A grand experiment is being conducted in the Arctic this year that may not only falsify a prediction made in 2007, but may also further distance a connection between Arctic air temperature and sea ice decline.
You may have noticed the countdown widget at the top of the right sidebar. I’ve been waiting for this event all summer, and now that we are just over a month away from the Autumnal Equinox at September 22, at 20:44 UTC., (4:44PM EDT) signifying the end of summer in the Northern Hemisphere, this seemed like a good time to start the countdown. If there is still significant ice (1 million square kilometers or more as defined by Zwally, see below) in place then, we can consider that this claim by Maslowski in 2007 to be falsified:
Source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/7139797.stm
What is most interesting though, is that Arctic temperatures seem to be in early decline, ahead of schedule by about 30 days compared to last year’s record melt:
Figure 1A: Overlay of temperature plots for 2012 and 2013 from the Danish Meteorological Institute.
Note that in Figure 1A, for 2013 the temperature has fallen below that which is needed to freeze seawater (approximately -1.8°C according to Peter Wadhams) at 271°K (-2.15°C). It is also approximmately 30 days ahead of the date that the temperature fell to the same value last year, and so far, the current situation with early colder temperature seems to be unique in the DMI temperature record back to 1958. However, it is worth noting that DMI has a caveat not to take the actual temperatures too literally.
…since the model is gridded in a regular 0.5 degree grid, the mean temperature values are strongly biased towards the temperature in the most northern part of the Arctic! Therefore, do NOT use this measure as an actual physical mean temperature of the arctic. The ‘plus 80 North mean temperature’graphs can be used for comparing one year to an other.
As if on cue for that caveat, shortly after I prepared figure 1A, DMI updated their plot to show a bit of a rebound:
Figure 1B DMI plot for today.
But there are other indications, for example this plot from NOAA ESRL, showing air temperatures well below freezing in the region:
Figure 2: Surface air temperatures in C Source: NOAA ESRL – Click the pic to view at sourceAnd, extent this year is ahead of extent for this time last year and within the standard deviation range (grey shading):
Figure 3: Danish Meteorological Institute (DMI) – Centre for Ocean and Ice – Click the pic to view at sourceAfter a new record low in Arctic sea ice extent in 2012, the phrase “Nature abhors a vaccum” comes to mind as indicators suggest this melt season may end earlier than usual. The earliest that a turn in Arctic melt season was recorded in the satellite record was on September 2nd, 1987. With 14 days to go, will we see an earlier turn?
If we do, it might suggest (as many believe) that sea ice melt is directly tied to air temperature and the effects of increased CO2 on air temperature via the polar amplification we are often told about where the Arctic is the fastest warming place in the world.
Figure 4: The map above shows global temperature anomalies for 2000 to 2009. It does not depict absolute temperature, but rather how much warmer or colder a region is compared to the norm for that region from 1951 to 1980. Global temperatures from 2000–2009 were on average about 0.6°C higher than they were from 1951–1980. The Arctic, however, was about 2°C warmer. Based on GISS surface temperature analysis data including ship and buoy data from the Hadley Centre.
Image Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polar_amplification
If the melt continues, and turns around the normal time, which is usually +/- 5 days of the Autumnal Equinox on September 22nd, then we can assume other forcings are dominant this year, such as ocean currents and cycles like the AMO, winds, and ocean temperature below the sea ice. There’s also the unanswered question of the effects of black carbon soot.
If in spite of the early drop in temperatures, the Arctic sea ice extent ice drops below 1 million square kilometers, as NASA’s Jay Zwally famously predicted (with an assist from AP’s Seth Borenstein): “…the Arctic Ocean could be nearly ice-free at the end of summer by 2012″ then most certainly all bets are off.
But if we see an early turn, it will falsify Maslowski’s and Zwally’s forecasts. Also, if the melt marches on despite the colder temperatures, it will force a reconsideration of what is really driving Arctic melt patterns.
Interestingly, the final ARCUS sea ice forecast has been published on August 16th,and the ranges of predictions are quite broad, spanning 2.2 million square kilometers from the most optimistic NOAA’s Msadek et al. at 5.8 msq/km to the perennially gloomy “Neven” whose Artic Sea Ice blog poll predicts 3.6 msq/km.
See http://www.arcus.org/search/seaiceoutlook/2013/august
They write:
The Sea Ice Outlook organizers decided, with input from contributors and readers, to skip an August report this year in favor of a more thorough post-season report.
However, we provided this webpage to post and share individual contributors¹ August outlooks; the individual outlooks are below.
Since ARCUS didn’t plot them, I’ve plotted all the participant forecasts below.
Figure 5: plot of September Arctic Sea Ice Extent Mean forecasts submitted to ARCUS in August 2013.
Interestingly, I discovered that Robert Grumbine has participated in two forecasts (Wu and Wang) as a co-author, each with a different prediction, so that seems rather odd to me.
WUWT’s value is based on a weighted calculation of the top five vote getters in our poll here: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/08/11/sea-ice-news-volume-4-3-2013-sea-ice-forecast-contest/
The most popular value picked by WUWT readers was 5.0 msq/km 8.9% (94 votes), though it wasn’t a runaway vote, hence I opted for a weighted average of the top 5 vote getters.
Most importantly, none of the ARCUS forecasts participants suggested an ice-free Arctic, which is bad news for Maslowski’s prediction.
No matter what happens, we live in interesting times.
As always the WUWT Sea Ice reference page has interesting plots of data at a glance: http://wattsupwiththat.com/reference-pages/sea-ice-page/
UPDATE: Commenter “jimbo” adds in comments –
Here is a compilation of ice-free Arctic Ocean / North Pole predictions / projections from scientists for the past, present and future.
Xinhua News Agency – 1 March 2008
“If Norway’s average temperature this year equals that in 2007, the ice cap in the Arctic will all melt away, which is highly possible judging from current conditions,” Orheim said.
[Dr. Olav Orheim – Norwegian International Polar Year Secretariat]
__________________
Canada.com – 16 November 2007
“According to these models, there will be no sea ice left in the summer in the Arctic Ocean somewhere between 2010 and 2015.
“And it’s probably going to happen even faster than that,” said Fortier,””
[Professor Louis Fortier – Université Laval, Director ArcticNet]
__________________
National Geographic – 12 December 2007
“NASA climate scientist Jay Zwally said: “At this rate, the Arctic Ocean could be nearly ice-free at the end of summer by 2012, much faster than previous predictions.” ”
[Dr. Jay Zwally – NASA]
__________________
BBC – 12 December 2007
“Our projection of 2013 for the removal of ice in summer is not accounting for the last two minima, in 2005 and 2007,”…….”So given that fact, you can argue that may be our projection of 2013 is already too conservative.”
[Professor Wieslaw Maslowski]
__________________
Independent – 27 June 2008
Exclusive: Scientists warn that there may be no ice at North Pole this summer
“…..It is quite likely that the North Pole will be exposed this summer – it’s not happened before,” Professor Wadhams said.”
[Professor Peter Wadhams – Cambridge University]
__________________
Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Sciences
Vol. 40: 625-654 – May 2012
The Future of Arctic Sea Ice
“…..one can project that at this rate it would take only 9 more years or until 2016 ± 3 years to reach a nearly ice-free Arctic Ocean in summer. Regardless of high uncertainty associated with such an estimate, it does provide a lower bound of the time range for projections of seasonal sea ice cover…..”
[Professor Wieslaw Maslowski]
__________________
Yale Environment360 – 30 August 2012
“If this rate of melting [in 2012] is sustained in 2013, we are staring down the barrel and looking at a summer Arctic which is potentially free of sea ice within this decade,”
[Dr. Mark Drinkwater]
__________________
Guardian – 17 September 2012
“This collapse, I predicted would occur in 2015-16 at which time the summer Arctic (August to September) would become ice-free. The final collapse towards that state is now happening and will probably be complete by those dates“.
[Professor Peter Wadhams – Cambridge University]
__________________
Sierra Club – March 23, 2013
“For the record—I do not think that any sea ice will survive this summer. An event unprecedented in human history is today, this very moment, transpiring in the Arctic Ocean….”
[Paul Beckwith – PhD student paleoclimatology and climatology – part-time professor]
__________________
Financial Times Magazine – 2 August 2013
“It could even be this year or next year but not later than 2015 there won’t be any ice in the Arctic in the summer,”
[Professor Peter Wadhams – Cambridge University]
__________________
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Nick Stokes says:
August 18, 2013 at 2:40 pm
Well, Maslowski did update his forecast. As the BBC report of that says,
“The original prediction, made in 2007, gained Wieslaw Maslowski’s team a deal of criticism from some of their peers.”
From your link.
“We can run a fully coupled model for the past and present and see what our model will predict for the future in terms of the sea ice and the Arctic climate.”
“And one of the projections it comes out with is that the summer melt could lead to ice-free Arctic seas by 2016 – “plus or minus three years”.
As a lowly taxpayer I wish you and yours would cut the crap.
omnologos says:
August 18, 2013 at 3:02 pm
I predict that the surface of the earth will be almost water-free in a billion years, so we should start colonizing the asteroid belt now, which endeavor will also come in handy four billion years after that, when the sun goes red giant.
“Not one of these alarming media tailored claims of disappearance of Arctic sea ice has come true yet.” – Anthony
But it HAS. Long before anthropogenic Co2.
Remove the leading ” from my previous post.
Corrected.
And one of the projections it comes out with is that the summer melt could lead to ice-free Arctic seas by 2016 – “plus or minus three years”.
It seems to me the arctic ocean will lose a lot of heat now with temperature dropping and so much open ocean – especially compared to last year when the temperature drop was much longer and less dramatic.
But they used crunching supercomputers! What could possibly go wrong?
(/snark)
Nick Stokes says: @ur momisugly August 18, 2013 at 2:40 pm
“Well, Maslowski did update his forecast. “
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
That is not the point.
We are being told we HAVE to pay more taxes and forego cheap carbon based fuel sources to “SAVE the PLANET” from “CATASTROPHIC WARMING”
We were told in 2000
And then not only do we have record snows but Some 7,800 people die [in the UK] during winter because they can’t afford to heat their homes properly
Instead we get:
What the heck is it going to take? A mile high glacier sitting on Chicago? Or will you still be claiming CO2 is causing ‘Global Warming” How many more people have to DIE before you give up the nonsense?
If you think I am angry you are correct. It ceased to be a scientific argument after the first person died from these asinine policies.
What a coincidence! I was just finishing my Arctic ice free compilation. Here is a compilation of ice-free Arctic Ocean / North Pole predictions / projections from scientists for the past, present and future.
clipe says:
August 18, 2013 at 3:25 pm
Remove the leading ” from my previous post.
Corrected.
And one of the projections it comes out with is that the summer melt could lead to ice-free Arctic seas by 2016 – “plus or minus three years”.
=====================
The projections created this mess, now “we” need to walk it back.
It will be interesting to watch.
Off topic – there seem to be a lot of news articles about the upcoming IPCC report right now. All of them are selling the consistent meme that “scientists are more certain than ever”. Where is all this rubbish coming from? Who thought up this spin? Why is this even news? The IPCC report was leaked a long time ago. So who fired the starting pistol on this obvious media campaign and why choose to do it now?
Well, Maslowski did update his forecast…..
Nick, has it occured to you that if the Arctic did ever melt out, the size of Egypt…
…there have been so many predictions that one of them will probably be right
On that issue here is a bit of research – one from the past and the rest from recent times.
The best part of this post is the reference archive, so we can watch the goal posts move year by year. The next best part is watching Arctic amplification in reverse (it does work both ways, right?)
Of course he did. He also said “you can argue that may be our projection of 2013 is already too conservative.” Then he updates. What confidence should I have on his update Nick? Maslowski is a climate clown who thinks no one is looking. I am looking and recording their fairy tales.
cynical_scientist says:
August 18, 2013 at 3:46 pm
“Off topic – there seem to be a lot of news articles about the upcoming IPCC report right now. All of them are selling the consistent meme that “scientists are more certain than ever”. Where is all this rubbish coming from? Who thought up this spin? Why is this even news? The IPCC report was leaked a long time ago. So who fired the starting pistol on this obvious media campaign and why choose to do it now?”
a) The CFR / Bilderberger / Socialist (**) Billionaire Foundation complex. Because they OWN the media. (Ford foundation gave Wapo some grants for Outstanding Journalism to give them a lifeline until Socialist Billionaire Bezos bought them outright.) (*)
b) They have to start the campaign at SOME point.
(*) Why are all these billionaires socialists? Simple: Slamming the door shut behind them. After you’ve made your fortune you’d like to prevent competition by forcing socialism with the inherent prevention of capital accumulation on everybody else, keeping them a captive market / slaves.
(**) for Americans, read “liberal” ; it’s the same thing.
“In the end, it will just melt away quite suddenly. It might not be as early as 2013 but it will be soon, much earlier than 2040.” — Professor Wadhams
Context matters.
Good. It’s about time we got rid of all that ice. It’s just a nuisance, clogging up the sea.
Whilst I agree that making predictions for ice free arctic timing is silly we should not completely discount the trend in declining arctic ice will eventually lead to an ice free summer in the region at some point – unless the trend reverses is simple interpretation of the trend. What causes the ice loss? That is the interesting thing – and is the main point of this article. If we have colder air mass and ice loss increases then we have direct evidence that wind and ocean are greater contributors. It looks like we will have a colder air mass and increased minimum ice, so we cant easily say that air temp is not the major contributor…we know that wind and ocean temps play a big part but it is a dynamic system.
They predict everything and are never wrong. When will YOU admit they are crap? Your feeble attempts at defending these con artists is a joke. Have a break, have a Kit Kat.
As I have observed here before whenever there was some excitement about this ‘The ice will do what the ice will do ans there’s no doing anything about it.’ . With apologies to T S Eliot.
I also said please not to wake me up until something really exciting happens such as the discovery of Santa’s grotto or the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow by the North pole.
So if you will exciuse me I am going back to bed, I need my beauty sleep.
Kindest Regards
I was glad you caught the DMI graph uptick in time to include the second graph. However note that, even with the uptick, temperatures are still well below freezing and still below normal. Even if temperatures rise all the way up to normal, it still will be below freezing from now on. Most any melting from now on comes from the sea water below the ice, as the sun is getting too low and the air too cold.
I’m wondering if any fellow ice-melt-watchers know anything about the temperature of that first layer of water under the ice, (down to the “pycnocline.”) Is it at all colder this year? Several people have wondered if last year’s storm melted so much ice with its churning that the top layer of seawater was significantly cooled, leading to this summer’s cooler temperatures and (perhaps) a more rapid refreezing of ice.
The “North Pole Camera” shows a little thawing, after a solid week of temperatures below the freezing point of salt water. The lower black check on the snow-stake in the foreground has reappeared, after being hidden for a while by a drift of snow. However no melt-water is in sight.
http://sunriseswansong.wordpress.com/2013/08/16/the-big-chill-sea-ice-version/
Context does matter. Now open your eyes and read.
What is your take-home message now? He has sold you several different stories my friend.
Jimbo says: August 18, 2013 at 3:57 pm
” What confidence should I have on his update Nick?”
Probably about as much as Walt Meier. Or even:
‘”I’m not trying to be alarmist and not trying to say ‘we know the future because we have a crystal ball’,” said Dr Maslowski.”
The thing is, they are trying to work it out, and say what they currently know. There’s no certainty and no unanimity.
James of the West says:
August 18, 2013 at 4:01 pm
The Arctic Ocean has probably been effectively ice free for more summers in the Holocene than not, or at least a lot of them. For the past 3300 years or so, the long-term trend has been toward a cooler earth, but within that secular trend there have been warmer & cooler cycles. Arctic sea ice now is about where it was at the last PDO phase transition. It may well be entering its cool phase already. Passages along the North American & Eurasian Arctic coasts were open in the 1930s & the 2000s. Back in the Holocene Climatic Optimum, they were probably open during both phases.
The trend of decreasing ice since c. 1980 should reverse soon, if it hasn’t already started. CO2 has little to nothing to do with these cycles.
Nick Stokes says:
August 18, 2013 at 4:25 pm
If they feel no certainty, why do they keep making such ludicrous predictions?