by Steve Goddard
In April, I pointed out that PIOMAS forecasts for the summer didn’t make much sense.
The computer model is predicting that 3+ year old ice (which is probably in excess of 10 feet thick) is going to melt by early August. That seems rather far fetched.
It is now early August. Let us see how they did. They expected most of the ice to be gone in the Beaufort Sea by now, and much of the remaining ice to be very thin.
The most recent NSIDC newsletter included this map, showing that the thick multi-year ice is still present in the Beaufort Sea. This is in stark contrast to the PIOMAS prediction of thin ice in that region.
The image below shows in red where PIOMAS mispredicted the ice edge vs. NSIDC August 6 map. Green indicates areas where they overestimated the amount of ice.
This discrepancy will get worse through the remainder of the month. PIOMAS extent/thickness predictions are way off the mark, and their volume calculations are much too low.
As I forecast last week, DMI now shows 2010 ice extent highest since 2006.
Ice thickness remains between 2009 and 2006, just as PIPS data indicated it should back in May.
JAXA shows that divergence from 2007 continues steadily, and is now in excess of 700,000 km².
The JAXA area graph show that ice melt has dropped off dramatically.
NSIDC maps show little ice loss so far this month. There has been nearly as much gain (green) as loss (red.)
NCEP forecasts generally below normal temperatures for the next two weeks in the Arctic.
DMI shows that summer is just about done north of 80N, and has been the coldest on record (for that dataset starting in 1958). Average temperatures have fallen below freezing there.
Conclusion : There will probably be minimal ice loss during August. The minimum is likely to be the highest since 2006, and possibly higher than 2005. So far, my forecast of 5.5 million km² is looking very conservative. Ice extent is higher than I predicted for early August.
Meanwhile, down south. Antarctica continues gaining ice at a record pace. NSIDC showed it the highest on record for July.
Bremen shows it likely headed for a new record.
In Greenland, we are bombarded with stories about “losing Manhattan sized chunks of ice.” The BBC made it one of their lead stories yesterday. Yet the ice isn’t lost and the Greenland ice sheet has been having an exceptionally cold summer, as seen in the NOAA anomaly animation below.
Perhaps “some scientists” might want to actually check the Greenland temperature data before talking to the press? Under any circumstances, how would “abnormally warm” temperatures cause a 700 foot thick block of ice to fracture? The concept doesn’t make much sense from from an engineering point of view. A few months of (imagined) warm temperatures might cause a little surface melt, but the thermal conductivity of ice is much too low to alter the temperature and material strength of ice more than a few feet below the surface. I had this same discussion with Ted Scambos at NSIDC a few years ago about Antarctic Peninsula ice shelves.
The whole story is a complete ruse.
We are bombarded with misinformation about the state of polar ice. People’s brains have been programmed to believe that the last few ppm of CO2 have made a huge difference in the behaviour of the ice, and that belief makes their thought process irrational. People will find what they expect to find. It is human nature.
[snip – comparisons to WWII misinfo is not the tone we want to start this thread with ~mod]
10 day average is falling now. I would estimate 25 more days of melt at 40,000 sq km average. So 5.45m sq km left mid Sept.
I made some general comments on the CNN web-site ice-island story. The comment was liked by as many people as commented on my comment BUT all of the comments were questioning my sanity, authority, perspective etc. All demanded proof but none suppled anything of substance to rebut the lack of proof of CO2 contributing to “catastrophic” global warming, inaccuracy of climate models, connivance of Mann, the IPCC et al in proposing an agenda that ignored facts and included innuendo.
There is still a long row to hoe, but I am so glad that the upcoming and continuing cool spell will not be able to be co-opted by the climate change crowd as proof of the effect of their proposed taxes and restrictions. Timing IS everything.
Great article! The money quote:
[Maybe that should be: “75% irrational.”☺]
Steve and Anthony thank you for the reality update. It seems that this is the only place to get real science news. Probably a bit strong but certainly more accurate information than comes from corrupted U.S. government agencies.
Yet another nice and interesting posting, Steve.
Although I’m far from convinced that sea ice extent near the poles has more than a tangential and peripheral bearing on Global Warming. Let alone Anthropogenic Global Warming. Or that the sum of human happiness would be greatly different if there was twice as much ice in the Arctic, or half as much ice.
Still interesting though.
I’m still hoping our old chum R. Gates will stop by and let us know whether the “3xManhattan” ice chunk is a good thing or a bad thing. Bad in the sense that it is the biggest (worst??) for 60 years and signifies Climate Doom. (Although I suppose R. Gates might think this was 70% a “good thing” and 30% a “bad thing”. Or perhaps that should be the other way round?
Or altenatively a “good thing” because it was certainly colder in 1962 (according to all the climate models, anyway) and the chunk that broke off then was more than twice as big.
So, perhaps it is a bad good thing or a good bad thing. I must admit it is a little confusing. And I’m 70% sure it is all due to CO2. Or not.
It’s frustrating. I just have to keep hoping he’ll level with us. After all, as the Arctic Sea Ice’s answer to Dr. Sheldon Cooper, he’s bound to know.
Other points about this years melt are the number of days when the 10 day ave has exceeding 80k sq km/day
Year 80k or more
2003 11
2004 12
2005 18
2006 16
2007 37
2008 25
2009 24
2010 17
Something new is when this fast melt occurred this year. The fast melt has been in May and June , none since July 5th . In the other years the fast melt has been in July and August.
This implies that the melt this year has been thin 1 year ice. The multi-year ice is harder to shift and won’t melt now.
Considering what is coming this winter, next years minimum might get back to the 6.25/6.5m sq km range.
I suggest actually reading the NSIDC report from which the map came. Does the critique here still hold up?
looking good been watching sea ice everyday for years. whats happening warmers???????????
Regarding the Greenland glacier calving: What’s not being mentioned is the fact that if less ice were being ‘manufactured,’ then there would be less ice calving.
The glacier is merely shedding excess ice as glaciers will.
If there were LESS ice, then it would be losing its mass by melting, rather than by calving.
doug carmichael says:
August 8, 2010 at 8:20 am
I suggest actually reading WUWT.com. Then you’d know they actually cover the NSIDC newsletters and don’t just quote/data mine.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/08/05/analysis-of-nsidc-august-4-news/
Does your critique here still hold up?
-Scott
Steve, I noticed on the sea ice page that one of the data sets is showing a slight uptick in ice extent…presumably due to spreading of the ice:
http://arctic-roos.org/observations/satellite-data/sea-ice/observation_images/ssmi1_ice_area.png
Since the 30% extent is high relative to the last few years and the ice is also thicker than 2008/09, is this part of the reason you think we may top 5.5 M sq. km?
Also, any updates/comments with respect to the NSIDC data discrepancy versus the other data sets?
-Scott
The AO is slightly positive and the NAO remains negative as it has since a year ago and is no doubt correlated with the sea ice volume buildup last winter that PIOMAS some how cannot find.
http://ioc3.unesco.org/oopc/state_of_the_ocean/atm/nao.php
Note how fast the sea ice volume was estimated to have increased from 1955 to 1969 when the NAO remained strongly negative.
http://psc.apl.washington.edu/zhang/IDAO/retro.html#Satellite_ice
Even though the last few days have been of slow melt, I still think we will end up just a tad below last year. But, that’s more than I first originally thought.
In the event we do finish higher than last year, then it starts looking contradictory for the NOAA to be claiming the hottest year on record, yet sea ice area keeps growing.
Doug .. .it doesn’t matter what “commentary” NSIDC put up. The “critique” is based purely on data.
I would say it is specticular, as a skeptic, even back to early July I thought it is hard to have the 2010 minimum NH ice area higher than 2009, but now, with an arctic temperature dropping below zero almost 1 whole month before “normal” and the outlook that support a negetive abnormalty for more than a week, the odd is now far better than 50/50 that 2010 minimum NH sea ice area will be higher than that of 2009.
I haven’t looked at how the ice broke, but I’d imagine it has to do with the glacier extending too far out over the water and thus being subjected to an extremely high bending moment where water meets land.
As the glacier protrudes out into the sea, the part sticking out over the water is not in deep enough – there’s not enough buoyant force acting to it. Eventually the bending moment is too much and the glacier fractures and sinks into the water.
Isn’t this called calving? Or is calving more a shearing force type of failure?
What happened to my last comment?! It melted away!
[Both of your comments found in the spam filter & posted now. ~dbs]
In fact, it will be interesting to see when the 2010 minimum NH sea ice area take place, given the arctic temperature already dropping below 0 in early August.
We are living in interesting time.
The glacier breaking off was probably due to an excessive bending moment acting on the part protruding over the water. It sounds to me it was some kilometers into the water and not submerged as much as it should have been. And so the chunk broke off.
“We are bombarded with misinformation about the state of polar ice. People’s brains have been programmed to believe that the last few ppm of CO2 have made a huge difference in the behaviour of the ice, and that belief makes their thought process irrational. People will find what they expect to find. It is human nature.”
___________________________
It’s a Dog eat Dog, Man eat Dog world out there! It’s produce or perish everywhere you go! And if you work for the MSM, you better publish what the Boss wants to see and hear or you, your wife and kids, and your cat, dog, and parakeet are toast. Imagine trying to make it in today’s world without all the perks, and health insurance, and social security, and union protection, and stocks and bonds and Roth IRA’s. Can’t be done! It just can’t be done! Human Nature has always been about Man eat Dog, or anything else he can get his hands on. Such is life. Civilization, law and order, Hav’erd MBA’s, whatever, it’s all just a lot of smoke and mirrors. It’s a Dog eat Dog, Man eat Dog world out there! Always has been! The AGW stuff? It’s just another excuse to bite somebody’s leg off or steal from their savings account.
Do note that the ice fracture mechanism for antarctic ice shelves is quite well known and is due to melt ponds on the surface reaching the bottom of the ice shelf causing it to fracture and break up. That is why larsen A and B both split into tiny pieces. Another thing to consider that many times ice losses in polar regions are not so well correlated with air temperature but rather with sea temperature. Warming oceans are the major cause of ice losses in much of Greenland therefore wouldn’t it be more accurate to make that comparison? I do think that whoever said it was “abnormally warm” was wrong but that by showing it was cold doesn’t address the real mechanisms at play. Once again Goddard it seems that you ignore the real issues at play to make a swipe at the glaciological community.
899’s comment above seems correct. Further, it might have been used as proof of global cooling in the early 70’s.
Well, they say that there is nothing global warming cannot do. Or AGW alarmists.
That appears to be about right. They have made watching the ice melt exciting.
Them and our St. God!
As usual, I’m confused.
So we have this really great graph of ice thickness, over the entire Arctic? If so, what was the purpose of the Catlin expedition? If we know the thickness and extent, we should know the volume, an issue of much contention on previous threads.
Will someone pound some information into my thick head?