Note: I second Steve’s thanks below to Dr. Meier for his essays (part1 and part 2) that enable us to have this discussion.
Back on Feb 9th, 2010 WUWT readers polled that Arctic sea ice would be recovering over 2009, by a wide margin of 69.8%. We’ll see how that pans out this year. We did pretty well last year.
As leader of the WUWT “Ice Team”, I’ll ask that when the time comes, that we all scream for the Ice Team that comes closest to predicting the actual the Arctic Sea Ice minimum, then buy the other team a beer.
The next few weeks will be entertaining, perhaps even stressful, as we watch each twist and turn in agonizing slow motion. But, let’s all take it in stride, no matter who “augers in”, may the best team win. 😉
– Anthony
By Steve Goddard
First, thanks to Dr. Walt Meier at NSIDC for taking the time to write up his very informative recent article on WUWT. It is much appreciated. In that article, Dr. Meier made this statement :
As NSIDC states in its most recent post, we’ve expected we may see the rapid decline begin to slow because the melt will soon run into older, thicker ice, which will slow the loss of ice. Steve has said essentially the same thing and indeed we’ve the rate of loss slow over the past few days.
The NSIDC newsletter which Dr. Meier refers to is dated July 6, 2010.
However, it would not be surprising to see the rate of ice loss slow in coming weeks as the melt process starts to encounter thicker, second and third year ice in the central Arctic Ocean. Loss of ice has already slowed in the Beaufort and Chukchi Seas due to the tongue of thicker, older ice in the region noted in our April update.
Note that the slowdown actually started a few days before NSIDC published their forecast for it. NSIDC only produces one newsletter per month, so this may just be a matter of timing.
By contrast, my forecast came three days ahead of the slowdown and was very precise.
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.
NSIDC also noted in their July 6 newsletter the possible similarity between 2006 and 2010.
Weather conditions, atmospheric patterns, and cloud cover over the next month will play a major role in determining whether the 2010 sea ice decline tracks at a level similar to 2007, or more like 2006. Although ice extent was greater in June 2007 than June 2006, in July 2007 the ice loss rate accelerated. That fast decline led up to the record low ice extent of September 2007.
By contrast, I clearly noted the similarity to 2006 over six weeks ago – at a time when the extent graphs showed 2010 far below 2006. My observation was made based on PIPS thickness data, which allowed me to make a very early prediction.
Can we find another year with similar ice distribution as 2010? I can see Russian ice in my Windows. Note in the graph below that 2010 is very similar to 2006.
Bookmark this post for reference in September.
June 1, 2006
June 1, 2010
Six weeks later, 2010 extent is very close to 2006 – just as the PIPS data indicated it should be. It is important to note that whether or not PIPS thicknesses have correct absolute values, I am only using it for comparisons relative to other years. The absolute thicknesses are not important – as long as their methodology is consistent from year to year.
‘
Conclusion : The PIPS thickness data has been an extremely good indicator of 2010 Arctic ice conditions. Thanks to reliance on PIPS data, WUWT has been far ahead of the curve in forecasting future 2010 ice conditions.
Coincidence? Not very likely. Theory is fine, but it is difficult to argue with results.
Actually, if one tossed out 2007-2009 like they didn’t exist, what would one expect 2010 to come out at based on 2006 and earlier long-term trend?
To me, that’s a more interesting number –but the reason I say that is I consider 2007 and recovery from 2007 to be an “outlier” event (and I put 2008 and 2009 in that “recovery from the 2007 outlier” catagory).
stevengoddard says:
July 15, 2010 at 9:40 am
I calculated that in order to stop the long term downwards trend, the summer minimum would have to be 22 million km^2.
Yes, but I’d prefer the terms “eliminate” or “cancel” to “stop.” If we allow anything other than a first order regression, a few more years of increase could justify a claim that the downward trend has “stopped”.
Let me suggest a 10 year moving average as a reasonable measure of the long term trend. It’s long enough to approximately capture whole solar cycles while still being round. If the 10 year moving average stops decreasing, the the long term trend can fairly be described as stopped. We might get there in ~4-5 years but it’d surprise me. I’m of the camp that says the recovery from the Little Ice Age isn’t done yet.
Here’s a prediction – in 3 days ice melt will speed up again.
Source – looking at the GFS charts that suggest a change from the current pattern of low pressure over Beaufort sea cycling cool air around the Arctic Basin, back to a dipole pattern with southerlies pushing warm air from the Asian continent into the Arctic, and compacting ice towards Greenland. Currently some very patchy ice near the north pole should make the ice pack quite easy to compact if this wind pattern happens as forecast.
Steven, you got it wrong and Dr Mieir told you so. Just swallow the pill and stop saying that you always said it before.
You (at last) found something scientific to show you how things works in the Arctic and again you pull all of what is happening on your behalf stating you are predicting this or that.. C’mon, the Pips is telling you that, can’t you show just a tiny bit of humility.
As per doing prediction on the Arctic or else, i don’t see that as funny. In fact it is quite stupid trying to make fun out of something that could lead to disaster. While you’re joking about the sea ice, the permafrost is melting – and that is dangerous for the locals, but also for the industrial pipelines sitting on top of that melting permafrost. Just ask you’re friend taking care of those pipeline – it cost millions just to make sure they don’t move. If the permafrost starts to move, make it multi billions – and the risk of disaster, or even simply to shut it down – economic disaster then.
What’s the difference between 2006-2007 and the upcoming 2010, who cares.. As more and more years are with less ice cover, we’re just closer to see a tanker hitting the ground, an offshore rig collapsing in the Arctic, a spill of crude oil all over that place. That’s whats at risk. But you’re too busy having fun with the cryosphere graphical view.
Try to think beyond your noze instead of laughing at that situation – this is serious stuff not only to the AGW proponents, but for all the industrial world making big bucks on top of the world.
Regg, your post might just be the perfect poster child for what is wrong with the Alarmist crowd. The arctic was warmer in the Medieval times than now. The Vikings tried to farm in Greenland based on a short term warming and then were driven out by the sudden cooling that occurred again. Whose fault is that?
Maybe the problem isn’t the globe warming. Perhaps its people who expect the climate to remain stagnant. The climate was warming coming out of the Little Ice Age. It was going to warm regardless or not if we helped it along a bit. The Little Ice Age killed a lot of people with famines and starvation. Maybe we should try and make the climate go back to that great time in the 1600s when it was freezing? Lots of farmers would probably lose millions on crops and famine would hit with less food.
Get off your high horse already. The climate changes whether we think we can control it or not. It will change if we all stopped burning fossil fuels.
On a side note, another very slow day of melting in the Arctic.
Warren says:
July 14, 2010 at 8:20 pm
It gets silly after those paragraphs.
“If the decline in the sea ice continues – as predictions of global warming suggest it will – it is feared that the bears could die out in 25 to 30 years, or perhaps in as few as 10, if there are a succession of years with very low sea ice cover”
I’d suggest that the Canadian authorities sacrifice a few of these underweight bears to make sure that there isn’t some horrible disease process going on, like what’s affecting the Tasmanian Devils.
[REPLY – They already permit the Inuits dry gulch around 300 a year, as it is. ~ Evan]