Anytime I see the “canary in the coal mine” phrase being applied to some phenomenon related to climate, I know right away that the person using it hasn’t really put much thought into using the phrase, and that it is purely an emotional response. Photographer James Balog is the emotional user this time.
This misleading headline, photos, and story in the Daily Mail highlights the photo work of James Balog and the “Extreme Ice Survey” (EIS). They write:
This shocking time lapse video shows how a glacier has receded thousands of feet in just four years.
The footage of Alaska’s Columbia glacier was taken by expert and photographer James Balog and his team between May 2007 and September 2011.
Balog used to a climate change skeptic himself but eventually went on to start the Extreme Ice Survey (EIS), the most comprehensive photographic study of glaciers ever conducted.
His new documentary Chasing Ice will premiere at the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah, on January 21, the Huffington Post reports.
…
Balog told the Idaho Press: ‘Shrinking glaciers are the canary in the global coal mine.
‘They are the most visible, tangible manifestations of climate change on the planet today.’
Unfortunately, I can’t show you the video, because this is what happens when you try embed it in a blog or newspaper article:
So, you have to follow the link: AK-01 Columbia Kadin Narrated
It seems Balog is all about his film, paying speaking engagements, and photo shows, and less about “saving the planet”, since everything he does is heavily copyright plastered. Given that he only wants people to visit his website and see his talks/photo/presentations, I’ll not try to post any of his video or photos here given that he’ll likely squawk about it even though it would be considered fair use. He won’t like what I’m about to say.
Here’s the interesting thing though. In the video, Balog shows what glaciers do normally: calve to the sea, no surprise there. And yes, there was some reduction in the terminus between May 2007 and September 2011.
But is it really honest to show the glacier time-lapse with different endpoints (May versus September) when you know those endpoints have seasonal differences?
And, more importantly, is a four-year period statistically valid for comparison of anything climate related?
If any of us used four years worth of data to make a point about climate, our warmer friends would have a veritable cow. Tamino would call out the cherry picking brigade and scream about hiding/not using the whole data set. Dana1981 of “Skeptical Science” would dash off another get even missive calling us names in violation of his own site policy. Peter Gleick would create some new “worst climate deniers” list to denigrate us with for being so dumb as to use 4 years worth of data to try to make a point.
But, not one of those guys has uttered a peep about four years of glacier footage being used to make a point. Of course what they’ll say now in response is that “Watts is ignoring the ENTIRE glacier record with his four year criticism”.
So to head that off, and to keep in the spirit of photographic evidence, I am in fact going to show more than four years worth of Alaskan glacier data. Let’s have a look at what the USGS says about this glacier. They also have a page on glacier photography.
While they don’t have Alaska’s Columbia glacier in that page, they do have others. Here’s the photos of the Muir glacier in sequence. I’ve added captions for the dates the USGS says they were taken at:
It seems a good portion of the reteat happened well before 1950. They write about this photo sequence, bold mine:
Three northeast-looking photographs taken from a Glacier Bay Photo station that was established in 1941 by William O. Field on White Thunder Ridge, Muir Inlet, Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve, Alaska. The three photographs document the significant changes that have occurred during the 63 years between August 13, 1941 and August 31, 2004. The 1941 photograph shows the lower reaches of Muir Glacier, then a large, tidewater calving valley glacier and its tributary Riggs Glacier. Muir and Riggs Glaciers filled Muir Inlet.
The séracs in the lower right-hand corner of the photograph mark the location of Muir Glacier’s terminus. The ice thickness in the center of the photographs is more than 0.7 kilometers (0.43 miles). For nearly two centuries prior to 1941, Muir Glacier had been retreating. Maximum retreat exceeded 50 kilometers (31 miles). In places, more than a 1.0 kilometer (0.62 mile) thickness of ice had been lost. Note the absence of any identifiable vegetation and the numerous bare bedrock faces present on both sides of the glacier (W. O. Field, # 41-64, courtesy of the National Snow and Ice Data Center and Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve Archive).
The August 4, 1950 photograph, the first of two repeat photographs documents the significant changes that have occurred during the 9 years between it and the 1941 photograph. Muir Glacier has retreated more than 3 kilometers (1.9 miles), exposing Muir Inlet, and thinned 100 meters (328 feet) or more. However, it still is connected with tributary Riggs Glacier. White Thunder Ridge continues to be devoid of vegetation. In places, erosion has removed some of the till from its surface. (W. O. Field, # F50-R29, courtesy of the Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve Archive).
The August 31, 2004 photograph, the second repeat photograph, documents the significant changes that have occurred during the 63 years between the first and third photographs and during the 54 years between second and third photographs. Muir Glacier has retreated out of the field of view and is now located more than 7 kilometers (4.4 miles) to the northwest. Riggs Glacier has retreated as much as 0.6 kilometers (0.37 miles) and thinned by more than 0.25 kilometers (0.16 miles). Note the dense vegetation, dominated by Alnus, that has developed on the till cover of White Thunder Ridge. Also note the correlation between Muir Glacier’s 1941 thickness and the trimline on the left side of the 2004 photograph. (USGS Photograph by Bruce F. Molnia).
And here’s a map from USGS that James Balog will never, ever, show in his videos or photo essays, because it blows his argument (and meal ticket) right out of the water:
Note that the majority of the glacier retreat occurred well before CO2 was said to be a problem, when CO2 was at the “safe” level below 350 parts per million as espoused by weepy Bill McKibben and Dr. James Hansen of NASA GISS.
Balog may be an “expert photographer” but he’s a pretty shoddy historian. Maybe instead of “chasing ice” he should chase historical facts, it might help him be a skeptic again.
But none of these guys will ever show you this, it’s just too damned inconvenient.
h/t to Steve Goddard
A physicist says:
January 17, 2012 at 2:16 pm
By the way, John West, are you familiar with the well-respected, non-partisan Rasmussen Poll of American political trends? Well, it so happens that in this week’s pool, precisely 1/500 of the Rasmussen numbers are the opinions of … yours truly. 🙂
But hey, feel free go ahead and disregard this week’s Rasumussion poll, and in fact, disregard all polls. For the too-simple reason, that because polls sample only a tiny fraction of American voters, they can tell us precisely nothing, eh?
================
You use the tag “A physicist”.
If you are a ‘physicist’ you are obviously of the post modern variety. Psydo type of science. I have lost any admiration of you. Stick to your consensus, it is only incorporating those easily convinced of your skewed views. A consensus is the current level of the convincing of a group that a specific view is valid. A little thought and the consensus is ‘poof’. I could think of amore appropriate tag for you to use.
Definitely, kwik, it is embarrassing … those darn Cleveland glaciers all melted several thousand years ago.
Whereas, the North Cascade’s glaciers may last a few more decades at present rates.
Or how about the fact that it takes a couple hundred years for precipitation that falls up top in the snowfield to actually make it down to the terminus? There actually are advancing glaciers over there, though they are few – and its mostly due to changing weather patterns. So what we’re seeing has taken a long time to unfold – the lag in there makes it very tough to show “acceleration.”
Thank you “A physicist” for your suggestion to teach my son “Milankovitch Theory”. However since he just turned 12 I’ll hold that for a while. What I have taught him is to think things through before accepting them as fact. When he asked me about AGW I told him the jury is out but that we should require a great deal of proof before accepting the idea that man has greater influence on our climate than oceans, volcanoes, clouds, and that big yellow ball in the sky.
No doubt the glacier is receding. But, I think it’s worth noting that the photographer is NOT standing at a fixed point, each one of the photos is taken from a slightly more distant position.
Well i`ll say this for the Mail , they are true devotees to the church of CAGW and thus ALL things prove it true , Got shrinking glaciers ? must be AGW . Got expanding glaciers ? must be AGW :
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1203500/In-pictures-How-global-warming-changing-face-northern-hemisphere.html
But then the whole CAGW meme seems to be constructed with ONLY the WORST aspects of many religions as a template , I could bang on for several pages about that but John Brignell does a much more eloquent job of it than I ever could
http://www.numberwatch.co.uk/religion.htm
Great work Anthony. You should have been a detective. Actually I will be waiting for the climate version of NCIS to appear on TV. 🙂
A physicist says:
January 17, 2012 at 11:51 am
“J. Snow, if you teach your son about Milankovitch Theory, . . . ”
You might want to include this in your reading:
http://earthweb.ess.washington.edu/roe/GerardWeb/Publications_files/Roe_Milankovitch_GRL06.pdf
This simple and dynamically-logical change in perspective is used to show that the available records support a direct, zero-lag, antiphased relationship between the rate of change of global ice volume and summertime insolation in the northern high latitudes. Furthermore,
variations in atmospheric CO2 appear to lag the rate of change of global ice volume. [from paragraph #1]
and this:
http://motls.blogspot.com/2010/07/in-defense-of-milankovitch-by-gerard.html
The second one is a post on “the reference frame” dealing with the first.
A physicist says:
January 17, 2012 at 2:16 pm
Since you did not write a radiative heat transfer equation with the emissivity for CO2 only more words I assume you can’t or you know the emisivity of CO2 is so low at 1atm and 288 K that the equation would show how bad the idea of CO2 heating the ground is. By the way an equation would have been shorter than the paragraph you did write. But thanks for the limited answer.
As any competent glaciologist will tell you, the Glacier Bay situtation is rather unique. During the Little Ice Age (1300-19xx), glaciers worldwide reached far downvalley in response to profound global cooling. This is why ice in the late 1700s extended all the way to the mouth of Glacier Bay. The large glacier system terminated in the sea and required a lot of nourishment to maintain its position at sea level. As we’ve been thawing out of the Little Ice Age, the snowline moved to higher elevations and sent less ice into the Glacier Bay system, causing it to become precariously unstable. As the ice thinned, calving of ice into the sea produced major losses of ice mass that were not replaced by flowage from upvalley. Calving glaciers are notorious for rapid recession because much ice is lost by breaking off into the sea without melting. Thus, the spectacular rates of recession of the Glacier Bay glacier is a continuing process that has little to do with recent warming–it continued to recede during the 1890-1915 and 1945-1977 cool periods while other glaciers were advancing. The Glacier Bay glacier is the last place in the world one would look to find correlations with global warming and cooling.
The early photograph is in May, at the start of summer.
The end photograph is in September, at the end of summer.
Surprise, surprise, surprise. Over the course of a summer, a glacier melts.
What always amazes me is how quickly a forest can take over – In less than a human lifetime bare rocky soil becomes a dense forest. I see this time and again in my travels.
It’s no big deal people, you want more forests? Plant em now!
Do you suppose this is the kind of thing that goes on during interglacials?
RE: Paul Homewood says:
January 17, 2012 at 11:27 am
That was interesting, reading about the MWP log exposed by recent retreat. I’ve come across the same observations in Europe. What is most interesting is when a Roman Road to a lead mine (still covered with ice) is exposed. It really does tell you something about how warm it was in the past.
I’m glad the ice does not totally scour everything away, but in some situations just compresses the branches and logs it overrides. This gives us a chance to glimpse what existed before, as the ice again retreats. A little stick may have grown in a brief period, but a big log indicates a tree had to grow for some time, and also to live in warmth beyond the tree-line chill where things barely cling to life.
There are parts of the east (colder) side of Greenland where to this day nothing grows, however the retreat of ice has exposed branches and scrub from the MWP. In other words, the east coast of Greenland was actually green, back then. It could turn green again, just as the bare rock in these three pictures show the return of trees.
I knew about all this stuff back in the 1960’s and 1970’s, before there was any political advantage to promoting Global Warming. That was what made me start to doubt “climate science,” when I first heard about it in the 1980’s. They were “eracing the MWP” in too obvious a manner, completely ignoring and even attacking the work of scientists who came before.
The fact people persist with this “ereace the MWP” nonsense really disgusts me. I am less and less able to be polite. In fact I don’t even think it is wise to be polite, in the face of such bald-faced balderdash.
“Canary in a coal mine” is so ironic. A bird perches in the ultimate non-green source of energy and may succumb to methane or carbon monoxide but never to CO2. When a warmist speaks of birds I think of bird bodies under a wind turbine.
http://theextinctionprotocol.wordpress.com/
more and more seismic activity around Antarctica. I wonder what AGWs druids will invent to explain this event, especially if the volcano suddenly springs to life, ala Iceland.
regards
http://s446.photobucket.com/albums/qq187/bobclive/?action=view¤t=swissglacier.jpg
The fact that it only took 4 years to retreat as it did (accepting the odd start and finish points exaggerates the retreat) then is is not warming that caused the retreat, +0.75C in a century cannot cause that amount of retreat.
Any one notice the commenter Kwaut_Lizard at the video link who commented.
“I am a scientist, well aware of the facts, hype and politically driven denial of global warming. I was a member of an expedition that hot-pointed and delineated the area of the worlds equatorial glaciers in the early 1990’s. I truly pity your attitude and the subjective approach you have chosen to take in an attempt at dispelling what is quite simple science. You are a testament to the demise of quality education in the US and to the rudely pervasive approach of American politics.”
It’s funny how these people cherish communism and Mao. Look at what he/she chose for the gravatar. Isn’t that Mao. Incredible to know the Obama administration is filled with these people.
This is just the latest tactic in the war.
I used to be a sceptic, but now I’m convinced.
A bit like BEST!.
DaveE.
Anthony, this is an interesting post and all, but the shot at a “weepy” Bill McKibben really does nothing to help your position and if anything pulls it down into an emotional shot at the guy. I realize it is easy to get frustrated with people and there is a desire to get your shots in from time to time, but while it may be satisfying in the short term it doesn’t help your case any. Just a thought, keep up the good work.
@a physicist
“Definitely, kwik, it is embarrassing … those darn Cleveland glaciers all melted several thousand years ago.”
And why did they do that, aphysicist, when CO2 levels were so low? Or why did the glacier in the post above begin its retreat long before the turn of the 20th century? Glaciers have been retreating for hundreds of years (they carved out the entire Puget Sound), so by what mechanism was this massive reduction in glacier mass been constantly occurring long before out industrial era?
Or, how do you explain the mechanism by which some glaciers retreat, others grow, and then they swap with the previous retreating ones growing and the previous growing ones retreating, which is common in the cascades (around which I grew up) and other mountain regions?
Your bias and preconceived ideas in this matter are highly unscientific, and do not explain the observational evidence.
A physicist says:
“John West, please consult this summary of mass balance for all glaciers having continuous long-term observation series. Do you see a pronounced downward mass slope, and an obvious accelerating trend of the melting rate? ”
From the link you provided: [bolds mine]
“The mass balance statistics (Table 1) are calculated based on all reported values as well as on the data from the 37 reference glaciers in 10 mountain ranges (Table 2) with continuous observation series back to 1980.”
All the way back to 1980. WOW! /sarc
We’re talking about a geologic process, not fashion. What was the rate from 1780 to 1880, 1880 to 1980?
We are at the very end of the present Interglacial Warmup Period. It is long in the tooth at 10,500 years old. It may come as a shock to Mr. Balog, that glaciers are melting during this IWP. But that is what they are supposed to be doing.
The world’s total ice inventory or Mass Balance is the only measure that can be used to judge whether ice is being lost or added. Looking at cherry picked glaciers is anecdotal information and is no canary in a coal mine. Does Mr. Balog know what the MB is doing? If not, he is wasting everyone’s time.
Hello Anthony, love the story,
I actually sent you a link to my thoughts on the story on the 16th.
http://robertleather.wordpress.com/2012/01/16/daily-mail-richard-black-propagate-bogus-extreme-ice-survey-video/
The majority of what is being shown is the melting of the extraordinarily large snowfall that lasted almost continually from Winter 2007 into Summer 2008. My piece includes two references to the events and it’s effect on the Northern part of Prince William Sound…. which is where the glacier is located. So the “sudden loss of ice” is in fact a sudden loss of snow, the Anchorage story mentions the snow floating on the Sound.
I contacted Richard Black, the BBC environmental columnist to ask what he thought, he declined to comment. Or rather… he said “No comment”, which is surely a paradox. 🙂