This week was a true roller coaster ride with Arctic Sea Ice. It is best summed up by looking at the JAXA graph for extent, shown below:
Below, see the area of interest magnified.
I’ve added the 5 million square kilometer line for reference.
The roller coaster ride actually looked for a day like it might cross the 2009 line, but soon turned down again, ending this week at 5,142,813. Here’s the recent JAXA data
08,28,2010,5342656 08,29,2010,5352500 08,30,2010,5348281 08,31,2010,5329375 09,01,2010,5332344 09,02,2010,5304219 09,03,2010,5245625 09,04,2010,5192188 09,05,2010,5142813
Source: http://www.ijis.iarc.uaf.edu/seaice/extent/plot.csv
JAXA sea ice area has dropped to 2008 levels:
JAXA AMSR-E Sea Ice Area – click to enlarge
Sea ice concentration from JAXA:
While JAXA shows extent now lower than 2009, DMI and NANSEN plots show it to be about even. The differences in observing sensor/platform AMSRE -vs-SSMI and methodologies at agencies are in play.
Above: Danish Meteorological Institute Arctic Sea Ice Extent – 30% or greater. Note that while this graph shows 30% concentration at the cutoff point, it is valuable to compare.
Above: NANSEN Artic ROOS- Sea ice extent 15% or greater – click for larger image
The differences appear to be in the low end of concentration, the 15% to 30% range. It suggests that the brief gains we saw may be wind related, blowing floating ice around, compacting it when winds are strong versus allowing expansion when winds are weak.
Temperature, after holding near freezing, now appears headed sharply downward.
Above: Danish Meteorological Institute – Mean Temperature above 80°N
Some light refreezing may take place before the end of September, which could minimize the ability of wind to sharply change extent like we saw recently.
With all these variables in play, choosing a winner will be as much a game of luck as of skill. Based on what we’ve seen, it seems probable that it will come from the middle of the pack between 2008 and 2009.
From SEARCH:
The estimates from the scientific community range from 4.0 to 5.6 million square kilometers, with 8 of the contributors suggesting a September minimum below 5.0 million square kilometers, 3 contributors suggesting a minimum of 5.0 million square kilometers, and 5 contributors suggesting a September minimum above 5.0 million square kilometers. Two contributors forecast a September minimum below that of 2007 at 4.0 million square kilometers and 3 contributors suggest a return to the long term downward linear trend for September sea ice loss (5.5 to 5.6 million square kilometers). None of the contributors indicate a return to the climatological sea ice extent of 6.7 million square kilometers.
Including all 18 contributions gives a September ice extent minimum of 4.8 +/- 0.77 million square kilometers, with a range of 2.5 to 5.6 million square kilometers.
Individual responses were based on a range of methods: statistical, numerical models, comparison with previous observations and rates of ice loss, or composites of several approaches.
Confirmed JAXA 15% extent for Sept 5th is in: 5136094 (the provisional was 5142813, quite a difference). Updated charts …
15-day: http://img26.imageshack.us/img26/6458/15day20100905.png
7-day: http://img683.imageshack.us/img683/4774/7day20100905.png
At the risk of “too many lines” confusion, I’ve added 2003 to the 7-day chart to show how violent these swings can get. While as Anthony notes above, the DMI above 80N temp is falling rapidly it still seems on the high side to me. Maybe we’re heading east and long, much as Joe Bastardi has been saying.
Given all this is a bit like using a 24” chocolate pipe wrench as a micrometer, who knows where we’ll eventually end up? A lot of heat could get sucked up along the way though. Time to fetch in more popcorn, this could drag on a while :-).
On one thing Neil is correct, we are ants on this planet. Nothing we do or do not do will stop the Earth from doing what it does best: causing extinction to the dominant forms of life. Once we accept the inevitable and move on, we will all be much happier.
I really love the guilt trips alarmists try to put on me. Good try, but I still do not feel guilty about breathing and using energy. If you feel bad, go turn your computer off and join a hunting-gathering society. No one will stop you, it is a free country.
You can’t preach to people and not follow what you preach.
Oh, I have an idea, I will guilt you. Why do you not care about my children? You are using a computer and consuming energy and making their futures bleak!! Stop it Neil, stay off the computer and internet!
What is clear already this year is that the Arctic Sea ice continues the pattern of a long-term downward trend. The brief so-called “recovery” in 2008-2009, was of course no real recovery at all and my guess is probably only brought about by the natural variability, the long and deep solar minimum, and the 2008 La Nina. From a purely scientific and mathematical perspective, any truly objective person, knowing that climate is seen over the longer term would have to say that indeed, there is no recovery and the 2008-2009 period was at best a levelling to the dramatic slide seen in 2007, but now in 2010, the downward trend continues.
Earlier in the season, much was being made by AGW skeptics about the “dramatic increase” in MY ice, and how it was going to stick around through this melt season and that the “recovery” was continuing etc. In fact, pretty much the exact opposite has happened. Much of that MY ice has been melted away as the total amount of ice loss in 2010, from the March 31 peak to the approaching low is at record levels– meaning more ice has melted this season than any other. This frustrates the AGW skeptics I’m sure (at least those who are dogmatic about their skepticism), but I would suggest that they instead, use it as a motiviation to try to really understand what the Arctic is doing and more importantly, the bigger picture as to why. The very smart people at the NSIDC and other institutions may not get things exactly right all the time, (as you can’t with any system on the edge of chaos) but I fully trust that they have a good grasp on the bigger picture, and that within the lifetime of most people posting here, we will indeed see an ice free summer Arctic.
Any chance of depicting a deseasonalized monthly trend of Arctic sea ice extend from (say) 1998? Descriptive rather than definitive, yes, but valuable as a projective baseline for future developments. Add a heuristic element in light of historically valid forecasts, and the resulting graph would supply a more intelligible if not necessarily more accurate means of extrapolating probable conditions.
Polar bears won’t drown this year too, that’s good, ice cover it is above 2007 and 2008 averages.
Personally I would like to see all the ice melt. Warmer is truly better. Very warm is best. (now who is smart enough to ask what I mean by warm and very warm?)
That is a pretty graph of yet another natural cycle. What will be the next great false panic? Second coming of who, what? Miserable overal summer here on the edge of the arctic. We are all gonna freeze? Oh right did that one in 70’s. Malignant rashes from continuous bedwetting?That it, the great rash of doom. When do the Catlin nitwits go forth in the new year? I can’t wait for more, “We are in the arctic and its so cold”. Still I anticipate some real courtcases by Christmas, lying for profit, abuse of position ect. Indeed from the hysteria of the team and their useful idiots, the end is near.
wow, R. Gates. you and your really smart friends can tell all that from a 30 year trend, which could be part of some natural cycles that are 60 or more years long? I have a 30 year trend of hair loss. Can you look in your crystal ball and tell me when the top of my head will be “hair free?” Or will I bake to death before then?
R. Gates says:
September 6, 2010 at 8:48 am
What is clear already this year is that the Arctic Sea ice continues the pattern of a long-term downward trend. The brief so-called “recovery” in 2008-2009, was of course no real recovery at all and my guess is probably only brought about by the natural variability, the long and deep solar minimum, and the 2008 La Nina. From a purely scientific and mathematical perspective, any truly objective person, knowing that climate is seen over the longer term would have to say that indeed, there is no recovery and the 2008-2009 period was at best a levelling to the dramatic slide seen in 2007, but now in 2010, the downward trend continues.
So, mathematically, you can’t judge a recovery from two years – that’s natural variability. But you can confirm, with absolute confidence, a return to a downward trend by a single year?
I do try to be objective in posting but I’m afraid, mathematically, that’s just plain stupid.
I’m astonished that there are still people — see posts above — who cling stubbornly to the man-causes-global-warming mysticism. Their behavior is akin to an 18-year-old adult who still believes in Santa Claus despite all the evidence to the contrary.
Remember way back in February 2010, when AGW skeptics were still optimistic that the two year “recovery” from the record 2007 Arctic sea ice summer melt would continue ?
Prediction: Arctic Ice Will Continue to Recover This Summer
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/02/09/prediction-arctic-ice-will-continue-to-recover-this-summer/
69.75% of WUWT readers thought that the 2010 Summer Arctic Sea Ice Extent would be greater than in 2009. Anthony Watts and Steven Goddard predicted that “we’d see another 500,000 km2 of Arctic sea ice recovery in 2010” (since IARC-JAXA minimum was 5,249,844 km2 in 2009, that would have been about 5,750,000 km2 minimum this September)
This sea ice extent was passed on August 20th, 2010.
These attitudes and predictions made good sense, if you happen to believe that anthropogenic global warming is not happening: 2007 was just weird weather, winds like that hadn’t been seen since satellite data started in 1972. We saw 2008 and 2009 bounce back from that crazy summer low, and 2010 would continue the recovery.
The 2009 summer minimum was passed on September 3, 2010
What would someone who believes that the planet’s climatologists are competent predict ?
Way before summer started, I predicted the summer minimum would be less than 2009:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/05/15/sea-ice-graphs-have-limited-predictive-value/#comment-391310
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/06/06/wuwt-arctic-sea-ice-news-8/#comment-404240
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/06/06/wuwt-arctic-sea-ice-news-8/#comment-404352
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/07/04/sea-ice-news-12/#comment-424592
If you understand climatic trends, you don’t have to frantically change your prediction from 5.5 million sq km to 5.1 million sq km in late August, like some well known AGW skeptics.
Brent Hargreaves says:
September 6, 2010 at 4:18 am
“There is conjecture that a black hole is at the centre of our galaxy. Has anybody told the polticians? They’ll want to find out whose fault this is, and what to do about it!”
Brent, we know the answer. There will be no proper investigation into the science of blackholes and how they are created nor there effect. The politicians will simply decare that black holes are a recent manmade phenomenon, will cause unimaginble disasters if not brought under control and curtailed and will then tax us all. The financial whizkids will set up a new exchange dealing in blackhole offsets. The real problem is that government finance is the real blackhole and a bottomless pit in which we must all be forced to throw away our hard earned money. No one can spend money like a politician, mind you it is always easier to spend someone else’s money than your own.
On a technical aside, does anyone know what is the real effect of diminishing ice on albedo given the angle of incident? How reflective is water at these low angles of incident?
R. Gates says:
September 6, 2010 at 8:48 am
What is clear already this year is that the Arctic Sea ice continues the pattern of a long-term downward trend
========================================
I know we’re only looking at 8-9 years on these charts.
Serious question:
No matter how high ice was in March, it goes back to normal in June.
No matter how low ice was in Sept, it goes back to normal in Dec.
And normal is defined by the fact the little lines criss cross all over themselves in June and Dec.
Where’s the trend?
Doesn’t that just tell you that weather controls the highs and lows, but it keeps going back to normal? Every year, no matter how high or low, at the same time every year, it all re-groups within a very small margin of normal.
Seems as if someone is getting the message that the Ice caps are not melting as fast as orginally thought, wonder when the penny is going to fully drop.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1309490/Ice-caps-melting-half-speed-predicted.html
When tracking cause and effect of Arctic ice extent, what variables are simultaneously measured? Is there sorting for temperature? Wind direction and speed? Air quality (i.e. the presence of particulate) Cloud cover? Clearly the overriding factor is seasonal temperature. However, ice extent variations from year to year or within the seasonal cycle itself are not well understood. The easy (and lazy) answer is to jump to the conclusion that it’s solely due to temperature with little acknowledgment or exploration of other influences. It seems to me when the filling of your purse depends on only temperature mattering and you also control tracking and dissemination of data, there would be a very strong incentive to disregard any other factors. However, as the saying goes, if you live by the sword, then you die by the sword.
One important point which has not been dealt with explicitly concerns what was predicted in 2007 which was talked of as a ‘tipping point’. The arguments about the albedo of ice versus open water and the positive feedback effect of reduced ice seemed sound – yet the ice seems to be recovering.
Some people have commented on sea level rise. Since 1970 global sea levels have risen by 10 cm and temperatures by 0.6 C. This implies a rate of rise around 16.7. In previous interglacials sea levels have been from 3 m to 20 m higher than they are now. Taking the lowest figure of 3m and inverting the realtionship suggests that temperatures were 18 C higher than today – nonsense of course.
What these two factoids demonstrate is that much work has to be done to improve the accuracy of projected impacts of climate change.
Whilst I agree (at least in part) with some of the points raised by R. Gates in his post of September 6, 2010 at 8:48 am, I do not see why even if they were fully correct this frustrates sceptics. Most sceptics are not arguing that the world is not warming (although the extent and pace of any warming is a matter of debate) and accordingly most sceptics do not have a problem with Artic ice loss. I, for one, do not think ‘the decline in artic ice extent continues, gosh, those warmist must (after all) be right about AGW’
The issue is whether this is just some aspect of natural variability (which is my own view) or whether it is due to manmade CO2 emissions.
We all know the arguments about the reduced extent of ice cover in the late 1880s and the 1930s etc and that there is no quantative and qualative evidence that manmade CO2 emissions are the driver behind any recent warming so I will not repeat these.
From the warmist perspective whilst they may point to a reduction in Artic ice extent, they have a problem with increased Antartic ice which increase does not fit their models.
Their position will become more difficult should over the course of the next 10 years, the extent of Artic ice begins to show signs of recovery since such a long term trend would again go against their models.
What global warming in the Arctic this year?
Did I miss something?
I don’t think so:
http://www.robertb.darkhorizons.org/TempGr/meanT_2010vs58-09.jpg
See that white space under the very middle of the ‘melt season’ range?
That is where the temp in the Arctic fell back to freezing and left the 49 year range.
For most of the ‘summer melt’, the temp above 80 North was at the lower end of that 49 year range of temp.
It is now at the high end of that range…. after falling below freezing.
Nothing in this years temperature above 80N indicates a warming planet. Nothing.
There is something that happened up there that indicates exactly the opposite.
Anu says:
September 6, 2010 at 9:16 am
Whatever melted the ice this year, it was clearly not air-temperature induced from a warming world.
I have posted my proof of that.
Well , all I can say about the melt season is that the small summer melt pool seen in the foreground of the North pole web cam froze solid and dissappeared under fresh snow weeks ago , how come the warth that is destroying millions of tons of ice every day has had no effect whatsoever on the patch of the North Pole we can see with our own eyes . It is a waste of the scientists time putting the cam up if no one is taking any notice of the weather it is showing us .
R. Gates says:
September 6, 2010 at 8:48 am
What is clear already this year is that the Arctic Sea ice continues the pattern of a long-term downward trend.
Just so we can all be on the same page, which year are you cherry picking as the start of your “long term trend”? Thanks in advance.
Phil Nizialek says:
September 6, 2010 at 8:17 am
Well said.
latitude says:
September 6, 2010 at 9:20 am
R. Gates says:
September 6, 2010 at 8:48 am
“What is clear already this year is that the Arctic Sea ice continues the pattern of a long-term downward trend…”
Where’s the trend?
_______
This graph tells the story of the long-term downward trend:
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/seaice.anomaly.arctic.png
If you can’t see it in this graph, you simply don’t want to, and perhaps your supposed “skepticsm” is really your political or other bias?
________________
Joe Horner says:
September 6, 2010 at 9:11 am
So, mathematically, you can’t judge a recovery from two years – that’s natural variability. But you can confirm, with absolute confidence, a return to a downward trend by a single year?
________
First of all, there was no “recovery” in 2008-2009, so you can’t use those years as a guage for a recovery. 2008 and 2009 simply were a levelling to the dramatic drop seen in 2007, but those years did not suddenly bounce back to some pre-2007 ice extent. The only group calling 2008-2009 a “recovery” would be AGW skeptics. 2008 saw more total ice loss from peak to trough than 2007, and continued with a low that was more than 2 standard deviations below the 30 year norm. It looks like this year will see even more total ice area loss from the March 31 peak to the low than even 2008 with the sea ice area perhaps even dropping below 2008. There simply is no way to mathematically or scientifically state there has been a recovery.
I would suggest that some skeptics might actually use this as an opportunity to get beyond the dogmatic platform of “AGW isn’t happening, there is no proof, it’s bad science, etc. to at least consider the possibility that it is happening and that what we’ve seen in the Arctic, not just in sea ice decline, but in permafrost melt, etc. is potential proof.
I’ve stated that I am personally only 75% convinced that AGW is happening, and remain 25% a skeptic. I find this kind of balance to be very healthy, as I read everything I can about what other factors could be causing the warming and changes in the Arctic that we’ve seen. As such, I don’t discount that some longer term solar or ocean cycles could have an influence, and that these longer cycles just are just happening to mimic the effects of what GCM’s predict the 40% increase in CO2 since the 1700’s would cause. I would also sincerely suggest that some of those who are 100% skeptical about AGW, soften their position a bit, maybe to being a 75% skeptic, and 25% open to the notion that human activity could be causing the longer term changes we’re seeing in the Arctic. I know most skeptical posters here on WUWT won’t even consider this, as I fear the truth is their skepticism is more a personal or political stance, rather than one based in science or reason.
Bruce Cobb says:
September 6, 2010 at 10:21 am
Just so we can all be on the same page, which year are you cherry picking as the start of your “long term trend”? Thanks in advance.
Take your pick:
http://nsidc.org/sotc/images/mean_anomaly_1953-2009.png
rbateman says:
September 6, 2010 at 9:50 am
Agreed. Just look at that R. Gates post you referred. In it he claims the “recovery” in 2008 was in part from the La Nina, but he makes no such claim about this years decline with the strong and prolonged El Nino. It is never what Gates says, but what he does not says that interests me. Always leaving out logical thoughts that may counter the fault lying with AGW alone. 75% yeah right he has himself 98% convinced of AGW.