has melted in the past, and it will melt again in the future — without the help of mankind (assuming we are still around.)
Five or 10 years down the road, we won’t be musing about arctic sea ice. We’ll be complaining about the onset of colder winters (and increasing energy costs) and wondering if we’re on the brink of another Dalton Minimum or Maunder Grand Minimum.
A warming earth is the least of our worries.
stevengoddard says:
July 4, 2010 at 12:45 pm
wayne
The video is of 2010.
OK, 2010, but the same question applies for any year, when ice is spread thin due to a reversal of the wind circulation pattern, is it still counted if then less than the 15% or 30% or whatever the cutoff percentage is? Have always wonder that and haven’t come across a reference to that.
One of your links to the Norway conference of the IPY mentions 50,000 scientists up in the arctic for 30 months! One of them, Barber of Manitoba U, who was a geographer about a year ago is now an arctic ice specialist. (Geographer is one of those ancient crafts like alchemy that keeps hanging in there. When I studied geography it was all about maps, the highest mountains and where coffee and cotton are grown and the like). He recounts zipping all over the Beaufort Sea in an ice breaker and all he could find was rotten ice up to 14 meters thick. D’ya think 50,000 scientists boring holes, charging around in icebreakers and burning heating, cooking aviation and av gas might have created a UHI effect. I’d watch out for this crowd. They have the tools, the funds and the agenda to turn a lot of ice loose for the Fram Strait ice chute
stevengoddard says:
July 4, 2010 at 12:38 pm
R. Gates
The actual trend line is tracking slightly above mine. I am concerned that my forecast is too conservative, given the change in wind patterns.
______
Then you may want to adjust your prediction for the final September extent upward I would guess. I’m quite comfortable with my long standing forecast of 4.5 million sq. km. for now. I don’t think we’ll see a big July “bump up”, but rather, a July-August “bump down”, based on Arctic SST’s and the Dipole Anomaly.
wayne
The ice in 2010 is the most concentrated on record. A little spreading is not going to cause much to drop below the 15% or 30% cutoffs.
R. Gates
I see no reason to raise my estimates yet. I will evaluate again in two weeks.
Mike says:
July 4, 2010 at 12:16 pm
Happy 4th. Here is a more informed overview of Antarctic climate:
Mike, I think not, not when it talks about accellerated sea level rise when in heats up. With highest summer temps in the mid minus teens (and colder in the center) it will take many hundreds of years of IPCC predicted warming before the antartic itself begins to melt (melting sea ice doesn’t raise sea levels). Furthurmore, this was only predicted using their computer “models” which seems only to be showing the result they clearly wanted show after they feed it data to to make it so not withstanding the fact that quite a few computer modellers question the accuracy and validity of them.
paul revere says:
July 4, 2010 at 1:04 pm
I seems to me that if you add up the Arctic sea ice at over 8 sq. million km and the Antarctic at over 15 sq. million km you get a total of 23 sq. million km. The global sea ice chart says 20 sq.million km. Were is my math mistake?
You’re summing extent and comparing it with total area, the correct areas are 6.60 and 13.38 Mm^2 = 19.98 Mm^2.
Bill Illis
I think that Antarctica is dominated by downslope (warming) winds away from the pole, which is what makes recent claims about winds causing the ice gain somewhat “puzzling.”
Bill Illis says:
July 4, 2010 at 12:58 pm
I think you got something pretty solid there Steve. Often we are proposing maybes or subtle correlations but this is more solid based on real phenomenon that we can monitor. Good stuff.
The forecast though depends on the forecast of conditions (and the winds in this specific case). And I also wonder if there is something similar for the Antarctic ice – it should be even more succeptible to wind directions/conditions.
**************************************************************************
Bill, Antarctic ice has a land anchor in the center, while the Arctic ice has the land anchor on the edges. Currents flow under the Arctic ice, causing it to twist, flow and break. The winds can the blow the loose ice around. In contrast, the ice in Antarctica has currents rubbing against the outer edges, breaking off pieces that can then float away. The central core is not affected. Ice continues to grow outward, even though the edges get broken off.
Mike said on July 4, 2010 at 12:16 pm:
“Current Understanding of Antarctic Climate Change
Fall 2007”
Well that just about says enough right there. Current as of 2007, guess a more recent update would be too inconvenient.
Love that logo:
I’m certain everyone from GE to Pachauri would agree with that, and that it is quite profitable too (for them at least).
Ah, internet memes. Serious Business? O RLY? 🙂
paul revere says: July 4, 2010 at 1:04 pm
“I seems to me that if you add up the Arctic sea ice at over 8 sq. million km and the Antarctic at over 15 sq. million km you get a total of 23 sq. million km. The global sea ice chart says 20 sq.million km. Were is my math mistake?”
You are confusing Extent with Area. Global Sea Ice Area chart;
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/global.daily.ice.area.withtrend.jpg
is a combination of Antarctic Sea Ice Area;
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/seaice.area.antarctic.png
and Arctic Sea Ice Area:
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/seaice.area.arctic.png
The frightening models we didn’t even dare to talk about before are now proving to be true,” Fortier told CanWest News Service
I am laughing so hard there are tears rolling down my cheeks! I have a “frightening model” of Godzilla on my bookshelf watching over me, endearing me to enjoy this beautiful sunny long weekend. Cheers!
stevengoddard says:
July 4, 2010 at 1:14 pm
wayne
The ice in 2010 is the most concentrated on record. A little spreading is not going to cause much to drop below the 15% or 30% cutoffs.
Yes, I know that Steve, but I was more wondering if the data numbers, the actual data you download from IARC-JAXA, has a certain percentage cutoff removed from the numbers downloaded? I know the displayed chart and drawn maps do, but does the actual data also ignore that certain class of diffuse ice?
That class of ice is usually around the very edges but if the wind pattern reverses, a large amount of ice can then move out to the clear sea and drop below that cutoff percentage, see my question, is it in the numbers, not the displayed graphics?
Is that what “Please note that only the sea-ice pixels in the browse image are counted for estimating the values of sea-ice extent, and thus sea ice outside the image is not taken into account in this data.” is saying? It seems that to me. So the data downloaded is not the REAL data of TOTAL sea ice.
wayne
The JAXA and NSIDC definition of extent is is a grid cell with 15% of the area covered with ice. DMI uses 30%. So yes, all extent data already has this factored in.
Inuit have several words for winds at the Arctic:
Rhys Jaggar
Here an great expert predicting the demise of skiing in Scotland, months before their coldest and snowiest winter on record.
http://news.scotsman.com/latestnews/Skiing—is-.4962678.jp
strange that Steven keeps mentioning barrow, but still has not corrected his false claim at the start of his first barrow post.
he wrote on the 26th of June:
In my last post, we discussed how there has been no visible change in the landfast ice near Barrow, AK. during the last week.
but we can see on the webcam pictures over those days, that the landfast ice on the beach of barrow is disintegrating and basically vanishes on the day of the post (actually one day earlier even.)
http://ak.aoos.org/op/webcam_archive.php?region=AK&name=Barrow&db=ABCam&yr=2010&mo=07&dy=04
Steven did even link a photo from the webcam, obviously in the entirely false believe, that the fog in the picture was hiding the ice.
the error is easy to check: look at the picture for 25th June, and 27th. and check the pictures before the 25th, to see the non-VISIBLE CHANGE.
REPLY: Strange also, that you never mention or retract your “surge” of failures with the now extinct blog “seed of doubt Iraq”. All that survives of that period of FAIL is your anonymous handle “SOD”. Losing your campaign against Iraq, you’ve now shifted to climate, and your logic and honor is no better. – Anthony
The North Pole has become an island for the first time in human history.
There is a high likelihood that this statement from September 2008 is history revision.
wayne says:
July 4, 2010 at 12:55 pm
Last I read some of the ice breakers (U.S. I think) are actually iced into their harbors and will not even be able get out this season!
And if that comes to pass, you can bet your stars & stripes the MSM won’t mention one word of it.
robert says:
July 4, 2010 at 11:45 am
‘off topic (but vaguely arctic related):
I’ve been checking activity near the Katla volcano’
_______________________________________________
Billy Liar says:
July 4, 2010 at 12:19 pm
If that scares you, take a look at the Tjornes fracture zone – large or the Reykjanes ridge. Many more and much stronger quakes in those areas.
_______________________________________________
Speaking of the Arctic and volcanoes, there is a nearby one in Russia that is on “yellow alert” Map of Russian volcanoes
EBEKO VOLCANO, Paramushir Island, Northern Kurile: 50o41’N,
156o01’E Elevation 1,156 m
AVIATION COLOR CODE IS YELLOW
PREVIOUS AVIATION COLOR CODE IS GREEN
Activity of the volcano increases. Ebeko volcano is not
monitored with seismic instruments. KVERT has satellite
monitoring and occasional visual messages about this
volcano. The danger of sudden ash explosions as high as 3 km
(9,840 ft.) ASL as well as ash falls at Severo-Kurilsk,
exists.
According to the data by local observers at Severo-Kurilsk,
activity on the volcano increases. Ash explosions at the
volcano began to occur from 03:53 UTC on July 02. A height
of ash column was about 1.8 km ASL. Ash plume extends to the
south-south-east – to Severo-Kurilsk. KVERT continues to
monitor the volcano.
““The ice pack looks like Swiss cheese,” agreed Mark Serreze”
No Mark, it’s your arguments which look like Swiss cheese.
Here is the current understanding of Arctic sea ice – the above post and:
2007 Arctic ice retreat due mostly to wind, currents
http://www.nasa.gov/vision/earth/lookingatearth/quikscat-20071001.html
NASA says at least 45% melting since 1976 is most probably due to aerosols (soot)
http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/warming_aerosols_prt.htm
Arctic ice thicker than expected In 2009
http://epic.awi.de/Publications/Haa2010b.pdf
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/ArcticReflector/arctic_reflector2.php
“So in addition to changing sea ice, we can kind of guess that something must be happening in the atmosphere over the Arctic, too.” Clouds are bright, too, and an increase in clouds could cancel out the impact of melting snow and ice on polar albedo.”
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/ArcticReflector/arctic_reflector4.php
“Although sea ice and snow cover had noticeably declined in the Arctic from 2000 to 2004, there had been no detectable change in the albedo measured at the top of the atmosphere: the proportion of light the Arctic reflected hadn’t changed. In other words, the ice albedo feedback that most climate models predict will ultimately amplify global warming apparently hadn’t yet kicked in.”
“According to the MODIS observations, cloud fraction had increased at a rate of 0.65 percent per year between 2000 and 2004. If the trend continues, it will amount to a relative increase of about 6.5 percent per decade. At least during this short time period, says Kato, increased cloudiness in the Arctic appears to have offset the expected decline in albedo from melting sea ice and snow.”
I hope I’ve cheered you up.
Marlene Anderson says:
July 4, 2010 at 12:33 pm
July 3 – snow overnight on the top of the Adam’s Plateau (melted before noon, but still). It’s the first time I’ve seen it since moving to the Shuswap Lake area of the south central BC interior. It’s been very cool this spring and early summer. Normally the strawberry season in this area is nearing it’s end and this year it hasn’t even hit peak yet. Everything is late. Just too cool for good growing.
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
If La Nina does really start in earnest then you may also have a cold winter in B.C.
Here’s what a typical La Nina weather pattern looks like:
http://www.crh.noaa.gov/Image/gid/LaNina%282%29.png
So how do you know if a La Nina is happening?
Animation of equator:
http://www7320.nrlssc.navy.mil/GLBhycom1-12/navo/equpacsst_nowcast_anim30d.gif
Look at the equator in the animation starting at Ecuador, South America and heading toward Indonesia. Check the colors in the scale below the animation. Colors to the left in the scale are cooler, La Nina. Colors to the right of the scale are warmer, El Nino. It looks like La Nina.
p.s., I have a good friend from Kitimat.
Steve,
Every time I look at the sea ice on The Cryosphere Today to Compare Daily Sea Ice I am struck by how solid the ice is. Most of the Arctic sea is covered by 80% to 100% ice compared to the 60% to 80% for the 1980 default map. A time when we were coming out of the colder temperatures of the 1970’s. Here is the earliest map available, 1979, and there was still more open water in the arctic sea that there is today. Yes I know the extent of the ice was larger but it was more like “swiss cheese” than compared to now as another commenter put it.
stevengoddard says:
July 4, 2010 at 12:38 pm
R. Gates
The actual trend line is tracking slightly above mine. I am concerned that my forecast is too conservative, given the change in wind patterns.
You say 5.5. And I think you said Anthony said 5.8. You both are probably closer than anyone I know of—including PIOMAS. Maybe it will be 5.65. 😉
stevengoddard says:
July 4, 2010 at 2:31 pm
wayne
The JAXA and NSIDC definition of extent is is a grid cell with 15% of the area covered with ice. DMI uses 30%. So yes, all extent data already has this factored in.
That’s kind of what I thought. Now may I ask for a very particular question since you have been deep in this topic? And area is best the term, not extent, since extent implies some kind of boundary.
Do you know of any publically downloadable dataset that gives you the total sea ice area without some xx% cutoff involved. Seems to form a specified cutoff limit on the data, the entity that holds the original data must know the total sea ice to begin with. Have you ever found such a raw dataset? The answer might by simply ‘no’ or ‘none’ for I have not found one but have been looking.
stevengoddard says: ” .. expert predicting the demise of skiing in Scotland …. ”
http://www.worldsnowboardguide.com/news/story/20100621CairnGorm.cfm
” More than 60 people took to the slopes at CairnGorm Mountain on the summer solstice on Monday 21st June 2010 to enjoy some midsummer skiing on the snow still lying there in the Ptarmigan bowl. … Skiers had travelled from as far away as the Isle of Mull in order to be able to say that they had skied at midsummer at CairnGorm … This was the 147th day of skiing at CairnGorm since the season started on 28 November 2009 and brings to 145,007 the total number of skier days at the resort in what by any account has been an extraordinary season. Last year 65,000 skiers visited the resort and only three years ago they had their worst season ever with only 38,000 skiers. “
Gary Pearse says:
July 4, 2010 at 1:08 pm
“One of your links to the Norway conference of the IPY mentions 50,000 scientists up in the arctic for 30 months! […] D’ya think 50,000 scientists […] might have created a UHI effect.”
Depending on how you define the Arctic, that population density is the same as 750,000-7,000,000 people over the entire Earth. I don’t think that you have anything to worry about.
“The ice pack looks like Swiss cheese,” agreed Mark Serreze, a senior research scientist at the National Snow and Ice Data Centre in Boulder, Colorado.
I guess he didn’t bother to actually look at the data.
This map shows July 3, 2010 sea ice to be 90 to 100%. The only other years with a decent percentage of ice (80 – 100%) are 1991 and 2002
The flat out lies are getting a bit difficult to swallow.
Goofed the HTML tags again
The map is http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/NEWIMAGES/arctic.seaice.color.000.png
REPLY: No need for tags, waste of time mostly just put in the URL like this http://www.google.com and it will auto convert to a link – Anthony
Here’s some light humour. This stuff is so funny:
http://climatesanity.wordpress.com/2010/07/03/entire-arctic-ocean-melted-as-early-as-august-8th-this-year/
Thank you Kirk! It’s nothing new my friends.
http://www.ngu.no/en-gb/Aktuelt/2008/Less-ice-in-the-Arctic-Ocean-6000-7000-years-ago/
http://noconsensus.wordpress.com/2009/06/16/historic-variation-in-arctic-ice-tony-b/
http://co2science.org/articles/V12/N32/C2.php
http://docs.lib.noaa.gov/rescue/mwr/050/mwr-050-11-0589a.pdf
http://www.john-daly.com/polar/arctic.htm
http://www.navsource.org/archives/08/08578.htm
http://www.icue.com/portal/site/iCue/flatview/?cuecard=41751
http://www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/RS_Arctic.htm
http://www.usgs.gov/newsroom/article.asp?ID=2372
http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2008/03/changing-artic_monthly_wx_review.png
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2008/03/16/you-ask-i-provide-november-2nd-1922-arctic-ocean-getting-warm-seals-vanish-and-icebergs-melt/
Global warming AND cooling FEARS are nothing new. Take an historic perspective:
Global Cooling Fears Of The Past – Ice Age – iceage
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,944914,00.html
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,945635,00.html
http://newsbusters.org/node/11640
(150 of global warming and cooling fears)
http://www.almanac.com/sites/new.almanac.com/files/1895_cvr1_0.png
(1895-2008 warming and cooling fears)
http://anotherviewonclimate.wordpress.com/2010/01/15/time-announces-approaching-ice-age/
(numerous new ice-age articles from 1970s)
wayne says:
July 4, 2010 at 3:27 pm
Do you know of any publically downloadable dataset that gives you the total sea ice area without some xx% cutoff involved. Seems to form a specified cutoff limit on the data, the entity that holds the original data must know the total sea ice to begin with. Have you ever found such a raw dataset? The answer might by simply ‘no’ or ‘none’ for I have not found one but have been looking.
Try here:
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/SEAICE/arctic.historical.seaice.doc.txt
These graphs on NH ice, COI, IJIS have 2010 close to 2007. don’t seem to match the pic’s at cyrosphere
http://igloo.atmos.uiuc.edu/cgi-bin/test/print.sh?fm=07&fd=02&fy=2007&sm=07&sd=02&sy=2010
or am i missing something?
Here’s a nice 4th of July shot from the North Pole http://www.arctic.noaa.gov/latest/noaa2.jpg
The monthly Antarctic Sea Ice Extent Anomaly is the highest on record for the month of June:
http://nsidc.org/data/seaice_index/images/s_plot_hires.png
and Antarctic Sea Ice Area continues to trend well above average:
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/seaice.recent.antarctic.png
In a prior thread Julienne noted that this might be because the Antarctic Oscillation (AAO) has been in a strong positive state since mid-May;
http://www.cpc.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/daily_ao_index/aao/aao_index.html
Here is some background on the AAO:
http://fp.arizona.edu/kkh/climate/PPT-PDFs-09/indices/AAOReport.pdf
http://www.ecmwf.int/newsevents/meetings/annual_seminar/2006/Presentations/Wallace.pdf
http://www.earthgauge.net/wp-content/fact_sheets/CF_Antarctica.pdf
This version of the AOI chart above includes cross sections of the Polar Vortex;
http://www.cpc.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/daily_ao_index/hgt.aao.shtml
and here is some background on the Polar Vortex:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polar_vortex
Here’s are several good visualizations of the AAO and its interrelation with the Antarctic Vortex;
http://www.cpc.noaa.gov/products/intraseasonal/z200anim.shtml
http://www.cpc.noaa.gov/products/intraseasonal/z500_sh_anim.shtml
http://www.cfm.brown.edu/people/sean/Vortex/
(Note that the last link is an all flash site, so you will need to click on the links on the left especially “Physical Overview” to see the animations.)
Based on this chart by rbateman showing how well Antarctic and Arctic Sea Ice Anomalies match up;
http://www.robertb.darkhorizons.org/seaice.anomaly.Ant_arctic.jpg”
there certainly seems to be significant symmetry. Furthermore, in this animation of global pressure anomalies;
http://www.cpc.noaa.gov/products/intraseasonal/z200anim.shtml
note how the Arctic starts out as almost average pressure, and then as the pressure drops (becomes darker blue) over the Antarctic, the pressure increases (becomes dark red) over the Arctic. My potentially erroneous understanding of this effect, is that the Antarctic Vortex becomes very powerful (like a giant ice cold hurricane), creating very low pressure over Antarctica and increasing the pressure around the rest of the globe. If you watch the animation again, between June 10th and 20th it looks like a high pressure (dark red) pocket of more temperate air over the Atlantic gets pushed into Arctic. So when the Antarctic Vortex is strong/large, the pressure drops within it and increases around it (a positive Antarctic Oscillation) and the increased pressure forces warmer air towards the other pole.
On a prior thread Stephen Wilde put forth the global sea ice balancing mechanism as this:
“The Arctic is sea surrounded by land. The Antarctic is land surrounded by sea.
When the mid latitude jets move poleward more solar shortwave energy gets into the oceans and in due course more energy from warming seas eventually penetrates into the Arctic ocean to reduce ice cover. That cannot happen in the Antarctic so the continental Antarctic just gets more isolated by the faster tighter run of jets around it and it cools whilst the Arctic warms.
When the mid latitude jets move equatorward the seas receive less solar shortwave and so cool down and in due course the Arctic cools because it receives less energy from the waters entering the Arctic ocean. However the Antarctic warms because the slacker jets around the poles allow more north/south air flows and more warm air gets into the Antarctic continent.
Thus the apparent short term stability of global ice cover. Arctic and Antarctic ice cover always moves in opposite directions but of course longer term variability does nevertheless affect global ice quantities for other reasons.”
Can anyone else elaborate on the existence and function of Global Sea Ice balancing mechanisms that help to explain why the Global Sea Ice Area Anomaly;
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/global.daily.ice.area.withtrend.jpg
remains reasonably stable?
Steve,Hansen and colleagues’ model in 1988 did not forecast “near symmetrical warming at both poles”.
It forecast warming at low latitudes,particularly over land and sea-ice areas:
“Regions where an unambiguous warming appears earliest are low -latitude oceans,China and interior areas of Asia and ocean areas near Antarctica and the North Pole.”
No mention of near-symmetricality.
It also has to be considered that a warmer circum-Antarctic ocean can support more sea-ice.
Robert your spot on Katla volcano has had 72 earthquake’s since 17th of may if it blows its top forget about global warming
Sod,
I have discussed extensively in several articles that the NARL site is NE of Barrow, the ice is still there, and that a stretch of ice broke off immediately adjacent to Barrow on June 25.
Maybe you should try reading before firing off accusations?
Gail,
I’m going to write up an article pointing out how important high concentration ice is towards limiting the summer minimum.
Nick
Hansen’s prediction of symmetrical warming is right there in plate 4. The black steps on the lower right are due to the high altitude at the South Pole.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IDjb9SIPAMU]
Some interesting lines from The Declaration of Independence
Steve G,
That brought to mind this.
Above I pointed Nutation as a possible important driving factor of sea ice variation.
Interesting to see that some work as been done in this issue but I doubt in made into any IPCC report. See it here. Pretty interesting to me.
http://ansatte.hials.no/hy/climate/IcesJMS1999V56.pdf
“stevengoddard says:
July 4, 2010 at 6:45 pm”
Things certainly are shaping up again, and rapidly.
Steve, I have posted this before in other articles, but it seems appropriate here again.
Form Eisenhower’s Farewell Address, Dartmouth College, 1953:
Akin to, and largely responsible for the sweeping changes in our industrial-military posture, has been the technological revolution during recent decades.
In this revolution, research has become central; it also becomes more formalized, complex, and costly. A steadily increasing share is conducted for, by, or at the direction of, the Federal government.
Today, the solitary inventor, tinkering in his shop, has been overshadowed by task forces of scientists in laboratories and testing fields. In the same fashion, the free university, historically the fountainhead of free ideas and scientific discovery, has experienced a revolution in the conduct of research. Partly because of the huge costs involved, a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity. For every old blackboard there are now hundreds of new electronic computers.
The prospect of domination of the nation’s scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present
• and is gravely to be regarded.
Yet, in holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite.
Ike saw this all coming. How do we unwind the corruption of good science by the government/academic cabal? Can we ever get the evil djinn back in the bottle?
Spartacus:
I thought the earth’s “nutation” refered to the warm-earthers’ brain anomalies. Now you have enlightened me that it is a bona fide scientific term.
But…”I’m Spartacus!”
Steve Goddard said in update 12:-
Last week we discussed the importance of wind in determining the summer minimum. In 2007, the winds blew consistently from the south and compacted the ice towards the North Pole.
How much was compacted compared to being melted in situe by the southerly warm winds? Your sentence seems to indicate it is just the direction of the wind that caused the reduced extent on the Siberian side.
Andy
Marlene Anderson:
July 4, 2010 at 12:33 pm
Maybe this video will help you understand a little more about weather in Canada. El Nino made it warm in Vancouver (and in the western 1/2 of Canada) for the Olympics. And if La Nina develops it will be a cold winter there; the opposite of last year.
Steve,that’s not ‘symmetrical’, and most importantly,nowhere in the text does Hansen use those words. You must consider the text as well as figures…and the fact that model inputs are more refined two decades later.
stevengoddard says:
The summer melt season is nearly half over. There are less than 60 days remaining of possible melt in the high Arctic.
Sure, it might seem like the Summer is half over, but it’s only psychological, Steven. Probably related to the World Cup.
Summer started June 21 in the N. hemisphere. Day 172 of the year:
http://www.soils.wisc.edu/cgi-bin/asig/doyCal.rb
You posted on July 4: day 185 of the year.
13 days is not “The summer melt season is nearly half over”. Unless you stretch the meaning of “nearly”…
Autumn starts September 23 this year, btw. Day 266. 81 days from July 4.
There are less than 60 days remaining of possible melt in the high Arctic.
The last day of summer melt vary slightly summer to summer – in 2007, it was September 24 – day 267.
That would be 82 more days of “possible melt”.
Did this occur in the “high Arctic” ?
Here’s September 20:
http://iup.physik.uni-bremen.de:8084/amsredata/asi_daygrid_swath/l1a/n6250/2007/sep/asi-n6250-20070920-v5_nic.png
And now September 24:
http://iup.physik.uni-bremen.de:8084/amsredata/asi_daygrid_swath/l1a/n6250/2007/sep/asi-n6250-20070924-v5_nic.png
Yup, definite melt above the 80° N latitude. The sun warmed ocean water causes bottom melt, and together with sunlit top melt, the summer-thinned ice disappeared up to September 24. In the high Arctic. Oh yeah, and the wind was blowing, somewhere…
I wouldn’t want you to miss the dramatic end of the 2010 melt season.
Mark your calendar.
My prediction is still “less sea ice extent minimum than in 2009, IARC-JAXA measured”.
Are you still predicting
same as 2003 and 20065.5 million sq km ? Or are you going to make your “real” prediction on September 15 ?stevengoddard says:
July 4, 2010 at 6:15 pm
Gail,
I’m going to write up an article pointing out how important high concentration is towards limiting the summer minimum.
This is how I misread that line at first 🙂
I can imagine Steven trying to concentrate on limiting the summer minimum:
http://access.nuim.ie/files/images/hand_head.jpg
Good luck with that.
Works with goats.
Anu,
The Arctic summer is nearly half over.
http://climateinsiders.files.wordpress.com/2010/07/meant_2010-4.png
Meteorological summer starts on June 1 and ends in August.
I’m sorry that you are confused about my prediction. Most people here don’t have difficulty understanding simple graphs.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RweRX-U3zv8]
You seem to be really nervous that I will be correct.
Nick
Hansen predicted North Pole at +2.0-2.5 and South Pole at +2.0-2.5 in “2010s”. That is symmetrical, and a far cry from South Pole cooling.
He was wrong.
Lets Put the Melt in Perspective with NUMBERS:
Numerically, Sea Ice Extent: http://www.ijis.iarc.uaf.edu/seaice/extent/plot.csv
Comparing _____2007___ to___ 2010
Ahead June 30____ no_______ 569,532 km2
Ahead July 4 _____ no_______ 209,688
Monthly Melt Average:
June 1-30 ___ -65,150/day __ – 75,496 square km
Jun30-Jul31__ -98,610/day _____ ?
7/31-minimum = 6,409/day _____ ? (55 days in 2007)
Daily Loss in Extent:
June 30-7/1 _ – 169,061_____ – 56,093
July 1-2 ___ – 162,031_____ – 82,969
July 2-3 ___ – 201,875_____ – 47,656
July 3-4 ___ – 130,937 _____ – 91,563
July 4-5 ___ – 89,844 _______ ? ?
July 5-6 ___ – 93,125
July 6-7 ___ – 81,650
July 7-8 ___ – 74,844
… 2010 got way ahead from Melting off Hudson Bay early, but then 2007 did, so it over halved the margin.
2010 is still the record.
So this is Steve’s ‘ running a little ahead of my projections ” – – You forecasted ABOVE NORMAL Steve
— A RECORD LOW is a ‘Little bit ahead’ ?.
But the Real News is in the yellow area in the first Ice Concentration Chart
— the SPECTACULAR “swing” of the densest Ice from looking like a long line stetching Westwards to one almost North-South. A little clearer here: http://iup.physik.uni-bremen.de:8084/amsr/amsre.html
If it continues this swing, the thickest ice will have Pushed itself AND THE MEDIUM ICE IN THE MIDDLE BASIN — both — out into the North Atlantic. Leaving little but Thin Ice.
On the Other Hand, it could wipe out the New Siberian Islands Polynnya that caused most of the Melt in 2007.
And in reference to that: look at the Sea Surfacce temps in 2010: 2007 reached over 4 degrees C in just 1 area in (late) August ,but much of all 3 of 2010’s Polynnya are Already over 4 !!
http://iup.physik.uni-bremen.de:8084/amsr/amsre.html << ARCTIC SeaSurfaceTemp click lower left & click: Anomaly, upper left
Compare 2007 Sea Surface temp anomaly http://www.arctic.noaa.gov/reportcard/figures/Fig5c2_2008.jpg
PS: here is the Barrow Radar, conveniently marking the Narl site, which has the only sea ice on the map (ugh) !
Remember though, a bright reflection is a Pressure Ridge & this drowns out the returns from flat ice, nearby. http://ak.aoos.org/data/ice/radar/BRWICE/staging/radar/SIRwebimg.png
Gail Combs says:
July 4, 2010 at 4:12 pm
“The ice pack looks like Swiss cheese,” agreed Mark Serreze, a senior research scientist at the National Snow and Ice Data Centre in Boulder, Colorado.
I guess he didn’t bother to actually look at the data.
—
Where is the problem? Of course he didn’t mean an Emmentaler:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/de/3/38/Emmentaler_Premier_Cru.jpg
he surely meant a Gruyere:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/de/6/6c/Le_Gruyere_Premier_Cru.jpg
😉
Phil. says:
July 4, 2010 at 5:06 pm
wayne says:
July 4, 2010 at 3:27 pm
Do you know of any publically downloadable dataset that gives you the total sea ice area without some xx% cutoff involved. Seems to form a specified cutoff limit on the data, the entity that holds the original data must know the total sea ice to begin with. Have you ever found such a raw dataset? The answer might by simply ‘no’ or ‘none’ for I have not found one but have been looking.
Try here:
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/SEAICE/arctic.historical.seaice.doc.txt
Thanks for the ref Phil., got that up and running. That 850+ MB file is really detailed & noticed the caveats. However, I was really looking for something more up-to-date, within months, since that file only spans Jan. 1870 to Oct. 2008.
I am impressed with Steve Goddard.
He is facing an elephant in the room called al Gore. With al Gore’s power point slides, poley bear pics, maps of Florida under water, it isn’t easy for a real scientist. Oprah is the next elephant in the room with her GREEN talk show coming up. She can bring in the weapons of Dr Phil and various shamans and teachers of alternative religions to fortify the Green spiritual movement.
Don’t worry Steve. They won’t fly their massive carbon consuming aircraft to Antartica to tape shows. They can use arctic pics as backgrounds in their studios.
If the June temp. in the Pacific sector of the Arctic is a good indication,
http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/cgi-bin/data/timeseries/timeseries.pl?ntype=1&var=Air+Temperature&level=2000&lat1=90&lat2=68&lon1=90&lon2=225&iseas=1&mon1=5&mon2=5&iarea=1&typeout=2&Submit=Create+Timeseries
We’re headed for a September minimum almost certainly below 2009, likely below 2008, and possibly below 2007. This seems to have some merit, notice how the very cold June in 1996 led to very high survival of the ice pack and warm Junes of 1990, 1993, and 2005 led to heavy melting. And the warmest June of all was in 2007…and we all know what happened that year. This year we had the fourth warmest June since 1948, behind 2007, 1953, and 2005. So I say the implications are clear. Warm June = widespread melt ponds and ice albedo feedback get going early.
The average melt for July over 2003-2009 rounded to nearest thousand was 92000 KM2 p/d. For August this was 53000 KM2. (No full month for September, so not calculated)
The average melt for the 2 months July+August was 66,000 KM2.
Using just the averages and adding an adjustment for for September, I anticipate the minimum extent for 2010 to be be 4.34 million KM2. Even though 2006 and 2007 were unusual years, my bet is on just the simple averages, not anticipating another unusual year.
Steve, according to your forecasted melt, would 2010 sea ice beat 2002 and 2005?
Anu
For your information; in this part of the Northern Hemisphere, (England), June 21 is usually referred to as “Midsummer Day.”
A belated but sincere Independence Day greeting to our American cousins. Keep on fighting the good fight.
[Reply] Solstice falls on the 21st. Midsummers day is the 24th. RT – Mod
Curious Yellow says:
July 5, 2010 at 6:37 am
The average melt for July over 2003-2009 rounded to nearest thousand was 92000 KM2 p/d. For August this was 53000 KM2. (No full month for September, so not calculated)
The average melt for the 2 months July+August was 66,000 KM2.
Using just the averages and adding an adjustment for for September, I anticipate the minimum extent for 2010 to be be 4.34 million KM2. Even though 2006 and 2007 were unusual years, my bet is on just the simple averages, not anticipating another unusual year
________________
Very logical, and probably a decent estimate. I’m currently sticking with my 4.5 million sq. km, that I’ve been putting out since March, but will make a final forecast later in July when I see how the Arctic Dipole Anomaly is behaving.
Henry chance says:
July 5, 2010 at 6:23 am
I concur with what you said about Steve.
I would caution anyone who is wont to compare Steve with James Hansen. Hansen is motivated by greed and power, not scientific inquiry. The Climategate emails have proven this; thus Hansen has disqualified himself completely from any scientific debate, whether about ice, or climate, or the physics of pogo sticks. Steve is looking seriously at the science in an honest and inquisitive way. As a scientist myself, I appreciate his willingness to accept arguments and question his own arguments’ validation.
All of us here who recognize that there is a probability that we are entering a catastrophic climate of cooling know that this would be a hardship causing many to starve and perish. None of us look forward to other than a “normal” climate around the globe and will not delight in seeing an ice age dawn.
Especially since the Gores, Hansens, Manns, Jones, and the warm-earth cabal have made the world unprepared and unexpectant of a cold climate.
The Piltdown Man hoax was by-and-large a victimless crime. The AGW criminals have cultivated billions of potential victims.
This quote is apropos:
Robin: “Boy! That was our closest call ever! I have to admit that I was pretty scared!”
Batman: “I wasn’t scared in the least.”
Robin: “Not at all?”
Batman: “Haven’t you noticed how we always escape the vicious ensnarements of our enemies?”
Robin: “Yeah, because we’re smarter than they are!”
Batman: “I like to think it’s because our hearts are pure.”
bubbagyro
Thanks for the kind words. I honestly believe that Hansen believes everything he says. He just got confused by the 1998 El Nino, and hasn’t been able to recover his thought process since.
@Steve Goddard
Yes, but they are rotten winds
Speaking of icebreakers, this $10 million NASA, “ICESCAPE,” study is noteworthy:
http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2010/jun/HQ_10-135_NASA_ICEBREAKER_Voyage_Begins_June_15.html
In regard to Robert E. Phelan’s question (July 4, 2010 at 12:23 pm), perhaps we could write and request they also study the impact their presence in the Arctic has on ice extent. It is a question that deserves further investigation.
Elizabeth
Those icebreakers are a classic case of the Heisenberg principle. The process of measurement alters what is being measured.
Steve:
So Hansen is a dupe not a stooge?
bubbagyro
Put yourself in Hansen’s place.
He forecast a big rise in temperatures in the 1990s. For about six months it happened (before it plummeted back down.) During those six months he convinced himself he is a climate god, and has been oblivious to the fact that temperature trends have fallen far below even his most conservative forecasts.
He plays coach and referee, and always makes sure he keeps his results newsworthy. Like “0.001 degrees above the old record.”
The DMI plots since 1979 show the summer temperatures always just above freezing. Is this indicative of anything? Melting ice will always keep the temperature at this point.
Icebreakers are not an instance of the Heisenberg uncertainty principle. This being said, it is true that the ice extent operator does not commute with the Hamiltonian, so if it is measured twice with unitary time evolution in between there could (in principle) be some effect but it would be miniscule given the scales of the system…
“Here is a more informed overview of Antarctic climate”
I wouldn’t call anything out of Pew to be “more informed”. Pew doesn’t take any pains to disguise that they are a “progressive” institution and their output can be relied upon to promote that “angle”.
Nightvid Cole
Your message was quite unintelligible, but if you look at satellite images of the Arctic it is very easy to see the cracks in the ice, because they are dark and therefore absorb more sunlight.
Each time a ship breaks up the ice, it contributes significantly to melt in that region.
NSIDC 2010 will cross over 2007 tomorrow or Wednesday. Make a note!
bubbagyro says: “…I would caution anyone who is wont to compare Steve with James Hansen. Hansen is motivated by greed and power, not scientific inquiry…”
I disagree. I don’t doubt his sincerity at all. I wouldn’t rule out a Messiah Complex.
stevengoddard says: “…if you look at satellite images of the Arctic it is very easy to see the cracks in the ice, because they are dark and therefore absorb more sunlight….”
Yes, obviously they are dark when viewed from 90° above. What do they look like viewed from a 23.5° angle?
jorgekafkazar
Barrow is at 71N. The sun is currently 42 degrees above the horizon.
One of the NOAA polar webcams caught a shot of a rainbow with one of their instrument domes looking like the pot of gold at the end.
http://www.arctic.noaa.gov/latest/noaa1.jpg
A pot of gold? Aha, so that is why those greedy scientists are so interested in the Arctic sea ice!
Elizabeth says:
July 5, 2010 at 9:48 am
Speaking of icebreakers, this $10 million NASA, “ICESCAPE,” study is noteworthy:
http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2010/jun/HQ_10-135_NASA_ICEBREAKER_Voyage_Begins_June_15.html
In regard to Robert E. Phelan’s question (July 4, 2010 at 12:23 pm), perhaps we could write and request they also study the impact their presence in the Arctic has on ice extent. It is a question that deserves further investigation.
____________________________________________________________
Yes I have often wonder about the effects of ice breakers on the sea ice extent. Crushed ice melts a heck of a lot faster than a quart container size lump in my ice chest. (1/2 day vs 2 days)
REPLY: Arrgh. Next we’ll have the chemtrail people looking at sat photos of icebreaker paths. 😉 – A
Günther Kirschbaum says:
July 5, 2010 at 1:02 pm
A pot of gold? Aha, so that is why those greedy scientists are so interested in the Arctic sea ice!
********
VILLABOLO:
Ah, yes. Brilliant! Those greedy Arctic specialists whom, by predicting the meltdown of the Arctic Ice Cap, are putting themselves out of a job. Most brilliant!
jorgekafkazar says:
July 5, 2010 at 12:26 pm
stevengoddard says: “…if you look at satellite images of the Arctic it is very easy to see the cracks in the ice, because they are dark and therefore absorb more sunlight….”
Yes, obviously they are dark when viewed from 90° above. What do they look like viewed from a 23.5° angle?
***********************************************************************
VILLABOLO:
Ice reflects light you know.
Curious Yellow says:
July 5, 2010 at 6:37 am
The average melt for July over 2003-2009 rounded to nearest thousand was 92000 KM2 p/d. For August this was 53000 KM2. (No full month for September, so not calculated)
The average melt for the 2 months July+August was 66,000 KM2.
Using just the averages and adding an adjustment for for September, I anticipate the minimum extent for 2010 to be be 4.34 million KM2. Even though 2006 and 2007 were unusual years, my bet is on just the simple averages, not anticipating another unusual year.”
You really need to take a closer look at how previous season melts have gone to spot the flaw in this argument. The bottom line is that where there has been a high early season ice loss, the ice loss from July onwards is always far lower. This year we have seen a very large early season ice loss so I predict a much slower rate of loss for the rest of the year.
It wouldn’t surprise me if the average daily ice loss for the remainder of the season is well below the 2003-2009 average and the minimum extent in the 5-5.3 million sq km range.
My prediction for 2010 Arctic sea ice extent minimum;
p (probability of exceedance) = 0.5 (50%), minimum area = 3.9E+6 km^2, sigma (standard deviation) = 0.51E+6, date of minimum = 9/19
The CDF looks like this;
0.0032%,0.13%,2.3%,16%,50%,84%,97.7%,99.87%,99.9968% p (probability of exceedance)
5.9E+6,5.4E+6,4.9E+6,4.4E+6,3.9E+6,3.4E+6,2.9E+6,2.4E+6,1.9E+6 minimum area
9/13,9/14,9/15,9/17,9/19,9/21,9/22,9/24,9/26 date of minimum
EFS_Junior
I think there is 100% probability that the minimum will be >= 0.
Now how about producing an actual prediction?
From: Gail Combs on July 5, 2010 at 1:20 pm
Almost makes one think surface area has something to do with how much thermal energy a given mass can absorb over a certain period of time, eh? 😉
The link I provided for the north pole webcam photo of the rainbow in my comment above has updated to the current photo. This link to the archived photo should work
http://www.arctic.noaa.gov/npole/2010/images/noaa1-2010-0705-144824.jpg
Joe Bastardi is forecasting below normal cold for the first 1/4 of next year. Also that Arctic ice melt next summer (2011) will not surpass 2009. He does think 2010 will be between 2007 and 2009.
video about 1/4 of next year:
http://www.accuweather.com/video/103968440001/major-cooling-on-the-way-worldwide.asp?channel=vbbastaj
video of 2010 being between 2007 and 2009:
http://www.accuweather.com/video/89017432001/colder-pdo-thickening-ice.asp?channel=vbbastaj
He has said he thinks it’s because of warm Atlantic waters that this year will drop below 2009, and I remember Steven Goddard noted that somewhere on WUWT.
I wonder if he has read this thread and would like to update his 2010 prediction?
stevengoddard says:
July 5, 2010 at 9:55 am
Elizabeth
“Those icebreakers are a classic case of the Heisenberg principle. The process of measurement alters what is being measured.”
*************************************************************************
VILLABOLO:
Steven, the Heisenberg principle refers to quantum physics concerning subatomic particles.
If there were a parallel to it in the Macro world why would we be measuring Sea Ice Extent or for that matter anything else?
brace for impact:
http://www.ijis.iarc.uaf.edu/en/home/seaice_extent.htm
Villabolo, you need to get up to speed on Physics. It’s been demonstrated that the Uncertainty Principle is not limited to subatomic particles.
Smokey says:
July 5, 2010 at 5:32 pm
Villabolo, you need to get up to speed on Physics. It’s been demonstrated that the Uncertainty Principle is not limited to subatomic particles.
VILLABOLO:
Assuming that applies to the “icebreaker situation” then that leaves my second statement unanswered. Why should we measure anything, including the Sea Ice anything?
By the way, even though Physics is not my forte, I have a sneaking suspicion that if the Uncertainty Principle applies to the Macroscopic world it is under certain limitations that would make the “ice breaker” situation very trivial. If one disagrees, please go back to the first sentence of my response.
villabolo says:
“…Physics is not my forte…”
So, you were just winging it?? Do you do that often?
What is your specialty? P.E.? Spanish? Writing blog comments? Sociology? Some kind of “Studies”?☺
The Heisenberg Principle is often used in a less literal form to mean that you perturb the system by measuring it.
stevengoddard,
Are you certain about that?
°
☺
stevengoddard says:
July 5, 2010 at 3:31 pm
EFS_Junior
I think there is 100% probability that the minimum will be >= 0.
Now how about producing an actual prediction?
______________________________________________
I did.
3.9E+6 km^2 (sigma = 0.51E+6).
Since you don’t appear to understand probability of exceedance and CDF, it goed something like this;
There is a 50% chance (even money) that the Arctic sea ice extent minimum will be either above 3.9E+6 km^2 or below 3.9E+6 km^2.
There is a 68% chance (+/- one sigma) that the Arctic sea ice minimum will be between 4.4E+6 km^2 and 3.4E6+6 km^2.
So, for you, if you need a single number, than as stated above, that single number, for Arctic sea ice extent minimum, would be;
3.9E+6 km^2.
BTW, based on JAXA statistics (2003-2010 inclusive)..
Yes, I remember being taught that as a small child by the nuclear physicist who lived in our house. ;^)
Smokey says:
July 5, 2010 at 7:05 pm
stevengoddard,
Are you certain about that?
°
☺
Maybe!
The Heisenberg principle is sometimes misused as if it were an equivalent to the Observer Effect, which it isn’t.
David says:
July 5, 2010 at 3:08 pm
Curious Yellow says:
July 5, 2010 at 6:37 am
“You really need to take a closer look at how previous season melts have gone to spot the flaw in this argument. The bottom line is that where there has been a high early season ice loss, the ice loss from July onwards is always far lower. This year we have seen a very large early season ice loss so I predict a much slower rate of loss for the rest of the year.
It wouldn’t surprise me if the average daily ice loss for the remainder of the season is well below the 2003-2009 average and the minimum extent in the 5-5.3 million sq km range.”
———————
Yes, I did have a closer look, pondering the question, what constitutes an early melt season. So first I looked at 1 May to 30 June and two things stand out; 2003 and 2004 with a low melt of 2.8 and 2.35 million KM2 respectively. The other outstanding is 2010 with a melt of 4.24 million KM2. The years in between 2005-2009 had melts between 3.03 and 3.33 million KM2.
Okay, so this is not the earliest part, so I looked at start of melt season to 30 April.
Here again 2003 and 2004 and 2008 had the highest early melt of 1.97, 1.87 and 1.64 respectively. Strangely though, some people refer to 2006 as a reference for 2010 as to what may happen. Yet 2006 had an average start to 30 April melt of 1.33 and an average 1 May to 30 June of 3.03 million KM2. Indeed, 2006 had the lowest melt of 3.5 million KM2 between 1 July and end of melt. However, the association of an early melt followed by a slowing late melt does not seem to be correct. I think that years prior to 2007 had much more multi-year ice than 2010 which is now affecting the melt pattern. Also, the late melt start of 2010 needs some qualification; if compared with the melt start date of 2009, March 5, 2010 started 25 days later. However, on March 5 2010 the extent was 14.31 million KM2 and on March 31 14.4 million KM2, a difference of 90,000 KM2 or a days melt. Perhaps less, because this late March ice must have been very thin indeed.
stevengoddard says:
July 4, 2010 at 11:45 pm
Anu,
The Arctic summer is nearly half over.
http://climateinsiders.files.wordpress.com/2010/07/meant_2010-4.png
Meteorological summer starts on June 1 and ends in August.
I guess you missed the part of my post which showed that in 2007, the Arctic melt continued throughout the actual summer, into autumn.
And in 2009, Arctic melt continued until September 13 – again, following actual summer. Arctic sea ice doesn’t really care what meteorologists call “summer”, and melt continues until about the autumn equinox.
http://iup.physik.uni-bremen.de:8084/amsr/ice_ext_n.png
See how the ice always continues to melt into September, and in recent years, even later into September ?
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=42456&src=eoa-iotd
I’m sorry that you are confused about my prediction. Most people here don’t have difficulty understanding simple graphs.
If your second prediction is your final one, that’s fine, but your comment leads me to believe you will be fine tuning your “prediction” all summer:
You seem to be really nervous that I will be correct.
I’m just hoping you keep predicting a summer minimum above that of 2009, so I can give you grief this autumn. If you keep changing your “predictions” to be closer to mine every few weeks, it won’t be fun if we are both correct in late September.
stevengoddard said
July 5, 2010 at 12:02 pm
NSIDC 2010 will cross over 2007 tomorrow or Wednesday. Make a note!
You’ve jinxed it again like you did in March. Jaxa just took a 100k+ drop so I think NSIDC’s 5 day average will keep it parallel for a short time yet. 2007 has some big days from the 10th onwards so I’d estimate this weekend.
Andy
Anu
Sorry. You are misrepresenting what I said, and I have no respect for people who do that.
Anu:
Sept 2007 had a Lower minimum later in the month:
from JAXA extent: http://www.ijis.iarc.uaf.edu/seaice/extent/plot.csv
09,13,2007,4323750
09,24,2007,4254531
Extent Update: 2010 widening its lead on 2007 again:
Comparing _____2007___ to___ 2010
Ahead July 4 _____ no_______ 222,813 km2
Daily Change:
July 4-5 ___ – 89,844 _____-102, 969
July 5-6 ___ – 93,125 _______ ? ?
Biggest Gains relative to Average, were in the Laptev Sea/New Siberian Isand area, where the Great Polynnya of 2007 expanded from.
And the Wrangel Island area East of the Bering Strait Open water, which has expanded North rather than NW & thus is lagging 2007 there.
>> Central Basin continued its INCREASE (!) in Ice, presumably because of the high Winds this year.
If my prediction is right, the minimum should occur on 8th August (!)
Looks like my forecast may have been too conservative.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rJVhVD83plE]
stevengoddard says:
July 5, 2010 at 10:40 pm
Anu
Sorry. You are misrepresenting what I said, and I have no respect for people who do that.
I blockquoted your entire comment.
If you can’t write what you mean, and have it remain online for people to read days and months later, you shouldn’t be blogging.
Dr. Hansen has no respect for people like you, but he still writes clearly and explains his past statements.
Anu,
What is it that you are trying to accomplish? You aren’t saying anything even remotely interesting to the vast majority of readers. The rest of us are discussing science here.
Charles Wilson says:
July 5, 2010 at 10:43 pm
Anu:
Sept 2007 had a Lower minimum later in the month:
from JAXA extent: http://www.ijis.iarc.uaf.edu/seaice/extent/plot.csv
09,13,2007,4323750
09,24,2007,4254531
Yes, I mentioned the last day of 2007 melt in my comment :
Anu says: July 4, 2010 at 11:28 pm
My comment Anu says: July 5, 2010 at 9:38 pm mentions the last day of 2009 summer melt. The last day bounces around a bit in mid to late September.
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=42456&src=eoa-iotd
The trend is for the melt season to get longer and longer.
p.s.
Good luck with your prediction on the Arctic summer sea ice minimum – unlike everybody else commenting on WUWT, you put together a reasoned prediction and submitted it for the world to see:
http://www.arcus.org/search/seaiceoutlook/2010/june (click Pan-Arctic tab)
http://www.arcus.org/files/search/sea-ice-outlook/2010/06/pdf/pan-arctic/wilsonjuneoutlook.pdf
I’m just predicting less than 2009 (I don’t think 2008 and 2009 are part of a new “up cycle” as some people say, just annual variability on the downward trend) – I think your prediction of 1 million sq km is too low, but I respect you for making a prediction and not changing it every few weeks.
Anu,
I get it. You have realized that my forecast of 5.5 is likely correct, so you are trying to make up some BS claiming I keep changing it.
Two problems with that. 1. It is an incredibly lame idea. 2. The only forecast I have made is 5.5.
stevengoddard says:
July 6, 2010 at 10:49 am
Anu,
I get it. You have realized that my forecast of 5.5 is likely correct, so you are trying to make up some BS claiming I keep changing it.
It’s not like the Internet forgets what you say, Steve (even if Anthony starting deleting old threads, which as far as I know he never does, Google cache will still have it).
I’ll let the reader decide if your “Conclusion” was a “prediction” or not:
(and yes, there are no guarantees in predicting the future, fine)
It wasn’t a bad prediction for you, since you seem to feel 2007 was just ‘unusual weather’, and 2008 and 2009 are “recoveries” from that unusual year. Expecting a return to the 2003/2006 levels (close to 6 million sq. km.) would be logical for you, given your dismissal of global warming.
My prediction has always been “less than 2009” for the opposite reason:
http://nsidc.org/images/arcticseaicenews/20091005_Figure3.png
I think the downward trend caused by global warming is continuing, and the years scatter above and below the trendline – the probability is very high that 2010 will be lower than 2009. If I am wrong in late September, I will gracefully admit it, and not try to weasel out with some excuse like “but the wind didn’t do what I expected from August 23 to 29!”
Two problems with that. 1. It is an incredibly lame idea. 2. The only forecast I have made is 5.5.
If you stick with your revised 5.5 million sq km prediction, that will be fine with me. I’ll let the first “Conclusion” prediction slide. You are still predicting a summer minimum higher than in 2009, and I am predicting one lower than in 2009. You are putting some faith in the PIPS 2.0 ice thickness model and your understanding of unpredictable winds compacting low concentration sea ice, and I can respect that. Disagree, but respect.
Perhaps I misunderstood your comment of I see no reason to raise my estimates yet. I will evaluate again in two weeks.
If you stick with your prediction of 5.5 million sq km for the whole summer, then I can look forward to you being embarrassed in late September, which will make it more fun to keep tabs on the summer Arctic melt.
IARC-JAXA:
09/13/2009 (lowest day of summer melt) was 5,249,844 sq. km.
There you go again – “updating my predictions”.
I hope you are not going to weasel out of your 5.5 million sq km prediction by summers end.
But I suppose if you return to your original 6 million sq km prediction in the next few days, no harm, no foul.
Just don’t jump on my bus and start “predicting” less than 2009.
Anu
Your rhetoric becomes more desperate and more lame every day.Why do you bother?
stevengoddard says:
July 6, 2010 at 10:27 am
Anu,
What is it that you are trying to accomplish? You aren’t saying anything even remotely interesting to the vast majority of readers. The rest of us are discussing science here.
—————————
I have come to this site quite recently in order to get an insight into climate change d[~snip~ Try again without using the inappropriate D-word. ~dbs, mod.]
Casper says:
July 6, 2010 at 1:47 am
If my prediction is right, the minimum should occur on 8th August (!)
—————————
Just as well you used the illusionary ‘if’, supported with the wishful ‘should’.
AndyW says:
July 5, 2010 at 10:08 pm
stevengoddard said
July 5, 2010 at 12:02 pm
NSIDC 2010 will cross over 2007 tomorrow or Wednesday. Make a note!
You’ve jinxed it again like you did in March. Jaxa just took a 100k+ drop so I think NSIDC’s 5 day average will keep it parallel for a short time yet. 2007 has some big days from the 10th onwards so I’d estimate this weekend.
————————-
What crosses a line today may cross back tomorrow. Is this really sensible, seems like gloating to me. Series of high melt days are not predictable; they are at the command of the weather, currents and temperature.
Here’s a different perspective looking at 2009.
To melt the first million KM2;
Took 2009 48 days and 2010 26
The second million
2009 23 days – 2010 13 days
The third million
2009 16 days – 2010 15 days
The fourth million
2009 20 days – 2010 15 days
The fifth million
2009 14 days – 2010 15 days
The sixth million
2009 12 days – 2010 12 days
Between 31 March and 6 July 2010 melted 5.96 million KM2
Over the same period 2009 melted 4.85 million KM2
Difference 1.09 million KM2
The 2009 melt started 5 March, 26 days earlier than 2010 and during these days the melt was 447,000 at an average of 17,000 KM2/day
This melt season 2010 has melted 5.96 million KM2 @ 61456 KM2/day (97 days)
2009 melted 5.29 million KM2 @ 43037 KM2/day (123 days)
As I said lines that are crossed, can be re-crossed. Seems to me that it is still a question as to whether the minimum will be between 2007 and 2008, with still an outside possibility of ending below 2007. 4.33 still seems reasonable.
Curious Yellow says:
July 7, 2010 at 5:00 am
stevengoddard says:
July 6, 2010 at 10:27 am
Anu,
What is it that you are trying to accomplish? You aren’t saying anything even remotely interesting to the vast majority of readers. The rest of us are discussing science here.
—————————
I have come to this site quite recently in order to get an insight into climate change d[~snip~ Try again without using the inappropriate D-word. ~dbs, mod.]
————————–
Censored? What’s good for the geese is not good for the gander?
I get the message. Still curious though. Last post.
[Reply: The rules are in the Policy on the mast head. “Censored” refers to government action. Like GISS/RealClimate’s policy. ~dbs]