Once again, I’m going to give WUWT readers an opportunity to make a forecast for submission, based on voting. See the poll at the end.
I’ll run this poll each month in the week before the deadline, and we’ll see how we do as the minimum approaches. The value used by ARCUS is the NSIDC value as they say here:
The sea ice monthly extent for September 2010 was 4.9 million square kilometers, based on National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) estimates.
So don’t be using the JAXA graph to forecast minimums, though it it useful for determining short term trends as it is more responsive than the NSDIC graph below, which is averaged.
Here’s the latest JAXA graph:
JAXA AMSR-E Sea Ice Extent -15% or greater – click to enlarge
On May 30th I submitted the results of the first poll to ARCUS to be included in their June Outlook, as shown below:
Download High Resolution Version of Figure 1.
WUWT is second highest, at 5.5 million sq km. Notably missing this year is “Wilson”, who in the last two years started out with impossibly low values such as 1 million sq km. I’ll repeat the poll next week in preparation for the July Outlook. In the meantime, check the WUWT Sea Ice Page for the latest.
Here’s the poll for the ARCUS July outlook, it will run until July 30th at noon EST.
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I went for less than 4.5 because we’re lower than 2007 earlier. However, I haven’t a clue and made a guess in the spirit of counting beans in a large jar. We’ll see how I do.
In the meantime, I’m puzzled. There seems to be a large disconnect between the Arctic and North America at latitude 40 degrees here in Utah. We have had a cold, very long spring. Vegetables that are normally planted here in April are being planted now. If it is so cold and wet here, why isn’t it even colder up there? It is clear I don’t know how the Arctic works. So any help would be welcomed. I figure the La Nina has something to do with it, but I figured it would have made the Arctic cooler too with much more ice extent than is currently showing. I hate making even a guess prediction in line with the Arctic doomsayers. I won’t take any pleasure if I’m right.
Dave Springer @ur momisugly 7:17
says “We know global average temperature has been rising. We got 30 years of satellite data to prove that.”
We do? Check the graph in the link below. I count 13 times that the curve has crossed the zero line. This if for the “global lower atmosphere” that comes from satellite data that you mention. This is a “running, centered 13-month average” – the latest month shown being +.13 C. degrees. I’m hard pressed to claim a warming trend with this data.
http://www.drroyspencer.com/wp-content/uploads/UAH_LT_1979_thru_May_20111.gif
Now if you want to take surface station data and torture it, in-fill, back-fill, project land stations out over the ocean and the Arctic ice – well then, maybe if you squint you can see warming, dying polar bears, and some even claim to see CO2. Not me.
I’m guessing 5.1 to 5.2 — as I did in the poll a month (?) ago.
If anyone wants to really bet on this (using the JAXA figures), here’s the link to it on Intrade:
https://www.intrade.com/v4/markets/contract/?contractId=744206
5.4
4.5
I prefer to err on the pessimistic side:
if I am wrong, and September ice extent will be larger, I’ll be delighted.
I use the following site. Really like it. I studied it before casting my vote. I also visit it daily as it shows ice movement predictions.
https://sites.google.com/site/arcticseaicegraphs/
Thought this was interesting,
The Sahara is getting wetter. Another proxy for cooling? Any correlation between lower solar activity and a wetter Sahara?
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/pf/30639457.html
@ur momisugly John Hultquist: respectfully, I think the warming trend in Dr Spencer’s chart is very clear, just from eyeballing the chart.
It’s not the number of times the running average (red) line crosses the horizontal T = 0 axis that’s important. The mid-point of the graph is in 1995: before then all red points are in the lower (T 0) of the chart apart from 3 fairly brief excursions below the line, so the mean is about plus 0.1C. This shows a clear warming trend over the 32 years plotted.
I thought Dave Springer’s thermostat concept must be essentially correct – but this must be largely a NP phenomenon, for while the arctic basin could be completely ice-free at onset of winter, in the Antarctic that would be impossible anywhere over 75 degrees S, due to the land-based ice sheet.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/06/110626145250.htm
Prodigal Plankton Species Makes First Known Migration from Pacific to Atlantic Via Pole
ScienceDaily (June 26, 2011) — Microscopic plant disappeared from North Atlantic 800,000 years ago; unwanted return 1 of several climate change symptoms already apparent throughout European oceans Some 800,000 years ago — about the time early human tribes were learning to make fire — a tiny species of plankton called Neodenticula seminae went extinct in the North Atlantic.
Today, that microscopic plant has become an Atlantic resident again, having drifted from the Pacific through the Arctic Ocean thanks to dramatically reduced polar ice, scientists report.
The melting Arctic has opened a Northwest Passage across the Pole for the tiny algae. And while it’s a food source, it isn’t being welcomed back by experts, who say any changes at the base of the marine food web could, like an earthquake, shake or even topple the pillars of existing Atlantic ocean life.
I don’t see the point of guessing the future ….. Besides, we already have government funded organisations to do theis …. NASA, NOAA and THE MET ORIFICE
It will be interesting to see where WUWT comes in.
You have 1 more month of information
Last months vote here is what we knew
May 4 extent/minimum
2011: 14.15 million square kilometers
2010 14.69 million square kilometers/4.60 million square kilometers
2009 14.58 million square/ min 5.10 million square kilometers
2008 14.49 million square /4.52 million square kilometers
The prediction was 5.5
Now here is what we know, june 6 extent/minimum
2011: 12.79 million square kilometers
2010: 13.10 million square kilometers/4.60 million square kilometers
2009:13.39 million square:/ min 5.10 million square kilometers
2008:13.18 million square/4.52 million square kilometers
Guessing 5.5 in light of the extent and last months melt rate, would seem to
fly in the face of “observations.” looks to be like 2008.
4.5
Here is a good test. All the other forecasters (models, heuristics, stats) will take
the last months observations into account, to modify there forecasts.
Will they generally go up? go down? or stay the same.
It will be interesting to watch who modifies their view based on observation
and by how much.
of course this is a poll, but nothing prevents people taking the poll from considering
observations. The ice varies “naturally”. if this years “natural” is like previous years
“natural” what does one expect? Looks to me like people here want to believe that
the ice melt will, for some strange reason, be less in the months of june,july, aug, sept
than in previous years. What observation supports such a belief?
Moshe, it’s because most years fall back within the historic range.
=============
steven mosher says:
June 27, 2011 at 12:35 pm
Steve, it is my opinion that many of the people who voted 5.5 million km^2 don’t follow the numbers much at all. I would rather have seen the mean value of the poll submitted rather than the mode. IIRC, the second-most common poll value was ~5.0 million, which is much more reasonable.
Several of us here do follow the ice closely with our own spreadsheets incorporating the common datasets…and we likely voted somewhere in the upper 4.x million range. I hadn’t fired up my spreadsheet for this melt season yet, but I think I voted somewhere in that range based on my experience last year (I put my guess in the comments from last month, so I could check there). I fired up the spreadsheet last weekend, so I’ll do some analyses and put together my updated estimate based on them…though I doubt it’ll be that different from my experienced estimate last month.
All that said, there may some well-educated people here that are guessing well over 5 million based upon the belief that the ice in the Arctic Basin has been getting older/thicker the last few years…a belief that is semi-supported by PIPS (which at least had respectable agreement with Cryosate in Jan/Feb).
-Scott
Apparently, essentially, when ever the arctic suffers in width in takes on in thickness at the same time when antarctica adds on and some mountain steals the rest of the glory.
And that’s what the freaky climate communist hippie is afraid of, the pre-order for CAGW disaster due to CO2, which just makes them look the more crazier for not minding the several thousands of ships breaking up the ice in the arctic every year. The ice doesn’t care about whether it is an oil prospector with its newest biggest ice breaker in the vanguard or some truly amazing crazed climate communist hippie trying to reach the north pole by “canoe-ice-breakers” or better yet with green peace tourist, err science, trips.
5.3, and I can bet money on it.
Scott,
Ya I used to do a statistical analysis of it. err I think I won the first ice bet at Lucia’s.. (yup I did, but not by using stats.)
I think the interesting thing is how few people use the information they have to inform and reform their beliefs. I will say this. I suspect there will be a tendency for people to avoid changing their beliefs month to month, and that the 5.5 will get a good number of votes, even when it becomes clear that 5.5 is a hope more than a warranted belief.
Steven, playing the numbers game is wriggle matching. Rather unscientific in my opinion. I’ld rather keep tract of weather pattern variations that are predictive of ice loss/ice retention, in other words, the mechanics of ice loss. Don’t care much for the numbers. There are no mechanics in just looking at trends and numbers.
Let’s see, the entire state of Alaska is somewhere around 1.7 M sq.km. The Arctic ice minimum will be around 2.5X-3X the size of Alaska this year. If the minimum icecap steadily decreased each year by an area the size of New Jersey (~22.5 K sq.km.), then in 200 years the Arctic will be ice free.
Whoopee.
I have been looking at the sea ice reference page every day since I discovered it, well over a year now, and I have read many articles discussing the sea ice extent and its changes.
I have learned that what you see in the graph plotting the extent at this time of year is not predictable, or indicative of what the final September ice extent minimum will end up as.
The lower extent we have been observing this year is largely affected by a small amount of warmer temps seen along the atlantic coast in the Greenland, canadian area, amongst other things.
Some areas, such as hudsons bay, once covered in ice, no longer can contribute to sea ice extent as it is land locked.
Some areas it doesn’t matter when the ice has melted as a reset takes place once the dark returns again, similar to how my local mountains always lose their winter snows at some point in the summer, and no matter when that has occurred, the first winter snows return is not affected.
Ice thickness has a affect on extent, and during this time of year, because of the nature of the beast, geographical in nature, doesn’t show well in the graphs, and will make its effect appear later in the year in a possible slowing of the rate of extent loss.
Wind will also have an effect, and its direction especially so. There are also aspects of an ice factory, were ice can be created in one cold spot and continuously be blown out into warmer waters, having some effect.
Note this is just a quick review of some of the intuitive knowledge I have gained over the past year and a halve of daily research on the subject, and I am leaving out many other observations.
Gary, good on ya. A study of the mechanics of ice movement via wind, in situ melt, and atmospheric/oceanic conditions is where the money shot is.
“Steven, playing the numbers game is wriggle matching. Rather unscientific in my opinion. I’ld rather keep tract of weather pattern variations that are predictive of ice loss/ice retention, in other words, the mechanics of ice loss. Don’t care much for the numbers. There are no mechanics in just looking at trends and numbers.”
No wiggle matching is something entirely different. Between now and the the minimum of course several mechanical factors will dominate: wind, currents, temperature, sea ice thickness.
Doing a statistical forecast is equivalent to saying ” the mechanical factors we will see in the future will be like those we have seen in the past” of course, that approach will be less accurate the more the future diverges from the average of the past, so one might want to add other factors.
Like forecasts for the mechanical aspects at play.
Your vote is for above 5.5. Based on what numerical approach. You see if you document an approach, then we can see what went wrong with it and we can improve it. So, showtime!
Pamela Gray says:
June 27, 2011 at 4:59 pm
Steven, playing the numbers game is wriggle matching. Rather unscientific in my opinion. I’ld rather keep tract of weather pattern variations that are predictive of ice loss/ice retention, in other words, the mechanics of ice loss. Don’t care much for the numbers. There are no mechanics in just looking at trends and numbers.
==============
Repeated for effect. Excellent.
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
Silly question: Which actual dataset(s) are they talking about?
your selection is too much? if want see real result you should put max 5 choice only
Gary Mount said
“The lower extent we have been observing this year is largely affected by a small amount of warmer temps seen along the atlantic coast in the Greenland, canadian area, amongst other things.”
“Some areas, such as hudsons bay, once covered in ice, no longer can contribute to sea ice extent as it is land locked.”
Gary, the main areas losing ice up to now are Barents, Kara and Hudson Bay, most seems to have gone on the Russian side. Also, Hudsons Bay is not landlocked.
I agree with Steve Mosher, I’m sure a lot of people voting on here only have a passing interest on this part of the site’s postings and “want” it to be high. This coupled with the fact the 5.5+ choice is 5 times bigger in range than the common 5.1-5.2 etc etc means it screwed the voting too high last time. I agree with Scott, it should be the mean.
Andy