UK Glaciations – Source: Western Washington University
Just prior to Copenhagen, there was a flurry of news stories about Greenland melt accelerating and sea level rising up to seven meters, like this one from Spiegel.
11/13/2009
A Warming Arctic
Greenland’s Ice Sheet Melting Faster than Ever
By Christoph Seidler
Everyone knows that the ice sheet on Greenland is melting. But new research shows it is disappearing much faster than previously thought. The findings could mean that ocean levels are also rising more quickly.
As a corollary, some climatologists have speculated (as recently as this week) that cold water pouring into the North Atlantic from Greenland melt will cause the Gulf Stream to collapse and an ice age to set in across Europe.
‘Glaciers on Snowdon’ warning by climate expert
Jan 12 2010 by Rhodri Clark, Western Mail
THIS winter’s prolonged cold spell could be a taste of things to come for Wales – with glaciers a possibility within 40 years. That’s the chilly message from a leading Welsh climate expert who has warned that global warming could paradoxically trigger a collapse in temperatures in western Europe.
It is simple enough to show how unlikely these claims are. If the Greenland ice sheet was melting at an accelerated rate and pouring cold water into the North Atlantic, we would necessarily see two side effects:
- Increased rate of sea level rise
- Cold water around Greenland
In fact, we see neither of these things happening. Over the last four years sea level rise has slowed, and over the last fifteen years sea level has been rising at an average of only 32cm per century. This is an order of magnitude less than the predictions of alarmists.
Source: University of Colorado Sea Level Lab
The Spiegel article further claims:
In the period between 2000 and 2008, the dwindling glaciers have been responsible for the sea level rising by an average of about half a millimeter per year. However, during the last three years of observation, the value rose to 0.75 millimeters per year. According to the researchers, these results could indicate that the sheet of ice is melting at an accelerated rate.
These claims are not supported by the University of Colorado data. Since 1900, sea level has been rising at about 20cm per century, and hasn’t changed much recently – as seen in the graph below.
Is there evidence of cold water around Greenland pouring into the North Atlantic? No, quite the opposite. Sea Surface Temperatures around Greenland have running consistently above normal. Below are SST maps for the end of July (peak melt season) for 2007-2009. Maps from Unisys.
http://weather.unisys.com/archive/sst/sst_anom-070729.gif
http://weather.unisys.com/archive/sst/sst_anom-080727.gif
http://weather.unisys.com/archive/sst/sst_anom-090726.gif
How about winter? Same story – warmer than normal temperatures around Greenland at the end of December 2007-2009.
http://weather.unisys.com/archive/sst/sst_anom-071230.gif
http://weather.unisys.com/archive/sst/sst_anom-081228.gif
http://weather.unisys.com/archive/sst/sst_anom-091227.gif
Even if all this speculation was true and the Gulf Stream did slow down and colder weather started to set in – Greenland would stop melting, causing the whole process to reverse. In other words, don’t book any glacier climbing vacations in Wales quite yet.
h/t to Steve Goddard
How much of this sea level rise could be attributed to other anthropogenic causes, such as agriculture, deforestation or the concrete umbrellas that sweep so much rainwater straight into rivers instead of into wetlands? My first though is it wouldn’t be that significant, but yet it still nags at me. Even Suzuki says the residence time for water on land has been significantly reduced and it has been blamed for extreme flooding (i.e. New Orleans).
just had my first game of golf for over 5 weeks at Carnoustie North Of Moscow. Last longest recorded closure of the courses we had, was 11 weeks in 1993.
The good news is that things are nicely bubbling up here in the Sociliast Rebublic of the Great Britain.
We have the BBC ‘overseeres’ looking into the Biased Broadcasting Corporations coverage of their science. We have the Sunday Telegraph running an article on the Ethics of the chairman of the IPCC. We have the Sunday Times running a front page article on the BBC possibly ditching the Met Office because of it’s AGW forecasts.
What is obvious is that we need to keep the pressure up, and continue to write letters to editors and on BBC blogs (look at Hudsons blog on BBC Science and Environment site) – hidden away I know, but about 75% anti AGW. There seems to be a perceptible shift towards printing uncensored points. I do believe that eventually the truth will out. That is why such sites as WUWT and Steve McIntires are invaluable.
A great, but dated map of currents and old (relatively speaking) ice sheets can be found at
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/67/Ocean_currents_1943_%28borderless%293.png
ChisM is correct – the “whole thing about the Gulf stream warming the British Isles is just another Myth”. The oceanic warming is independent of the GS. Richard Seager debunked this myth a couple of years ago.
See this: Gulf Stream page for details.
More glacier nonsense:
World misled over Himalayan glacier meltdown (Times)
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article6991177.ece
Politicians like to make exaggerated claims about sea level rise.
Tuvalu’s president said gllobal warming was like a slow insidious form of terrorism. Then they issued an Obama stamp sheet.
See: http://www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/SeaLevelRising.htm
Ref – Claude Harvey (10:29:03) :
“I’m ashamed that our decedents will know we were on board this ship of fools!”
__________________
I have no doubt that we will be remembered as the “children of the gods” or some other title to explain the fantastic difference between now and then. After a 95% (or more) reduction in population and the passage of a hundred years or so after civilization collapses, we will be the subject of myths and wild fantasies told around campfires by beings we would scarsely recognize (or understand).
“Max Hugoson (11:00:37) :
A marvelous computer scientist at my church, clued me into his observation that the DOCKS at Pompei are located about 3/4 mile INLAND from the current Medditeranian shore. The elevation difference is about 50′.”
They have a volcano there. Well in fact lots of them if you look around: Vesuv, Aetna, Stromboli. I would guess that there is a strong likelihood that the land has risen due to a refilling magma chamber. Sea level will also have changed but it would take scientific studies (no, not that science, *real* science…) to examine what influenced it.
UNIPCC caught out – glacier claims wrong!
http://www.twawki.com
Max Hugoson (11:00:37)
Former coastlines in a tectonically active region like near Vesuvius are completely irrelevant to sea level changes. The land moves much faster than the sea.
As a matter of fact it is extremely difficult to find any coast in the World that is stable enough to measure sea-level changes for periods of more than several thousand years (for example the previous interglacial c. 120 000 years back) .
“Pascvaks (11:55:37) :
[…]
I have no doubt that we will be remembered as the “children of the gods” or some other title to explain the fantastic difference between now and then. After a 95% (or more) reduction in population and the passage of a hundred years or so after civilization collapses, we will be the subject of myths and wild fantasies told around campfires by beings we would scarsely recognize (or understand).”
Any prognosis as to the exact year so i can stock up on canned foods, Mr. Malthus?
Ref – DirkH (12:15:10) :
“Pascvaks (11:55:37) :
“Any prognosis as to the exact year so i can stock up on canned foods, Mr. Malthus?”
_____________
That’s Dr Malthus. And yes, if you are already on SS, you’re probably OK. If not, don’t worry about. Enjoy your life and occassionally, stop and smell the roses. G’day:-)
Alan Cheetham (11:39:25) :
ChisM is correct – the “whole thing about the Gulf stream warming the British Isles is just another Myth”. The oceanic warming is independent of the GS. Richard Seager debunked this myth a couple of years ago.
See this: Gulf Stream page for details.
I don’t dispute that the jet stream has a much greater role to play in determining UK weather than it gets credit for, but it is too simplistic to say the warmth from the Gulf stream is just a myth. Just ask the residents of Tiree or Barra etc., – in the recent cold spell, when we (in the Perthshire highlands, about as far from the sea you can get in Scotland) were typically getting night minimums of -15C and daytime peaks of -8C, the coldest they got was -1C or -2C, and their daytime temperatures got up to 5 or 6C. The fact is the North Atlantic off Scotland rarely gets below 8C and that mass of relatively warm water, even when the wind is not from the south or west, protects us from what (given our relatively northern latitude of 56-57) would otherwise be much colder climate. http://ocean.dmi.dk/satellite/index.php is a good place to check Atlantic temperatures.
Speaking of the Gulf stream, can some help in relocating an article that Crosspatch posted some time ago?
It was an actual newspaper report (Boston or New York newspaper?) dated 1907? stating the Gulf stream was observed to be slowing.
Can anyone help? Moderators do you remember it? Can’t find it on a search here or on the Internet but I’m sure I wasn’t imagining it.
Obviously the best solution would be if someone would give me a large grant to fund the full time employment of a professional archivist to look after my growing collection of climate data. 🙂
Tonyb
Last I’ve been able to find… the gulf stream was picking up speed.
http://icecap.us/index.php/go/joes-blog/surprising_return_of_north_atlantic_circulation_pump/
Tuesday, January 06, 2009 Surprising Return of North Atlantic Circulation Pump Media Newswire
Andrew P. 12.43.46
Allen Cheetham left the link at 11.39.25 and if you study it you will see the following:
“Average January air temperatures are warmer over oceans than they are over land, because the sea retains more summer heat, which can then be released to the overlying air in winter”.
So you don’t actually need the Gulf steam, just the normal sea temperatures in January will cause the effect that you observe.
You get a similar effect in Vancouver, Canada it’s called a maritime Climate.
The Africa plate subducts beneath the Aegean Sea plate along the Hellenic arc, from the western Peloponnesus through Crete and Rhodes to western Turkey, at a rate of almost 40 mm/year.
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/world/greece/tectonic_summary.php
The Africa plate also subducts the Eurasian plate, lifting Italy. I don’t know the rate of the rise, but the volcanoes and obducted ophiolites are pretty much smoking guns.
Andrew P. (12:43:46)
ChrisM is correct (13:19:01)
I live in Seattle where we have been having a mild January while most of the continent has been freezing – this is the “warm” ocean effect (the east side of the ocean) – we don’t have a Gulf Stream.
The dates on the graphic depicting the Welsh ice sheets are a bit misleading.
The main Devensian cold phase ended some 12,000 years ago followed by a short warm period lasting approximately 1000 years. The temperature then again dropped into glaciation mode for another 1000 years. It is this last cold phase before the onset of the Holocene that is known in the UK as the Loch Lomond Advance or Re-advance and is directly equivalent to the Younger Dryas.
One theory for the cause of the Younger Dryas invokes the the catastrophic collapse of the remains of the Laurentide ice sheet and / or the Western Arctic ice sheet. Flooding the North Atlantic with fresh water and icebergs in what is known as a Heinrich Event. Thus disrupting the ocean circulation systems etc and producing a rapid cooing.
It is from the above theory that I suspect that the AGW idea of fresh water disrupting the thermohaline circulation and producing cooling comes from.
However a Heinrich event was many orders of magnitude greater and faster than anything proposed from the melting of the Greenland and Icelandic icecaps.
http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2009/12/wuwt_icecoreanim_image51.png
The above is one of Anthony’s graphics from a few weeks ago, the Younger Dryas is the dip at the far left of the graph around 10,000 yrs bp.
What is interesting to note is how rapidly the temperature rises at the end of the Younger Dryas, only matched by the rate of decline at the start and all without any help from humans.
I hope the above makes sense.
Regards
Dave
If the Gulf stream was weakening the Greenland would stop melting at an accelerating rate amd actually retreat, wouldn’t it?
Max Hugoson (11:00:37) :
A marvelous computer scientist at my church, clued me into his observation that the DOCKS at Pompei are located about 3/4 mile INLAND from the current Medditeranian shore. The elevation difference is about 50′.
THUS when Mount Vesuvius went off in something like 70 B.C., the Medditeranian was up 50′ from where it is now.
HUM, that seems like a HELL of a lot more water in the oceans
Max-
Did the sea sink or did the land rise?
IanM
Claude Harvey (10:29:03) :
> I’m ashamed that our decedents will know we were on board this ship of fools!
You must have an interesting family. 🙂 (You wanted descendants.)
IPCC has egg on its face over claims of glacier retreat:
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/united-nations-blunder-on-glaciers-exposed/story-e6frg6n6-1225820614171
Alan Cheetham (13:49:57) :
Andrew P. (12:43:46)
ChrisM is correct (13:19:01)
I live in Seattle where we have been having a mild January while most of the continent has been freezing – this is the “warm” ocean effect (the east side of the ocean) – we don’t have a Gulf Stream.
Apropos of nothing in particular
Stornoway Lewis Scotland 58º 11’N
Oslo Norway 59º 57’N
La Rochelle France 46° 10′ N
Seattle-Tacoma United States 47° 27′ N
I attempted to send email to Rhodri, and after filling it all out and hitting send, I was informed that the function “…has been temporarily disabled.”
Hmmmmmmmmm….have other WUWTers been doing the same?…could Rhodri’s mailbox be overflowing?
I really do think we have an obligation to send emails to these folks when possible. Mine simply said “Rhodri, I assume you’ve seen your story discussed here (insert WUWT link). It seems you’ve got the whole thing wrong.”
They should know that we’re watching them.
JimB (USA)