by Steve Goddard
In April, I pointed out that PIOMAS forecasts for the summer didn’t make much sense.
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.
It is now early August. Let us see how they did. They expected most of the ice to be gone in the Beaufort Sea by now, and much of the remaining ice to be very thin.
The most recent NSIDC newsletter included this map, showing that the thick multi-year ice is still present in the Beaufort Sea. This is in stark contrast to the PIOMAS prediction of thin ice in that region.
The image below shows in red where PIOMAS mispredicted the ice edge vs. NSIDC August 6 map. Green indicates areas where they overestimated the amount of ice.
This discrepancy will get worse through the remainder of the month. PIOMAS extent/thickness predictions are way off the mark, and their volume calculations are much too low.
As I forecast last week, DMI now shows 2010 ice extent highest since 2006.
Ice thickness remains between 2009 and 2006, just as PIPS data indicated it should back in May.
JAXA shows that divergence from 2007 continues steadily, and is now in excess of 700,000 km².
The JAXA area graph show that ice melt has dropped off dramatically.
NSIDC maps show little ice loss so far this month. There has been nearly as much gain (green) as loss (red.)
NCEP forecasts generally below normal temperatures for the next two weeks in the Arctic.
DMI shows that summer is just about done north of 80N, and has been the coldest on record (for that dataset starting in 1958). Average temperatures have fallen below freezing there.
Conclusion : There will probably be minimal ice loss during August. The minimum is likely to be the highest since 2006, and possibly higher than 2005. So far, my forecast of 5.5 million km² is looking very conservative. Ice extent is higher than I predicted for early August.
Meanwhile, down south. Antarctica continues gaining ice at a record pace. NSIDC showed it the highest on record for July.
Bremen shows it likely headed for a new record.
In Greenland, we are bombarded with stories about “losing Manhattan sized chunks of ice.” The BBC made it one of their lead stories yesterday. Yet the ice isn’t lost and the Greenland ice sheet has been having an exceptionally cold summer, as seen in the NOAA anomaly animation below.
Perhaps “some scientists” might want to actually check the Greenland temperature data before talking to the press? Under any circumstances, how would “abnormally warm” temperatures cause a 700 foot thick block of ice to fracture? The concept doesn’t make much sense from from an engineering point of view. A few months of (imagined) warm temperatures might cause a little surface melt, but the thermal conductivity of ice is much too low to alter the temperature and material strength of ice more than a few feet below the surface. I had this same discussion with Ted Scambos at NSIDC a few years ago about Antarctic Peninsula ice shelves.
The whole story is a complete ruse.
We are bombarded with misinformation about the state of polar ice. People’s brains have been programmed to believe that the last few ppm of CO2 have made a huge difference in the behaviour of the ice, and that belief makes their thought process irrational. People will find what they expect to find. It is human nature.
jakers
I will put you down as forecasting a huge melt the rest of the month.
noiv,
In 2007, ice extent was critically important. Now that it is recovering, that metric is no longer important.
Can someone please reconcile these two graphs, one of temps above 80 degrees north from DMI showing below average temps currently and the other from NOAA (via R. Gates) showing above average temps currently. It would appear the first would generate a negative anomaly while the second shows a generally positive anomaly.
DMI: http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/meant80n.uk.php
NOAA: http://polar.ncep.noaa.gov/sst/ophi/color_anomaly_NPS_ophi0.png
Either two data sources are reporting diametrically opposed data, or I clearly don’t understand what’s going on. Maybe SST is measuring something other than surface temps? Is that it?
stevengoddard says:
August 8, 2010 at 10:06 am
R. Gates,
When September comes, are you going to just admit that I was correct?
________
When the September LOW arrives and passes, we’ll see who is admitting what. It seems you don’t even address the issue of divergence in an honest way, equating melts rates with extent decline rates– which I feel is not at all accurate, and even misleading. The thermodynamics of the ice melting from the water doesn’t change on a dime, but extent can because of weather causing divergence in a short period. To think that this divergence means the ice suddenly stopped melting or even slowed down considerably in melting is misleading…it simply means the extent loss slows (i.e. the ice cubes spreading out on a warm table)
But as always, if I have been confused about the impact of warmer water temps, or the dynamics of divergence, or anything…the of course, come the September low, if you’re forecast of guess of 5.5 million sq. km. (or is it now 6.0?) is closer than my forecast of 4.5 million sq. km….then it will Mea Maxima Culpa…but either way I win, as my ultimate goal is to learn.
The McClure Straits (or M’Clure) are open in the PIOMAS August 6, 2010 forecast. But it is not open.
McClure Straits location
http://img411.imageshack.us/img411/3082/arcticu.gif
Cryosphere Today from 8/7/2010
http://img704.imageshack.us/img704/4298/arcticseaicecolor872010.png
Reuters reports:
“The ice island has an area of 100 square miles (260 square km) and a thickness up to half the height of the Empire State Building, said Andreas Muenchow, professor of ocean science and engineering at the University of Delaware.
Muenchow said he had expected an ice chunk to break off from the Petermann Glacier, one of the two largest remaining ones in Greenland, because it had been growing in size for seven or eight years. But he did not expect it to be so large.
“The freshwater stored in this ice island could keep the Delaware or Hudson Rivers flowing for more than two years,” said Muenchow, whose research in the area is supported by the National Science Foundation.
“It could also keep all U.S. public tap water flowing for 120 days.”
He said it was hard to judge whether the event occurred due to global warming because records on the sea water around the glacier have only been kept since 2003. The flow of sea water below the glaciers is one of the main causes of ice calvings off Greenland.
“Nobody can claim this was caused by global warming. On the other hand nobody can claim that it wasn’t,” Muenchow said.
Scientists have said the first six months of 2010 have been the hottest globally on record. The El Nino weather pattern has contributed to higher temperatures, but many scientists say elevated levels of man-made greenhouse gases are pushing temperatures higher.
The initial discovery of the calving was made by Trudy Wohlleben of the Canadian Ice Service.
The ice island could fuse to land, break up into smaller pieces, or slowly move south where it could block shipping, Muenchow said.
The last time such a large ice island formed was in 1962 when the Ward Hunt Ice Shelf calved an island. Smaller pieces of that chunk became lodged between real islands inside Nares Strait.”
Another professor who makes sure he does leave the door open for more funding…
The recently snapped-off chunk of Pederman Glacier in Greenland was a result of 20km movement over the period August 2007 to August 2010. Must be some serious buildup in Greenland to shove that much ice, that far, in that short of a time frame.
Excuse me while I grab a mouthful of helium.
jakers says:
August 8, 2010 at 10:29 am
Has anybody actually looked at the satellite images lately? http://exploreourpla.net/explorer/?map=Arc&sat=ter&lon=0&lat=89,9&lvl=4&yir=2010&dag=219
The ice looks like it’s thin enough to be getting blown apart across nearly the whole arctic basin. It’s really spreading out. Wish we had an archive of these images to compare prior years.
________
I’ve looked at it quite extensively and it my whole point about divergence (also mentioned by Julienne on a recent post). Common sense actually tells you if you spread ice cubes out on a warm table, it may appear (in a 2-dimensional way) that you have more, but in fact, if anything, the melt rates increase as you have more ice in contact with the warm table.
But even with the concentration data we have, although useful, we still need the CryoSat 2 data to give us a some true volume data. I would hope that next year perhaps we’ll get a Sea Ice Volume chart similar to the Extent chart that we have now, and it will be data and not a model. (Julienne, would this even possible from the CryoSat 2 data or do we know yet?)
Rod Everson says:
August 8, 2010 at 10:40 am
Your links are trying to compare DMI 80N temps with SST anomalies.
Try this:
http://polar.ncep.noaa.gov/sst/ophi/color_sst_NPS_ophi0.png
R. Gates
I’ll take that as a a “no.”
stevengoddard says:
August 8, 2010 at 10:38 am
jakers
I will put you down as forecasting a huge melt the rest of the month.
You can say the, um, oddest things…
So, what’s your take then on the images – you tend to never mention them, so maybe you don’t look at them or think it’s significant to eye-ball them?
stevengoddard says:
August 8, 2010 at 10:39 am
noiv,
In 2007, ice extent was critically important. Now that it is recovering, that metric is no longer important.
I think they’re hoping what has happened since 2007 will go away. Hoping something will go away is nothing new:
“The Americans are not here. We are pushing them back. We are cleaning them out.”
~ Baghdad Bob
Rod Everson says:
August 8, 2010 at 10:40 am
Can someone please reconcile these two graphs, one of temps above 80 degrees north from DMI showing below average temps currently and the other from NOAA (via R. Gates) showing above average temps currently. It would appear the first would generate a negative anomaly while the second shows a generally positive anomaly.
DMI: http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/meant80n.uk.php
NOAA: http://polar.ncep.noaa.gov/sst/ophi/color_anomaly_NPS_ophi0.png
Either two data sources are reporting diametrically opposed data, or I clearly don’t understand what’s going on. Maybe SST is measuring something other than surface temps? Is that it?
_________
They are measuring two different things, but I think you need to understand that the DMI “data” is a model, and not actual data as it uses ERA40 reanalysis data. Julienne spoke to this on a recent post and is far more qualified to address it, but in general, I don’t look at DMI “data” as a reliable guage. It might show you general trends.
Retired Engineer./ re Catlin
The answer to you question Sir is;
the world has to many idiots, Catlin, ( who is a prime example ) was fortunate enough to find some fellow travels who had deep pockets, after giving a ‘show’ the ticket holders not to compound their error, tip-toed out the fire exit.
The DMI page: http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/meant80n.uk.php has an interesting feature. You can quickly click from year to year and get graphs of the data for each year starting in 1958. I did that and noticed something I found interesting.j
If you start in 1958, looking only at the summer months when the temp is above 273 K, it’s interesting how little variation there is from the average temp for that day. Almost none for the first 20 years or so. (My understanding of this phenomenon is that the ice prevents the air temperature from rising, much like water in a glass of ice responds as long as there’s ice remaining, but my understanding might be incorrect.)
Now, if you keep clicking through the years, you’ll start to see a bit more variation. 21 of the remaining 33 years (1978-2010) I would characterize as varying quite a bit from the average, especially considering the behavior from 1958-77.
The years 1978 and 1986 appear somewhat colder; otherwise the years from 1979 to 1989 fit the pattern from 1958 to 1977. Then, starting in 1990 things start jumping around and some years are clearly warmer than average (in the summer), some clearly colder, and some are erratic.
Here’s a breakdown:
Warmer than average: 1990, 91, 93, 94, 95, 98.
Erratic around the average: 1992, 97, 2000, 01, 07, 08
Colder than average (besides 78 and 86): 1996, 2003, 04, 05, 06, 09 and now 2010 the coldest of all it would appear.)
Only 1999 and 2002 tracked the average closely during the years 1990 to present.
Note now the warm years. All were in the 1990’s when most everyone agreed the average global temps were rising.
And now note the cold years: Aside from one random appearance in each decade from 1970 through the 1990’s, all of the six of the remaining cold years appear from 2003 to 2010, again with this year clearly the coldest of all. This corresponds to the period when many are saying the earth is cooling again, while others are arguing that it’s hotter than ever. However, for many of the warmists, the Arctic has become their “canary in the coal mine.” If so, the canary isn’t singing if we look directly at the variable we’re most concerned with, i.e., the actual temperature as measure directly by a thermometer, instead of spending day after day looking at a proxy for temperature (ice extent, area, volume) that we can’t easily measure and that is apparently also subject to wind, waves and other extraneous variables, including previous years’ conditions.
Or are we to not believe the DMI? Someone did comment a while back that one of their thermometer readings appeared stuck at -20 degrees C. But was it stuck for the past decade? I realize I’m only looking at a few months of each year, but it still seems to me to be relevant somehow. Thoughts?
From: Robert on August 8, 2010 at 9:07 am
Do note this previous WUWT article:
Scripps: Antarctic Ice Shelf Collapse Possibly Triggered by Ocean Waves
Good reading.
“….with the negative AO index, we saw warmer temps over Greenland while the cold air was pushed south (to Florida, of all places!).”
====================================
So?? Snow and cold events in Florida are not unheard of throughout its history.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_snow_events_in_Florida
And just because it was orange and red in Greenland this past winter, R, compared to the blues and purples in Florida, does NOT mean [LOL] that it was all freaky-thawy warm up there in Greenland last winter.
Against the means, yes….but still below freezing.
As to the Arctic Oscillation, it went profoundly negative in 1899, 1908, 1935, 1940, 1947, 1969…and many other negatives. See for yourself.
http://jisao.washington.edu/ao/aojfm18992002.jpgone
None of it, the Arctic Oscillation, the Florida purple and the Greenland and NE Canada orange of last Winter, has nothing to do with anything, and is ALL within the realms of natural variability.
Your posts are sometimes 75% interesting and informed, but sometimes 75% ridiculous.
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
wayne says: ” .. JAXA showed a tiny uptick to the area. This morning, gone. Anyone else notice ?”
I closely watched the daily JAXA sea ice extent data during August/September in the last couple of years. Didn’t hold onto the data.
To recollection, initial daily data in the trough has tended to come out on the low side, as it tended to be revised upward (increasing the extent) for a period after initial publication. Don’t know why this might be.
Also April 2010 was highest in the sea ice extent series. Again, I did not keep the data, but the high appears to have diminished somewhat since first published.
I’d urge a good dash of caution when initial data comes out across the August/September trough.
stevengoddard says:
August 8, 2010 at 10:39 am
noiv,
In 2007, ice extent was critically important. Now that it is recovering, that metric is no longer important.
________
Steve, you have actually made the call that Arctic sea extent is “recovering”? Hmmm….seems a tad bit premature I’d say. Sort of like your excitement during the March-April “bump up” event this year, where even the much beloved skeptic pundit Rush Limbaugh was claiming the Arctic sea ice was recovering, only to see the steep decline we saw in May and June.
I personally would think no “recovery” of Arctic sea ice extent could even be seen for several years, during which time the summer minimum would have to consistently rise into the 6, 7 and 8 million km. range. Anyway, that would be the scientific standard for a recovery, but I understand there may be other standards that have nothing to do with science.
For some reason that above link would not post. Let me try that again…
http://jisao.washington.edu/ao/aojfm18992002.jpg
The professor said:
“The last time such a large ice island formed was in 1962 when the Ward Hunt Ice Shelf calved an island. Smaller pieces of that chunk became lodged between real islands inside Nares Strait.”
————————————————————-
1962 was in the middle of a period (1955-1969) when arctic sea ice volume was estimated to be rapidly growing.
http://psc.apl.washington.edu/zhang/IDAO/retro.html#Satellite_ice
“Nobody can claim this was caused by global warming. On the other hand nobody can claim that it wasn’t,” Muenchow said.
Nobody can claim this was caused by the fairies at the bottom of my garden. On the other hand ….
stevengoddard says:
August 8, 2010 at 10:10 am
Scott
Just back from a nice ride in the mountains.
I’ve noticed that it is a common occurrence for ice to take a downtick right around NSIDC newsletter time.
GeoFlynx – The only NSIDC newsletter this year, not given at the usual beginning of the month, was the one on July 20, 2010. On July 20, NSIDC announced a change in circulation, the dipole anomaly, during a pronounced “UPTICK”. I do not see your comment here as being objective or fair to the good people at the NSIDC.
http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/
R. Gates says:
But as always, if you’re forecast of guess of 5.5 million sq. km. (or is it now 6.0?) is closer than my forecast of 4.5 million sq. km….then it will Mea Maxima Culpa…but either way I win, as my ultimate goal is to learn.
===================================
There is nothing in your arrogant accusations to Steve of being intentionally “misleading”….or in the nonsensical last statement here above…that gives any evidence whatsoever that your “ultimate goal is to learn.”
I guess religious dogmatics can say their “ultimate goal is to learn” etc.
But when they already deductively have their minds made up, they can say all they want that they are open minded.
Their agenda, however, precedes everything they say and clouds their ability to think.
In religion, I guess it can be said that metaphysics are in charge, so arguably, they could be cut a little more slack when it comes to using deductive reasoning.
In the scientific method, there is no such wiggle room.
Inductive is the only way to go when it comes to science, and every time you open your mouth to speak, there is a pre-determined agenda of deductions, deductions, assumptions, assumptions.
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
stevengoddard said
August 8, 2010 at 10:38 am
jakers
“I will put you down as forecasting a huge melt the rest of the month”.
——–
Maybe he is suggesting the other way, large extent? If the temps are low as you claim and the wind is making the remaining spread apart then it will be a high extent as little melting of that ice, even though it is ripe for it. Or perhaps not 🙂
Your estimate is still looking ok at 5.5, perhaps won’t be too far away. I went for 4.9, still possible, it’s pretty finely balance this year. Where is that poster on here who put in 1.0 has the calculation on the prediction website ? What are his thoughts now I wonder, it always was a bit wacky.
Not sure I agree with your Antarctic thoughts on it being a record, it seems to be coming back in. However the Antarctic can be quite spiky around maxima so you may well be right.
Andy