As many readers know, the predictions for record low sea ice minimums in 2008 were not met, and 2008 ended up about 9% higher than in 2007 at the end of the season. See the report here.
Now in looking at AMSR-E satellite data, the red line on the graph below, one can see that the recovery is at a significantly faster rate than in recent years.
Click for larger image
I’m not one to read much into this, as to do so would be to make the same mistake as was done earlier this year when the NSIDC melt trend led one researcher there to conclude that we’d see an “ice free north pole”.
This graph from the National Snow and Ice Data Center, I published with annotations on July 14th 2008, which was oft cited back in early June with the phrase “if this trend continues…”.
Image from July 14th, 2008. Click for larger image – annotation added
So we will watch and wait to see if the current recovery continues at the same trend as shown by AMSR-E satellite data today, or gets softened. It is rather interesting to see this increased ice extent increase in September when both UAH and GISS reported warmer global temperature anomalies, including the northern hemisphere, for September.
h/t to Magnus
If all the water gets iced at the north pole – what will people drink?
If this dangerous sea ice trend continues it’s conceivable that we will run out of the liquid stuff!
Stop COAL now, no matter what it costs – it can’t be worse than dying of thirst in an ice field.
Studies of Vostok and Greenland ice cores show that the Dow Jones lags the AMSR-E graphs by about three months.
A recent study by NSIDC predicts that the credit markets may be “cash free this winter” for the “first time in recorded history.”
Why is the period 1979-2000 average used for comparison?
1979 is when satellite measurements started.
What is so magical about this period’s endpoint?
Nothing I can see. (Except it ends on a 2-year La Nina note which no doubt bumps up the average.)
The max winter extent seems more dependent on what happens in December onwards than October so judging how it will be from the rate currently is probably not very wise.
Regards
Andy
with such a quick recovery the average extent in 2008 should remain not only above 2007, but also above 2006 and 2005.
Probably even arctic ice albedo of 2008 may remain above the years.
The perfect storm: stock market crash (was defined as such on the financial channel today), and a brutal winter (not yet predicted by the models).
My 401k is now a 200.5k, heading for a 100.25k. Interesting times indeed.
Anthony,
Here is the text of my email to Richard Black, the BBC Environmental Correspondent, a copy also being sent to Dr. North, who is an avid supporter of your work. http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/
“Dear Mr Black,
Reference your email of 17th September, Anthony Watts has posted an update on Arctic ice. I would especially draw your attention to Anthony’s warning:
“I’m not one to read much into this, as to do so would be to make the same mistake as was done earlier this year when the NSIDC melt trend led one researcher there to conclude that we’d see an “ice free north pole”. http://wattsupwiththat.com/2008/10/09/sea-ice-extent-recovering-quickly/
However, you will see that, inexplicably, the sea ice appears to be recovering at a rapid pace. There are many opinions in the comments section as to why this is happening and perhaps you will have something to say about this in your BBC slot.
Yours truly,
Perry Debell
—– Original Message —–
From: Richard Black-Internet
To: PERRY DEBELL
Sent: Wednesday, September 17, 2008 10:35 AM
Subject: RE: Arctic Sea Ice Melt Season Officially Over; ice up over 9% from last year « Watts Up With That?
Dear Mr Debrell,
Thanks for your email. It’s always nice to see when people have access to what they know to be the unvarnished truth, with no room for doubt.
Best wishes,
RB
——————————————————————————–
From: PERRY DEBELL [mailto:cd014j7257@blueyonder.co.uk]
Sent: 17 September 2008 09:13
To: Richard Black-Internet
Cc: EUREFERENDUM@aol.com
Subject: Arctic Sea Ice Melt Season Officially Over; ice up over 9% from last year « Watts Up With That?
Dear Mr Black,
From Anthony Watt’s website, wherein he explains the unvarnished truth about global temperatures.
“Though it appears NSIDC is attempting to downplay this in their web page announcement today, one can safely say that despite irrational predictions seen earlier this *year, we didn’t reach an “ice free north pole” nor a new record low for sea ice extent.”
http://wattsupwiththat.wordpress.com/2008/09/16/artic-sea-ice-melt-season-officially-over-up-over-9-from-last-year/
* I wonder who was doing that? Was it Richard Black, Environment Correspondent?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6610125.stm
BTW, I read your latest contribution this morning. Spin as much as you like Mr Black, you and your contacts are fighting a losing rearguard action against the reality that our planet’s temperatures are ultimately controlled by the warmth from the sun. It occurs to me that you personally should now be publically reconsidering your position on AGW, don’t you?
Yours truly,”
Anthony,
Here is the text of my email to Richard Black, the BBC Environmental Correspondent, a copy also being sent to Dr. North, who is an avid supporter of your work. http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/
“Dear Mr Black,
Reference your email of 17th September, Anthony Watts has posted an update on Arctic ice. I would especially draw your attention to Anthony’s warning:
“I’m not one to read much into this, as to do so would be to make the same mistake as was done earlier this year when the NSIDC melt trend led one researcher there to conclude that we’d see an “ice free north pole”. http://wattsupwiththat.com/2008/10/09/sea-ice-extent-recovering-quickly/
However, you will see that, inexplicably, the sea ice appears to be recovering at a rapid pace. There are many opinions in the comments section as to why this is happening and perhaps you will have something to say about this in your BBC slot.
Yours truly,
Perry Debell
—– Original Message —–
From: Richard Black-Internet
To: PERRY DEBELL
Sent: Wednesday, September 17, 2008 10:35 AM
Subject: RE: Arctic Sea Ice Melt Season Officially Over; ice up over 9% from last year « Watts Up With That?
Dear Mr Debrell,
Thanks for your email. It’s always nice to see when people have access to what they know to be the unvarnished truth, with no room for doubt.
Best wishes,
RB
——————————————————————————–
From: PERRY Sent: 17 September 2008 09:13
To: Richard Black-Internet
Cc: EUREFERENDUM@aol.com
Subject: Arctic Sea Ice Melt Season Officially Over; ice up over 9% from last year « Watts Up With That?
Dear Mr Black,
From Anthony Watt’s website, wherein he explains the unvarnished truth about global temperatures.
“Though it appears NSIDC is attempting to downplay this in their web page announcement today, one can safely say that despite irrational predictions seen earlier this *year, we didn’t reach an “ice free north pole” nor a new record low for sea ice extent.”
http://wattsupwiththat.wordpress.com/2008/09/16/artic-sea-ice-melt-season-officially-over-up-over-9-from-last-year/
* I wonder who was doing that? Was it Richard Black, Environment Correspondent?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6610125.stm
BTW, I read your latest contribution this morning. Spin as much as you like Mr Black, you and your contacts are fighting a losing rearguard action against the reality that our planet’s temperatures are ultimately controlled by the warmth from the sun. It occurs to me that you personally should now be publicly reconsidering your position on AGW, don’t you?
Yours truly,”
The BBC will probably start showing repeated re-runs of
The Day after Tomorrow if this winter is bad. There is already a BBC Ethical Man to show us how we should live our lives.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/newsnight/ethical_man/default.stm
Britain is at the end of the gas pipeline from Russia, if this winter is particularly cold there might not be enough getting here after the rest of Europe has taken what it needs. I think they’ll have to shut down the gas powered electricity generators to ensure supply to the voters. Might be interesting.
Is this possibly an artifact of the reported mismeasurement of ice extent earlier in the year when water-covered ice was interpreted as open water. This would re-freeze very quickly, giving the rebound seen here.
Indeed lower global temperatures helped saving the arctic ice this year since the sea ice in arctic correlate well with global temperatures.
Just look at the extreme La Nina 1998 and how the ice just melted away in no time that year.
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/current.area.jpg
Hmm, on a second thought, the El Nino in “the warmest year in a millenium”, 1998, isn’t even visible in the arctic sea ice area record. The change in tempearature upwards 1998 was a lot bigger than the drop this year.
Obviosuly the correlation global temperature and arctic ice area isn’t that tight that you can explain changes in ice area from just global temperatures.
@Perry Debell
You are getting a response from Mr Black? I had occasion to complain to him a little while ago about balance – as below:
“I recently complained about bias in the BBC news item which reported the
recent OFCOM finding on the programme ‘The Great Global Warming
Swindle’. The gist of my complaint was that this programme was
substantially cleared of the many accusations against it, but the BBC
presented the finding as if the programme had not been cleared, by
headlining issues where OFCOM had found against the programme, but which
they had indicated were minor.
Richard Black, the responsible journalist, responded that these issues
HAD been mentioned by OFCOM, so it was correct to raise them. He did not
address my deep concerns about proportionate balance, so I sent another
mail, referencing the part of the OFCOM Broadcasting Code which I
believed he was ignoring, and indicating that I was still unhappy with
his response.
I have had no reply to this e-mail. I understand that the correct thing
to do in these circumstances is to refer the matter to you, so I am
doing so.”
And got the following response:
”
{Date:} 07/09/2008
{Feedback Type:} Complaint
Thank you for your further e-mail addressed to our journalist Richard
Black.
We have passed this to him for reply, but he is in the middle of the ocean
on another feature and therefore not contactable at this point. When he
gets back to land, he will respond to concerns directly.
Thanks for your feedback.
Vis Karunaratne
Divisional Advisor for Future Media & Technology complaints
BBC Complaints”
I have heard nothing more since.
Jerker. Good points. You’re right about the annual record, but also there may be multidecadal trends which is correlates with temperature. The very late 70th had the largest ice extent on record (which started then…), and in the 40th the ice extent may have been lower than after a warm period (it was a fuzz in media about the Arctic ice melting then). The ice retreat the last 30 years was during a warm period in the PDO.
So I think there most likely are multidecadal trends as well as annual patterns of losses and gain. Thus losses are statistically more likely during a warming phase, which means there are an over time temperature-ice correlation.
The large summer 2008 losses may have been due to thinner ice after a multidecadal trend — as well as or mostly due to wind and sea current patterns — and I think it’s not completely wrong to have the hypothesis that this year may have marked the beginning of a a shift in a trend due to PDO, which indeed controls the temperaturee on the northern hemisphere. I guess we would say so even if the supposed shift in the trend is also controlled by other more arbitrary year-by-year patterns…
Also any little ice age gives increasing Arctic ice of course — not any particular year though, but I would bet that very cold years correlates in some respect with increasing ice, just as trends in the PDO shift would indicate.
I’m no climate scientist. 🙂
Jerker. Actually 1998 marked the lowest ice extent on the record, as well as the most rapid losses in one year “ever” (since 1979).
Funny how last yar the comments on this blog were about the Antarctic ice sea ice, not a mention above but lets put the record straight, think global. http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/global.daily.ice.area.withtrend.jpg
As you can see the global sea ice area is around 2,500,000 square km below the mean.
Seeing as you guys have forgotten about the Antarctic, just thought I’d remind you!
On a seperate topic just thinking what China is going to do with its $1.2 trillion in US bonds, will they be the communist white knight to save the capitalist system from collapse by investing in stocks… or will they be the typical communists and destroy the capitalist structure by ‘cashing in’ the bonds. Interesting and worrying stuff.
I think it will pan out to be normal this year but subsequent years will continue to increase and then decrease again eventually its called “normal climate variation”. Anyway AGW is dying LOL
@Perry Debell
So Richard Black is able to respond to e-mails, is he? I recently complained about one of his items, and got no valid answer. So I referred the matter upwards, as follows:
“I recently complained about bias in the BBC news item which reported the recent OFCOM finding on the programme ‘The Great Global Warming
Swindle’. The gist of my complaint was that this programme was
substantially cleared of the many accusations against it, but the BBC
presented the finding as if the programme had not been cleared, by
headlining issues where OFCOM had found against the programme, but which they had indicated were minor.
Richard Black, the responsible journalist, responded that these issues
HAD been mentioned by OFCOM, so it was correct to raise them. He did not
address my deep concerns about proportionate balance, so I sent another
mail, referencing the part of the OFCOM Broadcasting Code which I
believed he was ignoring, and indicating that I was still unhappy with
his response.
I have had no reply to this e-mail. I understand that the correct thing
to do in these circumstances is to refer the matter to you, so I am
doing so.”
I got this response back:
“{Date:} 07/09/2008
{Feedback Type:} Complaint
Thank you for your further e-mail addressed to our journalist Richard
Black.
We have passed this to him for reply, but he is in the middle of the ocean
on another feature and therefore not contactable at this point. When he
gets back to land, he will respond to concerns directly.
Thanks for your feedback.
Vis Karunaratne
Divisional Advisor for Future Media & Technology complaints
BBC Complaints”
Now that he has returned from his travels, perhaps he will see fit to respond to me? I’m not holding my breath…
Dear Mr Debrell,
Thanks for your email. It’s always nice to see when people have access to what they know to be the unvarnished truth, with no room for doubt.
Best wishes,
RB
———————
Funny thing. That’s how I’ve always felt about most AGW advocates.
Think soot. Once the ice melts, all the soot that was accumulated during the past year is dissolved in the ocean.
There’s a bit more to it than that. Ice that doesn’t melt completely will accumulate a layer of soot on its surface in summer over a number of years. The soot will progressively increase the summer melt until the sea ice melts completely and the soot goes into the ocean. At which point the soot accumulation begins again.
If soot is the (or even a) major cause of sea ice melt, then we should see cycles of a number of years of sea ice decline, a spike down to the summer minimum, followed by a rapid increase over over a smaller number of years, which is what the few years prior to this year looked like.
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/seasonal.extent.1900-2007.jpg
Note how the spike down is a summer phenomena, which is what a soot accumulation model would predict.
Perry Debell (00:39:02) That’s pretty funny, Richard Black suggesting you have ‘no room for doubt’. He sounds a little sullen.
===================================
You know, Perry, that really is a powerful email. The juxtaposition of ‘unvarnished truth’ and ‘no room for doubt’, along with the sullen tone, makes me wonder if our dear Richard Black hasn’t suffered from a little introspection lately. If not, it’s wonderfully grand example of the sort of unconscious irony that flows like a stream in flood from cognitive dissonance.
===============================
Y’all should know by now that increasing sea ice is not noteworthy, only declining sea ice.
[…] Read More: wattsupwiththat.com No tags for this post. Related Posts […]
It looks like about 1/2 million square km more NH ice than one year ago from this graph.
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/current.365.jpg
That is balanced by less ice in the SH from the same website. This Antarctica Anomaly is discussed in “The Chilling Stars,” and is support for Svensmark’s theory.