Our one stop shopping Sea Ice Page has quickly become a world wide favorite, and Joe Bastardi of AccuWeather uses some of the graphics offered there.
To watch the AccuWeather broadcast go to:
http://www.accuweather.com/video.asp?channel=vbbastaj
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Steve Goddard writes that so far, “steady as a rock” and offers some interesting analysis:
At the beginning of June, I observed that the PIPS ice distribution in 2010 was very similar to 2006. The distributions were nearly identical, with 2010 average thickness a little lower than 2006.
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. 2006 had the highest minimum (and smallest maximum) in the DMI record. Like 2010, the ice was compressed and thick in 2006. Conclusion : Should we expect a nice recovery this summer due to the thicker ice? You bet ya.
Since then we have read seemingly endless hysterics by Joe Romm and government sources about record melt rates, and how clueless and ignorant my analysis has been. So let’s look at what has actually happened since June 1. The graph below shows JAXA extent since June 1 for 2006 and 2010.
Basically, they are two parallel lines. 2010 has tracked 2006 quite closely – just as PIPS said they should. There have been no major diversions from the pattern this summer. Summer 2010 has been almost a straight line. Apparently some bloggers “can’t see the forest for the trees.”
In the DMI record, 2010 has passed every year except 2005 and 2006. The only real question now is – will 2010 end up in the #2 or #3 spot?
Closeup below:
At the end of May, Mark Serreze and Joe Romm had a different take for 2010:
“Could we break another record this year? I think it’s quite possible,” said Mark Serreze of the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colo.
We are in the fourth quarter of the 2010 game. The score right now is :
Breathtakingly Ignorant* WUWT – 1
Experts – 0
Will the peer reviewed experts score at the last minute? What do you think?
* A term coined by Dr. Mark Serrezze
SG on June 2: “Conclusion : Should we expect a nice recovery this summer due to the thicker ice? You bet ya. Even if all the ice less than 2.5 metres thick melted this summer, we would still see a record high minimum in the DMI charts.”
Mark Serreze on May 20: “Could we break another record this year? I think it’s quite possible.”
The results to date:
“Arctic sea ice extent averaged for July was the second lowest in the satellite record, after 2007. After a slowdown in the rate of ice loss, the old, thick ice that moved into the southern Beaufort Sea last winter is beginning to melt out.”
http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/
SG – 0.0
MS – 0.8
This is why we don’t let students grade themselves.
Up coming:
“Cool, stormy weather this July has made it less likely that the upcoming 2010 sea ice minimum will set a new record. It would take a very unusual set of conditions in August to create a new record low.”
http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/
Side topic: Is Antarctica Melting?
http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/20100108_Is_Antarctica_Melting.html
http://www.nasa.gov/images/content/416685main_20100108_Climate_1.jpg
Arctic ice appears to be declining consistently, in every calendar month:
Jan: -3.2% per decade.
Feb: -2.9% per decade.
Mar: -2.6% per decade.
Apr: -2.6% per decade.
May: -2.41% per decade.
Jun: -3.5% per decade.
Jul: -6.1% per decade.
Aug: -8.7% per decade.
Sep: -11.2% per decade.
Oct: -5.9% per decade.
Nov: -4.5% per decade.
Dec: -3.3% per decade.
Where is there any evidence of a ‘recovery’?
The question R. Gates raises needs a better answer, perhaps one only Joe Bastardi can answer. However, the Northern Hemisphere is a very large place so maybe a little more geographical detail is called for. Are we talking about Cuba and the Yamal Peninsula or other parts of the N. Hemisphere?
Pamela Gray (in NE Oregon, I think) and I (in WA State east of the Cascades) have personal interest in the USA’s Pac. N. W. However, others might actually mean places farther north when asking about a “brutally cold N. Hemisphere winter.”
Also, where I live if we get a week of -15 F (-26 C) during January that would be considered brutally cold. If one lives in Ft. Nelson, B.C. that same temperature would not seem so extreme.
As Pamela indicates for the PNW the coming winter might be very snowy or less so with more cold, but “brutally cold” doesn’t seem to be on the way. That still leaves a lot of the N. Hemisphere not accounted for though.
So, to get these sorts of discussions to a more informative level there needs to be more concern for location and timing.
but..but..it’s all rotten ice. Yeah, that’s the ticket. (Must be at least 30 to understand the reference)
pgosselin says:
August 9, 2010 at 10:50 am
Why haven’t we heard any forecasts from Hadley? Why is it that all the warmists have stopped making forecasts?
Just a couple of years ago they were all out there hollering them to the world.
Their silence is deafening.
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Yes.
Also, the silence from Hansen, Gore, and the whole AGW presbytery is deafening, for sure.
Reminds me of when the ultimate spin-doctor & bureaucrat, Ellsworth Toohey, in Ayn Rand’s The Fountainhead, was asked why he did not speak up against his arch-enemy [the book’s protagonist and gifted architect], Howard Roark, Toohey replied, to the effect:
“No. I will not speak out against him. I simply will not acknowledge him.”
So that little game [of not acknowledging] is played over and over throughout history, between the people who have integrity, and who have an HONEST product [be it the design of a building, or good thorough science]…and between those who thrive on some sort of spin or political agenda.
In a similar vein….expect the prophets of AGW doom and gloom….such as Hansen and Gore….to keep silent and not ever, ever acknowledge that they were wrong.
Expect them to continue to use their Holdrens and Markeys to keep trying to marginalize and vilify those scientists who dare to speak out against the scam…each of those scientists at their own peril and risk of being ostracized from the political force of modern “peer review.”
And expect the Ellsworth Tooheys of the climate scare industry to turn up the deafening silence.
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
Pamela Gray says:
August 9, 2010 at 10:04 am
“During La Nina under a warm Atlantic, northern winters on both coasts become more severe temperature and snow wise. ……”
That is as good an explanation than any of the other prognosticators I’ve seen. Nice and to the point.
Warm water with cold temps = snow.
Cold water with cold temps = bitter cold.
La Nina and a cool PDO doesn’t bode well for upper latitudes of the NH, mix in an inactive sun, and we can easily see why we have all the dire predictions of a harsh winter. Then, factor in the AMO……Of course, the intervention of some otherwise unforeseen event could nix the whole fortune telling process.
What I find disconcerting is prior to the legislatures and bureaucracies attempt to govern these natural processes, I gave little thought or effort to understanding the weather/climate on anything other than a very local scale(that’s what we have meteorologists for). I have literally been forced to educate myself on matters of very little import to the personal improvement of myself or the improvement of my environment. I’m now familiar with terms and acronyms that should have never been part of the average person’s vernacular. I bitterly resent the hold on my life the alarmists have forced upon me and the people like me. Can one imagine the achievements of mankind had the world not paused to consider(out of necessity) the CAGW fabrication? The reason we don’t have a viable alternative to fossil fuels is because the alarmists have forced the areas of concentration to fit their world view/theology(what the hell ever happened to hydrogen?). The reason why world hunger is as prevalent today is because of the alarmists exasperation of land and fuel use and funds. While the world is forced to understand the multi-directional emissivity of CO2, the world waits for answers to the human condition. Text books are now written in direct conflict to basic and fundamental principles in mathematics. We haven’t just paused, we’ve taken several steps back and perhaps altered(thwarted) mankind’s progress forever. So, we wait for the cures of cancer and Alzheimer’s and the rest so we can settle this question of man’s control over the weather as our loved ones fall by the wayside. THANKS TO ALL CAGW/CC ALARMISTS Nero didn’t have sh*t on you guys.
Pam, obviously, that diatribe wasn’t directed towards you in any manner. I was merely trying to add to your thoughts and the flow of my thinking veered to the tangential. I loathe those SOBs.
R. Gates says:
August 9, 2010 at 8:15 am
General question, if anybody knows: Where does Joe Bastardi’s “brutally cold N. Hemisphere winter” for this upcoming winter come from? What is the basis? I don’t follow him at all, but I’d be curious to find out his basis for forecasting. I’ve also heard others mention this before here on WUWT, but not heard the reasoning why in any detail.
Email him and he will tell you and if you were not such a die hard agw religious fanatic you would have been taking in everybody’s opinion and would therefore know precisely where Joe gets his forecasts. He has explained it time and time again but you do have to read it to know it, of course.
Well I already knew I was a special baby; nobody in history, was ever born more ignorant than me; and wouldn’t you know it; I was breathtaking; pretty much from the moment of birth.
And since then I have had my ignorance challenged; discarding falsehood after falsehood; and quite often with teachers like Joe Romm; who seem to instruct in the “Andy Capp” mode:- “Forra me mate; (burp), I’ll gecha ‘ome (hick) in dis fog; I knows evry ditch in (hick) London; “splash !”; see deres one now (burp) ! ”
Yes many’s the time I learned something by not accepting carte blanche what “experts” proclaimed; but didn’t support with rational argument. So I had to map out my own drainage ditches; and yes like Andy; I have stepped in a few myself; but seldom twice in the same one. And I’ve had useful help from strangers who grabbed my arm before I went under.
I don’t think I know much about Arctic ice; or why it does what it does; but given the relatively short observational history; as well as anecdotal histories of Arctic events; I’m always amazed at how the “experts” are gung ho to sally forth, over the thin and often rotten ice; and peg their reputations to statements that will be sustained or falsified in our; and their lifetimes.
I’m too chicken; and still too ignorant to make any bets; but Steve Goddard and other WUWT denizens have been doing pretty well at it so far this season.
And 2010 ice does seem to be getting curiouser, and curiouser.
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Tom P says:
August 9, 2010 at 9:29 am
Steve,
You persist in miscalculating the ice values from the PIPS 2.0 data. You need to include concentration as well as thickness in deriving both the total ice volume as well as the average thickness.
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Sea ice concentration appears to compare the sea ice extent with some arbitrarily selected area. I’m not getting how this improves the presentation of trends given that it introduces an arbitrary component. How does use of sea ice concentration improve the data analysis? Why should it be used?
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/08/09/bastardis-monday-sea-ice-report-plus-new-analysis-of-2010-ice-distribution/#comment-452460
That last uptick to 90+ flux is solely the result of a solar flare arriving at the exact moment the flux was measured. Even the NOAA SWPC acknowledged that and corrected the value to 85, closer to the few days before that.
http://leif.org/research/TSI-SORCE-Latest.png
Icarus says:
August 9, 2010 at 11:50 am
If you were to suddenly wake up today from a 10-year sleep, look at the statistics for mortgage backed securities and nothing else, you would be then inclined to spend every last dime you had on them?
Note that the statistical trend blind to what is currently happening.
Icarus
Even if the summer minimum was 19 million, NSIDC could still claim a downwards trend from the unusually high ice conditions of the early 1980s.
____________
Is it here, here or you might very soon find it here.
Icarus why don’t you take a peek at the other end of the Earth and tell me whether or not you see a ‘recovery’ there. click
Why do I think it will be cold this winter? We have an astronomical society where I live and their spokesperson was talking on local radio about the solar minimum.The coldest weather in winter often happens after the shortest day when days are getting longer and it is the same with solar minimum as this sunspot cycle gets going winters will continue to be cold for some years to come. We will see if that is true.
James, no offense at all taken. I’ve always been interested in weather pattern variation (what AGWers mistakenly refer to as climate change) so I’m not upset that I have this strange way of talking. You should hear the folks here in NE Oregon talk “tractor speak”. They can say whole sentences about their favorite tractor and say it mostly in numbers. “1392-5?” Yep but not like the 1532-45. The 145569283-3298 is better than the 12482-=8i2w71 AND runs on that new 28743u9-$^&#@ing engine! One helluva tractor!
I made a mistake yesterday in saying I thought JAXA-IARC area on the chart had turned north overnight but I must have not been paying much attention. Today it’s apparent I was instead looking at NORSEX-ROOS sea ice area, it shows clearly a turn has been made and is now showing the re-freezing that is occuring.
Re: Tom P on August 9, 2010 at 9:29 am
Summary:
Got it. Thank you for playing. Come back for the results sometime in September.
George E. Smith
Your post reminded me of ….
While most in this blog seem to be worrying about what YOUR NH winter will be like, anecdotally South Australia (Adelaide Hills) is colder than a witches t??. For the hemispherically-challenged, the SH is in winter mode atm.
Several people in this area who have lived here for many (up to 50) years have mentioned how cold it is this year, our meteorologists keep teasing us with predictions/forecasts of 17C days then change within a day to lower temps and we have rarely seen the sun over the past 4-5 weeks.
Send some of your global warming this way guys.
Lets see:
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=8074
http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/2008/091608.html
From: Icarus on August 9, 2010 at 11:50 am
If it has been consistently declining in every calendar month, then how can both the IARC-JAXA area and extent graphs be showing March 2010 above March 2009?
In what context was there ‘unusually high ice’? A recent study by the Northern Arizona University and the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) finds that Arctic temperature has been rising for the last 100 years or so –
http://www2.ucar.edu/news/arctic-warming-overtakes-2000-years-natural-cooling
It seems counter-intuitive that there would be ‘unusually high ice’ after most of a century of warming. Do you have any evidence for this claim? Is there any reliable data on Arctic ice extent *before* the 1980s (i.e. before the satellite era)?
Tom P
I must have done something wrong, because I am getting all the right answers.
The experts do everything right, that is why they get the wrong answers.
Oh please. By all means explain to me how these graphs do *not* show a consistent decline. Arguing against a long-term decline by comparing two consecutive years is just arrant nonsense, and I’m sure Steven Goddard would agree with me on that.