Guest post by Steven Goddard
The WUWT Arctic Ice Thickness Survey has been conducted from the comfort of a warm living room over the last half hour, without sponsors, excessive CO2 emissions or hypothermia. The data is collected from the US military web site http://imb.crrel.usace.army.mil. All of the active military buoys show significant thickening ice over the past six months to a year, as seen below.
Location of Catlin team relative to buoy 2008D and the North Pole
Buoy 2008B has thickened by more than half a metre since last autumn, and is more than 3 metres thick.
2008C also shows thickening by more than half a metre since last autumn, and is nearly 4 metres thick.
2008D has not been updated since early February, but showed thickening and is 3.5 metres thick. It is close to the Catlin team position.
2007J has thickened more than half a metre, and is nearly 4 metres thick.
2006C has thickened by nearly a full metre over the past year, and is more than 3 metres thick
UPDATE: The military site also has graphs which are supposed to show depth. It appears that many of these are broken, which is why I used the more reliable temperature graphs. The depth at which the ice drops below the freezing point of seawater (-2C) is of course the bottom of the ice. You can’t have water in a liquid state below it’s freezing point.
Some of the buoys have reliable depth data, and they correspond closely to the temperature data – for example 2007J which shows 400cm for both.
http://imb.crrel.usace.army.mil/buoy_plots/ice2007J.gif
http://imbcrrel.usace.army.mil/buoy_plots/2007J.gif
Steven Goddard (07:45:33) :
Paul,
That is how the Arctic works.
The ice drifts towards the warm waters of the North Atlantic and melts after a few years. Putting a buoy on the ice does not stop polar drift.
Except of course for: 2007E, 2007F, 2008F, which all melted out in the Beaufort Sea! Of the buoys shown on the map in the original post only 2008E took the Atlantic route. The only buoys that are likely to stay in the Arctic for more than a year or so are those initially deployed in the Beaufort Gyre, with the breakup of the multiyear ice in that region and the accelerated melt out there in recent summers even those buoys aren’t lasting very long now. It’ll be interesting to see how long the current Russian ice station lasts, it’s entering a region of strong flow towards the Fram Strait so I’d expect it to be into the Atlantic by fall.
http://www.aari.nw.ru/resources/d0014/np36/data/drift/drift_big.png
to cold play’s comment.
the last time there was significant recession of the ice shelf was 9500 years ago. That’s about the dawn of civilization. I think figuring out a way to avoid a repeat of that time would be prudent, as this tiny warm period (geologically speaking) is a sweet spot for humankind. I’d like to keep it around awhile longer thanks…
cmw
David,
This article is about the Arctic. Snow falls in the winter, when the Arctic basin is full of ice.
Phil.
I hate to rain on your melting parade.
2007E shows that it lost 3 meters of ice in about two weeks.
http://imb.crrel.usace.army.mil/buoy_plots/ice2007E.gif
2008F was 3 metres thick when it malfunctioned.
http://imb.crrel.usace.army.mil/buoy_plots/ice2008F.gif
2007F was 3.5 metres thick right before it appears to have malfunctioned.
http://imb.crrel.usace.army.mil/buoy_plots/ice2007F.gif
“”” JAN (14:43:42) :
Rabe (11:58:26):
“Would someone please explain to me which physical miracle leads to the fact that older ice is more resistant to melting than some younger one? Is it also true that water, which stayed longer in the liquid phase, doesn’t freeze as fast as just melted one….”
I may be on thin ice here, but I’ll risk the following hypothesis:
When sea water freezes, the salt is forced out of the ice. However, this may not be an instant reaction, but one that takes months and years, so much that multiyear ice is significantly less saline than baby ice. As can been seen from the graphs on top of the post, the freezing point for seawater is -2C. Thus the melting point of baby ice is also close to -2C. However, older ice with less salt content, will have higher melting point, closer to fresh water at 0C. Alas, the sea temperature will have to rise more to melt older ice.
Likewise, recent meltwater from sea ice with low salinity tend to float on top of the sea water column due to lower density, hence that water will refreeze at around 0C, while well mixed sea water freezes at -2C, as shown above.
Voila, mystery solved….maybe. “””
Well when water containing dissolved salts freezes; the loss of salt from the solid phase is instantaneous; it doesn’t take months and years; the solid and salts simply cannot co-exist.
Now that does not preclude the solid ice from having voids in it, which are holes that do not contain ice; but they may contain liquid water and high content salt; so-called brine. And if the temperature of the ice and its contained brine pockets drops further, even that saltier brine can then feeeze; and the salt in it will also be excluded from the new ice,leaving the remaining brine even saltier, with an even lower freezing temperature.
But the ice remains essentially fresh water, and as the thickness builds up and water and winds push it around you get physical breakage and pileups
which expose new surfaces to open water, and maybe new growth of ice at the interface.
Older ice is thicker, the briny void filled surface layers are much weaker, and they collapse over time and the excess salts slowly migrate away into the deeper waters.
When the new ice starts to form, it forms in small chunks so the amount of surface area to volume is much greater than with older thicker ice, and with so much briny surface the whole structure is structurally weak and is like a mush.
There’s one other consequence of that salty water freezing and expelling the salts into the water.
CO2 is also way less soluble in ice, so it too is expelled from the ice at the solid liquid interface. And since that very cold (sub zero) sea water is also saturated with CO2 (Henry’s Law); the newly expelled CO2 is also rejected by the sea water, and enters the atmosphere.
So as the arctic ocean freezes, all the CO2 in that megatonnage of sea water that freezes, ends up being vented to the atmosphere; which is why the CO2 abundance in the arctic atmosphere goes up by 18-20 ppm as the sea ice forms starting in early to mid September.
The same thing doesn’t occur in the Antarctic, because the ice build up there is mostly precipitation of snow and ice from temperate or tropical waters that evaporated without taking lots of CO2 with the water vapor.
The peripheral growth of sea ice at the edge of Antarctica is much less becaue it is much further from the pole that is the Arctic ocean rim, and rather than being land locked it is swept twice daily by tidal bulges, and the horrific storms of the southern ocean.
Steven Goddard (09:59:13) :
Phil.
I hate to rain on your melting parade.
2007E shows that it lost 3 meters of ice in about two weeks.
http://imb.crrel.usace.army.mil/buoy_plots/ice2007E.gif
2008F was 3 metres thick when it malfunctioned.
http://imb.crrel.usace.army.mil/buoy_plots/ice2008F.gif
2007F was 3.5 metres thick right before it appears to have malfunctioned.
http://imb.crrel.usace.army.mil/buoy_plots/ice2007F.gif
Only if you adopt your rather strange interpretation of the thickness plots and your personal incredulity argument! For example 2007F melted in August and gave a spurious signal which appears to show 3.5m ice which suits your agenda so you latch onto it.
I prefer to rely on a scientific reading of the graphs and the findings of the operator:
Buoy 2008E: Buoy melted out on 11/14/2008
Buoy 2008F: Buoy melted out on 01/06/2009
Buoy 2007E: Buoy melted out on 10/18/2008
Buoy 2007F: Buoy melted out on 09/08/2008
http://imb.crrel.usace.army.mil/newdata.htm
Thanks for following up on the point I was making.
The title of this post is intended to make the reader think that ice is getting thicker all over the Arctic. Click-through on the links presents a more complete story. What is posted here is out of context and does not present the whole story. As such, it is misleading and dishonest.
Paul,
Every functional buoy shows an increase in thickness through their time of record. Perhaps it is you who is having difficulty with the truth.
Phil.
OK – so you believe that 3 metres of ice can melt instantly in the Arctic during the winter. I get the picture. Thanks.
http://imb.crrel.usace.army.mil/buoy_plots/ice2008F.gif
How does that compare with this? Also Phil appears to have busted you.
http://madrad2002.wordpress.com/2009/04/08/washington-post-refutes-itself/
Some references on research into desalination by freezing.
63. H.M. Hendrickson, R.W. Moulton, “Research and Development of Processes for Desalting Water by Freezing” R&D Report 10, Office of Saline Water, US Dept. Of Commerce, 1956.
64. G. Karnofsky, P.F. Steinhoff “Saline Water Conversion by Direct Freezing with Butane” R&D Report 40, Office of Saline Water, US Dept. Of Commerce, 1960.
65. H.F. Wiegandt, P. Harriott, J.P. Leinroth “ Desalting of Seawater by Freezing” R&D Report 376, Office of Saline Water, US Dept. Of Commerce, 1968.
66. Dravo Corp. “10,000,000 Gallon per Day Secondary Refrigerant Desalting Plant” R&D Report PB251906, Office of Saline Water, US Dept. Of Interior, 1973.
67. W. H. Denton, Desalination 14 (1974) 263.
68. H.F. Wiegandt, R.L. von Berg, Desalination 33 (1980) 287.
69. W. Rice, D.S.C. Chau, Desalination 109 (1997) 157.
70. M.F. Mitkin, Vodosnabzh I Sanit. Tekhn 2 (1963) 24.
71. J.W. Spyker “Natural Freeze Desalination of Brackish Water – Progress Report 1972-1973” Saskatchewan Research Council Report E74-1, January 1974.
72. D.L. Stinson Canadian Patent 782,784.
73. D.L. Stinson “Atmospheric Freezing Pilot Test of Salt Removal from Big Sandy River – Colorado River Water Quality Improvement Program” University of Wyoming Report for U.S. Bureau of Reclamation contract 14-06-400-5980 4010102100, July 1974.
74. D.L. Stinson, in “Water-1976” AIChE Symposium Series (1976) 112.
75. T. Szekely “Water Purification by freezing in Dugouts – Work Done in the Season 1963-1964” Saskatchewan Research Council Report E64-10, July 1964.
76. J.E. Boyson, J.A. Harju, C. Rousseau, J. Solc, D. J. Stepan “Evaluation of the Natural Freeze-Thaw Process for the Desalinization of Groundwater from the north Dakota Aquifer to Provide Water for Grand Forks, North Dakota” U.S. Bureau of Reclamation Water Treatment Technology Program Report No. 23, September, 1999.
77. A.J. Barduhn “Desalination by Freezing Processes” in Encyclopedia of Chemical Processing and Design, McKetta and Cunningham, eds., Marcel Dekker, New York (1982).
John F. Hultquist (13:05:36) :
Many thanks for the reference. It’s very interesting indeed.
Steven Goddard (11:16:41) :
Paul,
Every functional buoy shows an increase in thickness through their time of record. Perhaps it is you who is having difficulty with the truth.
And the ones that aren’t functioning are the one’s that had a decrease in their thickness until they ceased to exist. The truth is something that is a stranger to you.
Phil.
OK – so you believe that 3 metres of ice can melt instantly in the Arctic during the winter. I get the picture. Thanks.
http://imb.crrel.usace.army.mil/buoy_plots/ice2008F.gif
It was you who said:”UPDATE: The military site also has graphs which are supposed to show depth. It appears that many of these are broken, which is why I used the more reliable temperature graphs.” Although a year ago you resorted to abuse when I said that one of them was faulty!
The description ‘melted out’ is the Army’s term, I suppose they don’t know what’s happening to their own buoys?
2008F was in the area now described by Environment Canada as first year ice.
As on many other of your posts you show yourself here to be a cherry-picker of that data which supports your agenda.
More BS from Nasa:
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Newsroom/view.php?id=38192&src=eorss-manews
Mr. Goddard,
Sorry I called you Anthony in my initial post.
The temperature plots that you posted initially indicate depths for the snow and ice that are different than the snow-ice depth plots that you have switched to in your comments. For example, the 2008B temp plot indicates an October 08 depth near 1.4 meters while the depth data plot is near 2 meters. A system error may be indicated by the loss of the red snow depth output in the depth plot. I agree with your initial assessment that the depth plots are unreliable.
Unfortunately, the temp plots don’t show April 08 datapoints to compare to the Apr. 09 data.
Only the 2007J plot illustrates about 3 m of total depth. I don’t see any of the temp plots indicating 4 m.
Phil. (10:31:27) :
At least 2008F certainly can’t have “melted out”. The air temperature was -10 degrees centigrade and the ice-thickness 3 meters at the time. It may have been crushed by ice-press or lost in a crevasse, but not melted. There is any number of failure modes for unmanned weather stations. AWS on the Antarctic icecap fail with monotonous regularity and have to be resuscitated.
What I see is lots of people attempting to analise numbers and numbers alone. Having majored in physics back when there was much less knowledge to be learned, and when the basics were thoroughly taught, what is happening is frightening to me. I absolutely shudder whenever I hear or see the term “trend” mentioned. There can be differences in temperature. There may be times when these temperatures can increase over time (and times when temperatures can get lower over time) but if anyone thinks that the temperatures can be projected into the future from past data is, in my opinion, way off the mark, and no good can come of it.
From about 1990, housing prices in the US increased, and increased by at least 10% per year. Financial “wizards” saw this as a trend, and projected this “trend” into the future. No effort was made to attempt to understand just why housing prices increased in successive years after 1990. Why bother, when the “trend” was so obvious?
We all have seen the folly which has happened due to this incomparable bit of stupidity. And all because of attempting to analyze “just the numbers”.
When I took a 5 unit chemistry course back in 1953, my professor spent an entire lecture period explaining how mercury thermometers functioned, and explained just why temperature readings using mercury thermometers were no more than an approximation, and why the temperature readings could not be depended on for exactness. Even using the same thermometer, and taking great pains to assure proper reading of temperature, a difference in temperature between a reading of 72.5º F and 87.2º F didn’t mean that there was an actual and real difference of 14.7 F degrees in temperature. Variances in the cross-section of the mercury tube could and would produce significant error.
He also explained just how difficult it would be to obtain the average temperature of a large bowl of water in the laboratory an why.
As far as I am concened, what is being attempted regarding the global average temperature is an exercise in futility. There is no possible way that any “average” global temperature can be determined.
Going back to thermometer readings of the 1930s and “adjusting” those temperatures by hundredths of a F degree is no more than folly, and just a way of making it seem as though there is some sort of “scientific” process involved, when all Hansen et all are doing is changing the numbers to suit their own purposes.
I sure would be nice if “climatologists” were required to take and pass a heavy duty course in thermo-dynamics. It would be really nice if all involved could understand the difference in meaning of the terms “heat”, “temperature” and “electromagnetic radiation”.
Since I made a career of professional civil engineering, I certainly took note of the significance of “margin of error”. And I have observed the disasters which have occured caused by civil engineers who didn”t understand the significance of “margin of error”.
Perhaps it was just easier to understand when the primary tool for making calculations was a slide rule, and only 3 significant figures could be obtained, and we darn well knew that the 3rd significant figure had a margin of error of at least +/- 2 , and more likely +/- 3. And when we determined where the decimal point went by approximation using scientific notation.
Hansen’s throwing the easily falsifiable CO2 theory into the mix was simply a subterfuge to make extrapolation look respectable.
Using “magical mathematics” to “smooth” historical data does no more than hide the large variance in observed temperatures, and make the tiny differences obtained by calculation or modeling seem to have far more significance than they actually have. When the margin of error is +/- 2 or 3 F degrees, calculated or modeled future temperatures which all are within the margin of error have no real meaning at all.
The level of FUD here is getting hilarious. All of the active buoys show increasing thickness across their period of record. Sad news for people with an emotional need to be alarmed.
tty,
Maybe the military zapped the 3 meter thick ice on January 9 with a giant laser beam, and instantly melted the ice!
Steven Goddard-
I would appreciate learning a bit about your credentials. Thank you.
LarryOldTimer
Well said!
We may have had the same chemistry prof. (Not really, of course, but I had the same or very similar lecture in 1972).
Have the same problems in reading a dial pressure gauge on a pipe in a refinery or chemical plant. The needle may be oscillating rapidly (a blur, actually) over about a 5 to 8 psi range. What reading does one write down? And if the reading is taken every 8 hours for a week, with readings by 3 or 4 different employees on shift, each time with a slightly different figure written down, can the engineer legitimately average those numbers and get a result having one decimal point? NO.
Yet these so-called climate scientists have no problem doing the equivalent to the temperature measurements.
If you cannot measure it, you cannot control it. Fundamental principle of process control.
Craig,
It is interesting to me how some AGW promoters want to be insulated from inspection by the public, and at the same time promote policy which has major consequences to the public.
It doesn’t work that way in a democracy. Everyone is credentialed in this debate.
Steven,
“The level of FUD here is getting hilarious. All of the active buoys show increasing thickness across their period of record. Sad news for people with an emotional need to be alarmed.”
I don’t think so (and you’ve seen this before so why are you insisting otherwise):
http://img22.imageshack.us/img22/5204/ice2006c.gif
Tom P,
Good try.
The 2006C depth graph is clearly broken. Look at the discontinuity around October.
http://imb.crrel.usace.army.mil/buoy_plots/ice2006C.gif
The 2006C temperature profile indicates ice to a depth in excess of 300cm.
http://imb.crrel.usace.army.mil/buoy_plots/2006C.gif
ceashex,
This looks like about 400cm to me.
http://imb.crrel.usace.army.mil/buoy_plots/2007J.gif
LarryOldTimer says:
Dude, that was two years before I was born! That was before Dien Bien Phu, where some Communist Vietnamese soldiers dragged some American 105mm howitzers captured by the Chinese in Korea up onto the hills ringing the French positions and caused havoc.
I salute you. I hope I can still think when I am your age.