2nd day – Arctic sea ice is again on the rise

Espen (00:23:27) :
Actually, Espen, IT’S WORSE THAN YOU THOUGHT!
If summer minimum levels continue to grow at 0.5 mill.sq.km a year, summer minimum will in fact OVERTAKE winter maximum in less than 20 years!
This is of course settled science in the AGW creationist community.

Just noting a clarification about the DMI Arctic temperature chart.
This is an atmospheric temperature chart which peaks at the usual time of the year, about day 206 or July 25th.
Ocean temperatures, however, peak about day 254 – September 11th. The is the same date as the peak of the ice melt, the peak of the hurricane season, the peak of sea surface temperatures, the peak of the ice growth in the southern hemisphere.
Just something to take note of, ocean temperatures are a more relevant metric than the atmospheric temperatures for sea ice.

Geo (06:36:57): The reality is, it is a rube’s game on both sides to assign the most hysterical of the other side as the opposition that needs discrediting to bring the core assumptions crashing to the ground.
Hard cheese, Geo, and a trifle unfair. For instance, in this entire thread of 77+ comments about Arctic ice, nobody mentioned that hysterical phrase oft used by certain gummit scientists, namely “death spiral”. I look for that tasteful phrase in Arctic ice stories for exactly the rationales you cite: it is a crashing and burning core assumption of the Alarmists, and I am (proudly) a rube.

“”” S.E.Hendriksen (00:43:20) :
http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/meant80n.php
It started freezing about a week ago….see the small heat-peak about day 245-50….heat was released to the atmosphere.
Kind regards from Greenland
Svend “””
Hey Svend; it is good to hear your voice again. I was beginning to get worried about you the other day, when all that sea ice suddenly fell up onto Greenland leaving open ocean around. Glad that you survived that maelstrom of incoming ice, without having to head for the homeland.
At least it is nice to know we have one place to get the fair dinkum skinny about where ice is, and isn’t; have a nice winter Svend.
George

Anthony;
I was just revisiting the website of the International Arctic Buoy Programme, which I came across some time ago but hadn’t been back to since an equipment problem wiped out most of my bookmarks file a couple of months ago. In browsing around I came across this paper
http://iabp.apl.washington.edu/research_seaiceageextent.html
which is from 2004, but includes this updated animation thru 2007
http://iabp.apl.washington.edu/animations/Rigor&Wallace2004_AgeOfIce1979to2007.mpg. The description of the animation includes the following
This animation of the age of sea ice shows:
1.) A large Beaufort Gyre which covers most of the Arctic Ocean during the 1980s, and a transpolar drift stream shifted towards the Eurasian Arctic. Older, thicker sea ice (white ice) covers about 80% of the Arctic Ocean up to 1988. The date is shown in the upper left corner.
2.) With the step to high-AO conditions in 1989, the Beaufort Gyre shrinks and is confined to the corner between Alaska and Canada. The Transpolar Drift Stream now sweeps across most of the Arctic Ocean, carrying most of the older, thicker sea ice out of the Arctic Ocean through Fram Strait (lower right). By 1990, only about 30% of the Arctic Ocean is covered by older thicker sea ice.
3.) During the high-AO years that follow (1991 and on), this younger thinner sea ice is shown to recirculated back to the Alaskan coast where extensive open water has been observed during summer.
The age of sea ice drifting towards the coast explains over 50% of the variance in summer sea ice extent (compared to less than 15% of the variance explained by the seasonal redistribution of sea ice, and advection of heat by summer winds).
I generally don’t like to jump to wild conclusions, but to me this appears to be almost “smoking gun” evidence that the dramatic decline in summer ice in the Arctic is unrelated to temperature trends. I don’t recall coming upon any references to this elsewhere and it is not featured prominently on the IABP site, so I wonder if you might consider doing a post on it here. I really think it deserves wider circulation

Mark Fawcett (07:54:57)
I think you are right and it really is that simple.
As the main energy supply to the Arctic (more than from the sun even in summer) is from oceanic inflow to the Arctic Ocean it must follow that less ice will allow more energy loss to the air in a negative feedback process.I mentioned that in blogs over a year ago but got no response, presumably because we only had one year of ice recovery to go on at that time and no one else was prepared to commit to expressing such a view in public. Two years ice recovery is helpful evidence in support and 3 years plus should clinch it.
The past two years we have seen slightly cooler water flowing into the Arctic Ocean because the peak of the long run of powerful El Nino events was in 1998 and I suspect that the peak effect on the Arctic was in 2006 but winds favourable to ice loss put the maximum melt in 2007.
So we now have less energy reaching the Arctic from the oceans underneath plus enhanced energy loss to the air from the ongoing period of more open water plus a less active sun (probably a less influential factor in the short term).
It would be hardly surprising if we now see a rapid ice recovery for several years yet. It will not be for about 8 to 10 years after another huge El Nino that we will see a substantial Arctic ice reduction again and that is unlikely to happen during the newly commenced negative PDO phase. Even if we get a moderate El Nino in the Pacific the other ocean surfaces are now cool enough to offset it.

Well I’ll let y’alls argue whether this is the minimum and how many acres it is; it’s a bit like walking the halls outside the delivery room; at some point you might as well go out and have a beer.
So for me I think it’s time to call it on the arctic ice pack; yep she’s pregnant all right, and we can expect to see lots of little ice packlets any time soon; so I’m out of here to go and get that beer; it was fun again this year just like last year.
And Anthony, each time we do this, we all learn a little something about what Gaia is up to; so thanks for inviting me to the party; see ya next year too.
George

Philip_B (09:50:22) :
Fish don’t freeze in lakes because their body fluids are more saline than the water.
Where water is more saline than that in the fish, the fish will freeze.
Antarctic waters are particularly saline and as a result have few fish for precisely this reason.
I am not sure if that’s a good leg pull or not (it’s too late to research it and I’m cream-crackered) :o)
I was merely attempting to illustrate the point that freezing occurs from the top and that ice acts as an insulator.
Cheers,
Mark

DaveE (11:03:45) : Your posting on albedo gives me another opportunity to pose a thought that has been on my mind for a long time. The AGW community is very alarmed by loss of albedo as arctic ice coverage falls by 1.5 million sq km below 79-00 average for a couple of months. Meanwhile, we have paved over 156,000 square kilometers just in the United States and the United States is only 6% of the world’s land surface. With the angle being much more direct and for much of the year on populated areas, it would seem that the albedo effect of building roads and parking lots is more than the effect stemming from the loss of Arctic ice. (And this talk does not include rooftops and other changes in land use.)

” An Inquirer (14:38:33) : ”
Paint your roof white.

I am not sure if that’s a good leg pull or not (it’s too late to research it and I’m cream-crackered) :o)
I was merely attempting to illustrate the point that freezing occurs from the top and that ice acts as an insulator.
It’s no leg pull. A freshwater fish would have to be uncased in ice before it froze because the water would freeze before the fish. While ocean fish in subzero waters can be supercooled with their body fluids below their freezing point. Which means if the fish swallowed a single ice crystal, it would be at risk of instantly freezing solid. Like a scene out of sci-fi movie.
As for ice forming from the top. It does, but this as much to do with the physical properties of ice and water as it does the fact oceans lose heat from the surface.
If water didn’t reach its minimum density at 4C, the Arctic Ocean would be frozen solid, and oceans would freeze from the bottom up. Even the tropical oceans would be solid ice below the thermocline.
Apologies for the pedantry. Your main point is entirely correct. Ice is an effective insulator.

Stephen Wilde (13:34:02) :
I hope you are saving your posts. You have a logical and flowing writing style [and some palatable science] that could make for a larger paper.
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA