I wrote this nine days ago :
stevengoddard says:
June 28, 2010 at 10:16 pm
In three days, the slope of the Arctic extent graph will begin to drop off.
Mark it on your calendar.
Anyone who doubts the correctness of the PIPS based methodology I have been using, should take a look for themselves.
http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/icecover.uk.php
Close up below :
The modified NSIDC map below shows ice loss since the first of the month in red. Where’s Waldo?
The decline in the slope of the area graph is even more dramatic. Area is a better indicator of melt, because it is not affected as much by wind shifting the ice around.
http://www.ijis.iarc.uaf.edu/seaice/extent/AMSRE_Sea_Ice_Area.png
The graph below of average ice thickness shows that 2010 is starting to follow a path more like 2006 than 2007. In 2006 the ice thinned vertically, but did not compress much horizontally. In 2007 the winds compressed the ice horizontally, which led to lots of incorrect news coverage (to this day) that the Arctic was having a meltdown. The average ice thickness actually increased through the summer of 2007.
The video below shows how the winds have changed since earlier in the summer. The ice is no longer being compressed inwards, it is now being stretched outwards by cold northerly winds.
The NCEP forecast for the next two weeks is shown below. Temperatures generally running well below normal in the Arctic. Note – I color shifted the images and scale to make them easier to differentiate. This does not change their data in any way, it just makes it easier to understand.
Temperatures in the high Arctic have been below normal this summer, and in a few days will start their decline towards winter. In 50 days, they will drop below freezing, and remain there.
http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/meant80n.uk.php
Meltwater ponds at the North Pole are starting to freeze over.
http://psc.apl.washington.edu/northpole/webphotos/noaa1.jpg
Julienne from NSIDC wrote this yesterday :
I am not surprised that the rate of decline has slowed a bit during the last week. In the Beaufort and Chukchi seas, the ice has essentially melted back to the lobe of old ice that was transported there over the winter (under the negative AO phase). Thus, this is slowing the ice loss in this region. In the Kara Sea, temperatures have been colder than normal and the winds are causing ice divergence (also helping to slow loss of ice extent in that region).
This is the same point I raised questioning PIOMAS back in April.
The computer model is predicting that 3+ year old ice (which is probably in excess of 10 feet thick) is going to melt by early August. That seems rather far fetched. Below is an overlay of the NSIDC map and the U of W simulation for August 18. Note all the multi-year ice that needs to melt.
Like myself, Julienne has forecast 5.5 million km² for the summer minimum.
http://www.arcus.org/search/seaiceoutlook/2010/june
Not everyone at NSIDC agrees. Mark Serreze has been quoted as predicting a possible record low, like he does almost every year.
Mark Serreze of the center forecast the ice decline this year would even break 2007’s record.
Conclusion : There is nothing going on in the Arctic which hints of a repeat of 2007, other than the highly suspect PIOMAS graph.
http://psc.apl.washington.edu/ArcticSeaiceVolume/images/BPIOMASIceVolumeAnomalyCurrent.png
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Seeing as 2010 shows, by satellite, the best ice concentration in the Arctic basin in the history of mankind (or satellite era, whichever…), and the arctic air temp is running at or below normal according to DMI, is it unreasonable to anticipate that barring a wind pattern similar to 2007 that this year could have the highest summer extent in the history of mankind (or the satellite era, whichever….) ????
Oh, and my on-line nemesis on another forum has latched on the PIOMAS graph like a rotweiler on crack….
You like ice, nobody doubts it by now, so these “jewels” about water will be a delightful read for you:
http://www.rexresearch.com/piccardi/piccardi.htm
http://www.rexresearch.com/piccardi/piccardi4.pdf
The pips line is too flat. There should be some kind of roughness to that line. It is too smooth. Did some instrument stop transmitting? — John M Reynolds
jmrSudbury
The flat line is for dates which haven’t yet happened ;^)
” jmrSudbury says:
The pips line is too flat. There should be some kind of roughness to that line. It is too smooth. Did some instrument stop transmitting? — John M Reynolds”
I don’t think so unless we are talking time travel here! It’s projected into the future
Now that Phil Jones has got his super new job (no doubt excellently paid and with a fine index – linked pension), perhaps the UEA might prise him away from his computer screen (not to mention his email account!) and give him a thermometer and a tape measure and parachute him into the North Pole!
After a good spell of gardening leave, a bit of REAL scientific investigation and measurement would surely do him a world of good!
It would also keep him out of mischief until Prince Chuckles has sorted out his richly deserved knighthood!
Who is “Wilson” from that bar graph. Whoever he works for needs to fire him!
I laugh when people predict total meltdown within the next couple of years. If the ice is still there in a couple of years time then Gore et al will have some explaining to do. People like Serreze seem not to understand the work they do despite it being their job to understand.
Steve, I would only add what I wrote in my previous post that if we take the ice extent as it is today and project out in the future using average rates of ice loss for July and August, which are -84,980 and -53,290 sq-km per day, respectively, based on averages from 1979-2000, we would end up with a minimum of 4.8 million sq-km. Using rates of decline from 2006 we would end up with a minimum around 5.3 million sq-km, and 2007 would yield a value below 4 million sq-km.
My earlier assessment was based on survival rates of individual ice age classes between March and September is what yielded the 5.5 million sq-km estimate. I never thought it was all that realistic since the data is showing that survival rates have declined in recent years as air temperatures have continued to warm in all seasons and the Arctic Dipole Anomaly has been a dominant circulation pattern in recent summers (including this one). I should probably update this assessment based on survival rates of different ice age classes between July and September…
Where’s R. Gates when you need him most?
isn’t this a left turn ?
Steve,
I’ve already applauded you for your correct forecast in the slowdown of melt, but certainly I have no problem doing so again…nice job.
I still do sense you reaching (or almost hoping) that the melt season would just end as quickly as possible, so that you and your skeptical friends could somehow claim that the Arctic Sea ice is recovering. You seem to hold on every little wiggle in the graphs, hoping some little bit of data might help you prove that the Arctic is returning to normal and that this would somehow be a final nail in the coffin of the AGW hypothesis, much like you did back in March when strong (negative AO index created) NE winds whipped down across the Bering Sea and created some late season thin ice that created the much bally-hooed “bump up”, which of course has just as quickly melted away.
I do think your short term analysis of the sea ice dynamics is actually pretty accurate (minus the PIPS 2.0 thickness data). But I think that you’re still missing the far bigger picture with the Arctic, though you’ve hinted at it in a sarcastic way, that nothing that will happen this year will change the longer term DOWNWARD trend in Arctic Sea ice, and yes, the NSIDC will, and must report this truthful fact later on this summer, whether we a get 4 million sq. km. minimum or a 6 million sq. km. minimum. As I stated on another post, we’d have to see the average minimum bounce back to the 7 to 8 million sq. km. range for several years for even a hint of any declaration that a real recovery is underway. Looking at this chart (originally a courtesy of Julienne), it is obvious why this is so:
http://www.wunderground.com/hurricane/2009/stroeve.png
Again, I applaud you for the short-term call in forecasting that the 2010 melt would slow and begin to parallel 2006, but I think it is short-sighted to think that this is going to continue for the rest of July and August. On your post about “Concentration” I’ve posted links to plenty of data that shows warm water and warm air and a potent DA setting up later in July and into August. You seem to ignore that little beast called the Arctic Dipole Anomaly, which is just one reason why I am still more than comfortable with my 4.5 million sq. km. sea ice minimum forecast, though you’ve politely told me to forget it.
R. Gates says:
July 7, 2010 at 1:01 pm
Sounds like you are preparing your concession speech for September. “But but but but but but…”
Actual measurements versus model simulations.
The North goes down and the South goes up.
Only the models show catastrophe looming. The measurements are mostly reassuring.
julienne,
In 2008, the same technique was used by NSIDC to forecast a 3.59 minimum.
http://nsidc.org/images/arcticseaicenews/200805_Figure4.png
I think your original forecast was spot on ;^)
Am I reading that NCEP two week forecast map correct?
It appears that some peripheral areas are showing ice gain forecasted already. Makes sense to me from what I have deciphered using some other analysis lately. I just thought the re-freezing would occur more from the center outward generally and not from the edges in. Is that normal or just somewhat of a fluke for this year?
Jeff in Calgary
Someone hinted here yesterday that Wilson occasionally posts comments on these threads..
R Gates,
I too am quite certain that NSIDC will continue to report a long term downwards trend:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/06/25/the-trend/
Jon P says:
July 7, 2010 at 1:14 pm
R. Gates says:
July 7, 2010 at 1:01 pm
Sounds like you are preparing your concession speech for September. “But but but but but but…”
_______________
I never really viewed this as a contest, but I am still more than comfortable with my 4.5 million sq. km. sea ice minimum forecast. Interesting though that AGW skeptics see this as a contest. I suppose then that if my forecast turns out to be right or closer, Steve will just say that it was all “the variability of the wind” and move on, even though the Dipole Anomaly is all about the wind that seem to be generated from anomalous temperatures that create anomalous winds that create anomalous temperatures, and so forth, like all chaotic attractors do.
But if this is contest, what if it turns out to be 5.0 million– do we get to split the prize? 🙂
R. Gates,
there is no evidence of your “long term down trend”, as we have only data of one downward half of a natural cycle. Only if you subtract the half cosine from the 1979ff data, (what nobody really can do), there may be something left or not.
Steve:
I love your work! One thing that continuously bothers me is why NO ONE does a map of “atmospheric energy” around the globe.
GRANTED it would take a fair amount of processing, and you have to have the moisture level and temperatures a say, 0 to 50,000 feet to do a good job.
But I’ve had a little thesis for some time: ATMOSPHERIC ENERGY REMAINS RELATIVELY CONSTANT.
THUS, when you have, say, a couple of heat waves in the USA…that energy excess is balanced by, say, an energy (and possible comensurate temperature drop) elsewhere, say North Pole, and perhaps SOUTH.
Of course this might be non-sequitor to your work and interests, but I’m not beyond “planting seeds”.
Yours,
MAX
You know, Gates, regarding hollow compliments, eventually you might have to stop praising Steve for his short-term analysis being spot on, especially after a couple years of that. And I mean to say that you might have to change your oft repeated second half of your post regarding long term trends. If you pile up enough short term accurate assessments of continued ice health, it becomes a long term trend of continued ice health.
And surely you jest about ice being able to suddenly bounce back to some predetermined (by whom?) level of ice indicating rebound. Are you saying that it must do that in order to show rebound or are you willing to consider a slower return to previous levels?
Other measures, for example El Nino measures, use a much better analysis of data to suggest pending conditions and that purposely shy away from linear statistics, as these have proven to be poor predictors of possible pending changes in oscillating systems. And would you agree that the cryosphere is an oscillating system?
wayne
The NCEP map animation is a temperature anomaly forecast.
BTW:
according to a recent press release from the the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research (UCAR), the thermosphere has experienced a tenfold decline in temperature since 2002.
http://www.thunderbolts.info/tpod/00current.htm