It’s refreshing to see NSIDC director Mark Serreze coming to grips with his role in stirring up Arctic ice scare stories (like the famous “death spiral”) in 2007:
“In hindsight, probably too much was read into 2007, and I would take some blame for that,” Serreze said. “There were so many of us that were astounded by what happened, and maybe we read too much into it.”
Here’s some excerpts from the article:
With sea ice levels in the Arctic at record lows this month, a new report comparing scientists’ predictions calls for caution in over-interpreting a few weeks worth of data from the North Pole.
The Sea Ice Outlook, which will be released this week, brings together more than a dozen teams’ best guesses at how much sea ice will disappear by the end of the warm season in September. This year began with a surprise. More sea ice appeared than anticipated, nearing its mean level from 1979-2007. But then ice levels plummeted through May and into June. Scientists have never seen the Arctic with less ice at this time of year in the three decades they’ve been able to measure it, and they expect below average ice for the rest of the year.
But looking ahead, the ultimate amount of sea ice melt is hard to determine. Some trends, like the long-term warming of the Arctic and overall decreases in the thickness of sea ice, argue for very low levels of sea ice. But there are countervailing factors, too: The same weather pattern that led to higher-than-normal temperatures in the Arctic this year is also changing the circulation of sea ice, which could keep it in colder water and slow the melting.
“For this date, it’s the lowest we’ve seen in the record, but will that pattern hold up? We don’t know. The sea ice system surprises us,” said Mark Serreze, director of the National Snow and Ice Data Center.
The loss of summer sea ice over decades is one of the firmest predictions of climate models: Given the current patterns of fossil fuel use and the amount of carbon dioxide already in the atmosphere, sea-ice-free summers in the arctic are a virtual certainty by the end of century, and possibly much sooner. As the globe heats up, the poles are disproportionately affected. Warmer temperatures melt ice, revealing the dark sea water that had previously been covered. That changes the albedo, or reflectivity, of the area, allowing it to absorb more heat. That, along with many other feedback loops makes predicting change in the Arctic immensely difficult.
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Amino Acids in Meteorites says:
June 20, 2010 at 10:49 am
Almost all the trolls are back out.
So you are!
Elizabeth says:
June 20, 2010 at 8:16 am
“When this started in 2007, it was pretty scary for a lot of the scientists, putting these numbers out there,” said Helen Wiggins, program coordinator of the Arctic Research Consortium of the United States. “It’s a different way to do science. It’s more a community synthesizing exercise.”
A different way to do science? Whose science? In my scientific community, researchers tend to want to put their numbers out there so that others may validate their work.
You appear to have misunderstood what is being talked about (not surprising it’s not well written). The different way to do science that is referred to is the consortium getting together and making competitive predictions for the upcoming season, at the end of the season comparing them all. Based on the success (or otherwise) of the various predictions, try to improve the methods during the next year.
Andrew30 says:
June 20, 2010 at 6:20 am
“The Arctic will be Ice Free in 2013.”
This is the most widely publicized ‘prediction’ from the CAGW camp.
It’s also one of those ‘predictions’ which wasn’t actually made!
What Maslowski actually wrote in his presentations in late 2007/early 2008 in reference to the decrease in ice volume was:
“If this trend persists the Arctic Ocean will become ice-free by ~2013!”
I have yet to see this accurately represented when it is ‘publicized’, my emphasis on the missing part of the ‘quotation’, note also “~2013” i.e ‘about 2013’. The ‘!’ also indicates a certain degree of scepticism associated with the statement.
Amino Acids in Meteorites says:
June 20, 2010 at 6:52 am
‘Any mention of shear? Melt is the reader inference they want.’
Take a look at the Cam 2 animation for this year on the following site:
http://www.arctic.noaa.gov/gallery_np.html
The buoy to the left of the yellow one starts running around in the background near the end of the animation. At first I thought perhaps it was the Cailin expedition arriving!!
Villabolo, I have a simple question for you. Bearing in mind that AGW is a theory then what could falsify it? Please provide a time scale if possible.
Sorry ‘Caitlin’ expedition.
Phil. says:
June 20, 2010 at 12:19 pm
So you are!
I see you didn’t comment in the Arctic survey post. But here you are now.
villabolo says:
June 20, 2010 at 12:03 pm
Why don’t you pay attention to what the majority of Climatologists themselves are saying?
Would you list these numerous climatologists in that ‘majority’ you speak of and tell everyone what they are saying? Because I think you exaggerating. But if you list all of them, then prove how they are a ‘majority of Climatologists’, and tell what they are saying then you will prove me wrong.
villabolo says:
June 20, 2010 at 12:03 pm
you said ‘widely publicized’. So I brought up Al Gore. No one is more publicized than him. I was responding to something you said. Let’s not change horses in the middle of the stream like the global warming scientists who are constantly changing their predictions.
“For this date, it’s the lowest we’ve seen in the record, but will that pattern hold up? We don’t know. The sea ice system surprises us,” said Mark Serreze
Exactly. Because neither Serreze, nor any of the commenters here on either side (even R. Gates) have much better than a hazy idea how the climate actually works. The Warmists can huff and puff and come out with all the apocalyptic predictions they want.
But the Climate just keeps on doin’ whatta Climate’s gotta do.
And I certainly agree that it doesn’t matter a toss whether the Arctic is “ice free” in 2013 or at any other date. I’ve no doubt it has been ice free many times even in the last 1000 years.
If you want to change the energy that drives the economy of all the developed world and which holds out the only hope for all the poor souls living in grinding poverty in the Third World, then you need to come up with something a lot more scary than a bit of floating ice melting.
Amino Acids in Meteorites says: June 20, 2010 at 12:47 pm
“But if you list all of them, then prove how they are a ‘majority of Climatologists’”
It should not be too hard to come up with ‘a few dozen’ names; and since ‘a few dozen’ is consensus, and consensus implies all, and all is all, then de-facto ‘a few dozen’ is a majority. QED.
PS.
The sun has been out for hours, ‘if this trend continues’ the tooth fairy will never show up.
Some people can recognize a sine-wave, other are not so lucky.
Ice Free in 2013. Tick, tock.
PPS.
CAGW: Models by Revell. Some assembly required. Model may not be as illustrated.
Paul Thomas says:
June 20, 2010 at 11:35 am
Does the refractive index play any role here or are the laws of physics repealed in climate ? I thought that light was totally reflected in an air to water interface with incidence above 49 degrees.
You are mistaken, you are thinking about ‘total internal reflection’ which only applies when light passes from the denser medium, i.e. water to air.
Any significance to the further advance of the blue-gray color in the Arctic?
http://ice-map.appspot.com/
Here’s a very recent presentation on the Arctic Sea ice that may have been linked before but I will provide it again:
http://video.hint.no/mmt201v10/osc/?vid=55
Many excellent topics covered here, including the changing nature of multi-year ice, and why measurements to predict it’s volume may be way off due to how it is changing. Steve in particular should pay attention to this. For other AGW skeptics, if you’re really a true skeptic, then you should appreciate the new information here.
Roger, very few posters here have Ph.D’s, though some do. It doesn’t take a Ph.D. to understand and read widely in the field. I don’t recall that the much beloved hero of the AGW Skeptic club, Lord Monckton, having a Ph.D in any climate science related field. All that is personally required to learn is an open mind and a basic understanding of science–and of course lots and lots of time to study. Oh, and of course, lately you need a pretty good BS meter…
JK says:
June 20, 2010 at 1:33 pm
Any significance to the further advance of the blue-gray color in the Arctic?
http://ice-map.appspot.com/
Snow and clouds are white, ice is blue?
R. Gates says:
June 20, 2010 at 11:14 am
You seem to think that somehow a chart of Global Sea ice is more meaningful than looking at the Arctic and Antarctic as the separate regions with different dynamics that they are?
I seem to think that you ducked a simple challenge by practicing a double standard.
You challenged Steve Goddard for his prediction, and he obliged.
I challenged you to calculate a simple slope.
Your response was:
“In general, Arctic year to year sea ice is decreasing faster than Anarctic sea ice is increasing (year to year), and will continue to do so for the next few decades, until both will show declines from current means. A better chart is really this one:”
Well?
Which graphic are you going to calculate the slope on? My composite of N/S from Cyrosphere, or the one you chose?
JK says:
June 20, 2010 at 1:33 pm
Any significance to the further advance of the blue-gray color in the Arctic?
http://ice-map.appspot.com/
Increased surface melting.
So, the term “polar amplification” only applies to one pole … who would have thought. Or, when it doesn’t work like originally thought, just change the definition on the fly.
The fact is no one knows all the factors involved and all the “evidence” provided is over such small time scales that it is basically meaningless. But, that doesn’t stop folks from making predictions. I guess that’s OK, but at Dr. Serreze now admits, he’s often surprised. I’d suggest some of those making strong statements should take a hint.
As far as I can deduce so far it’s far more likely that ocean currents and winds are a bigger factor (in sea ice at both poles) than temperatures. But then, that wouldn’t make for a very scary story now would it?
“Which graphic are you going to calculate the slope on?”
I think if you compare the extent for each pole, and look at the +- 2 standard deviations, you get a better comparison. And of course, it’s mid-season, so… end of season will be much more interesting scientifically.
Well below-
http://nsidc.org/data/seaice_index/images/daily_images/N_stddev_timeseries.png
A little above-
http://nsidc.org/data/seaice_index/images/daily_images/S_stddev_timeseries.png
What’s new?
Where’s man’s influence here?
Following are a few extracts from Chapter 2 of “Arctic Climate Impact Assessment” which was referred to in the IPCC Working Group II report on the Polar Regions (Chapter 15 of the WGII report to the Fourth Assessment Report of the IPCC (2007)) as:
“a uniquely detailed assessment of the impacts of climate change in the Arctic (ACIA, 2005), which has been drawn upon heavily in the Arctic component of this chapter …… which has substantially improved the understanding of the impacts of climate change in theArctic, is a benchmark for regional impact assessments, and may become the basis for a sustainable management plan for the Arctic.”
Dealing with the period of the early to mid-Holocene (starting from about 11,000 to 10,000 years ago – ‘11ky to 10 ky BP’) the report says:
• “following the sudden end of the Younger Dryas (about 11 ky BP), the Arctic entered several thousand years of conditions that were warmer and probably moister than today”
• “central Greenland …. did not warm up until after 8 ky BP”
• “by 9 ky BP Spitsbergen glaciers had retreated to or beyond their present day positions”
• “this period was as warm if not warmer than at present”
• “climatic conditions in the early Holocene were significantly warmer than today”
• “marine mammals…were present far north of their present day range”
• “over most of Russia forests advanced to or near the Arctic coastline between 9 and 7 ky BP, and retreated to their present position by between 4 and 3 ky BP”
• “during the period of maximum forest extension, the mean July temperature along the northern coastline of Russia may have been 2.5 to 7 deg C warmer than present”
• “pollen records indicate a dramatic cooling about 3.5 ky BP”
• “evidence for a mid Holocene thermal maximum in Scandinavia is considerable….summer temperatures were 1.5 to 2 deg C higher than at present”
• “especially severe conditions in northern Swedish Lapland …330 BC…decrease in mean summer temperature of about 3 to 4 deg C”
• “Yamal Peninsula… treeline…by 7.4 ky BP it was located at approximately 69 deg. It remained here until 3.7 ky BP when it rapidly retreated .. to within 2 to 3 km north of its present position” “in the space of only 50 years”
>Paul Thomas says:
>June 20, 2010 at 11:35 am
>
>Does the refractive index play any role here or are the laws of physics repealed in >climate ? I thought that light was totally reflected in an air to water interface with >incidence above 49 degrees. All light would be reflected above 70 degrees latitude at >the solstice and at lower latitudes at any other time. Blackness of the surface doesn’t >enter the picture. Allowing for atmospheric bending of incoming light does not >markedly alter the critical latitude (moving it slightly higher).
No, this is wrong. What you are referring to is called “total internal reflection” and this only occurs when going from a more dense to less dense medium (from water to air NOT from air to water).
Most of the light will be absorbed.
JK says:
“Well below… A little above…”
Doesn’t matter. This is what matters. Global ice cover is above average. See?
http://ice-map.appspot.com/
Looks bleak, bleary & brutal.
The pull-apart areas look strange. Frozen on land in Greenland, clear sea, then a frozen breccia-like flotilla further out.
Hope that stuff stays up there.
Smokey says:
June 20, 2010 at 3:03 pm
JK says:
“Well below… A little above…”
Doesn’t matter. This is what matters. Global ice cover is above average. See?
Si. Please send warming, the real warming, not the phony AGW stuff that causes freezer-burn.
As for why should we be concerned if the arctic is ice free we can take look at the analogous system of heating a glass of water with ice in it.
As we put heat into the glass, the ice melts, but the indicator we typically look at, the temperature of the water, remains the same, 0C, more heat, more melting, temperature remains the same (but the volume of ice diminishes). Our indicator, is not accurately reflecting the situation. When the ice melts completely, the water begins to heat up and our indicator finally begins to change (but only after the buffering ability of the ice has completely gone).
With the arctic, if we beginning cooling before all the ice has melted, the ice cap will begin regrowing immediately (the water temperature has not changed). If we begin cooling after all the ice has melted, the water will first have to cool to freezing before the ice cap can begin reforming. This puts off the point of ice cap recovery later into the season giving a shorter ice cap ‘growth’ season.
More heat in the atmosphere will affect global wind patterns.
A warmer arctic ocean will increase the melt rate of the greenland glaciers and affect the flow rates and directions of the worlds’ ocean currents.
Smokey says:
June 20, 2010 at 3:03 pm
Doesn’t matter. This is what matters. Global ice cover is above average. See?
Yeah, I see – but you sure haven’t said _why_ it matters. Ever pondered the seasonality of the Antarctic ice, for one thing…
rbateman says:
June 20, 2010 at 3:04 pm
http://ice-map.appspot.com/
Looks bleak, bleary & brutal.
The pull-apart areas look strange. Frozen on land in Greenland, clear sea, then a frozen breccia-like flotilla further out.
And that breccia-like flotilla means it’s not solid, thick, old ice. And a surprising amount of snow-free land along shorelines in the Canadian Archipelago, too. Not even that brutal, as the snow is melting off the sea ice.
Georg says:
June 20, 2010 at 3:13 pm
Great analysis. Extend that to the Antarctic, and describe what will happen when the opposing forces meet at the Tropicana.
Is the warm water up around Greenland like El Nino, soon to be replaced with colder water when the supply is exhausted?
There is so much we don’t know that we’d all like answered.
The really hard part is waiting.