From the WOODS HOLE OCEANOGRAPHIC INSTITUTION and the “worse than we thought” department, comes this breathless press release that doesn’t even mention the name of the study somehow manages to spin model results into a future frenzy worse that if the ice shelves just collapsed.
New study projects that melting of Antarctic ice shelves will intensify
New research published on October 12th projects a doubling of surface melting of Antarctic ice shelves by 2050 and that by 2100 melting may surpass intensities associated with ice shelf collapse, if greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuel consumption continue at the present rate.
Ice shelves are the floating extensions of the continent’s massive land-based ice sheets. While the melting or breakup of floating ice shelves does not directly raise sea level, ice shelves do have a “door stop” effect: They slow the flow of ice from glaciers and ice sheets into the ocean, where it melts and raises sea levels.
“Our results illustrate just how rapidly melting in Antarctica can intensify in a warming climate,” said Luke Trusel, lead author and postdoctoral scholar at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI). “This has already occurred in places like the Antarctic Peninsula where we’ve observed warming and abrupt ice shelf collapses in the last few decades. Our model projections show that similar levels of melt may occur across coastal Antarctica near the end of this century, raising concerns about future ice shelf stability.”
The study, published Oct. 12, 2015, in Nature Geoscience, was conducted by Trusel, Clark University Associate Professor of Geography Karen Frey, WHOI scientists Sarah Das and Kristopher Karnauskas, Peter Kuipers Munneke and Michiel R. van den Broeke of the Institute for Marine and Atmospheric Research Utrecht University, and Erik van Meijgaard of the Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute.
To study how melting evolves over time and to predict future ice sheet melting along the entire Antarctic coastline, the scientists combined satellite observations of ice surface melting with climate model simulations under scenarios of intermediate and high levels of greenhouse gas emissions until the year 2100.
The results indicate a strong potential for the doubling of Antarctica-wide ice sheet surface melting by 2050, under either emissions scenario. However, between 2050 and 2100, the models reveal a significant divergence between the two scenarios. Under the high-emissions climate scenario, by 2100 ice sheet surface melting approaches or exceeds intensities associated with ice shelf collapse in the past. Under the reduced-emissions scenario, there is relatively little increase in ice sheet melting after the doubling in 2050.
“The data presented in this study clearly show that climate policy, and therefore the trajectory of greenhouse gas emissions over the coming century, have an enormous control over the future fate of surface melting of Antarctic ice shelves, which we must consider when assessing their long-term stability and potential indirect contributions to sea level rise,” said Frey.
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Funding for the research was provided by NASA, the Doherty Postdoctoral Scholarship Program at WHOI, the Netherlands Earth System Science Centre, the Polar Program of the Netherlands Organization of Scientific Research, and the Dutch Ministry of Infrastructure and the Environment.
Since these bozos that wrote the press release didn’t provide a link to the study, I will.
http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/ngeo2563.html
Divergent trajectories of Antarctic surface melt under two twenty-first-century climate scenarios
Ice shelves modulate Antarctic contributions to sea-level rise1 and thereby represent a critical, climate-sensitive interface between the Antarctic ice sheet and the global ocean. Following rapid atmospheric warming over the past decades2, 3, Antarctic Peninsula ice shelves have progressively retreated4, at times catastrophically5. This decay supports hypotheses of thermal limits of viability for ice shelves via surface melt forcing3, 5, 6. Here we use a polar-adapted regional climate model7 and satellite observations8 to quantify the nonlinear relationship between surface melting and summer air temperature. Combining observations and multimodel simulations, we examine melt evolution and intensification before observed ice shelf collapse on the Antarctic Peninsula. We then assess the twenty-first-century evolution of surface melt across Antarctica under intermediate and high emissions climate scenarios. Our projections reveal a scenario-independent doubling of Antarctic-wide melt by 2050. Between 2050 and 2100, however, significant divergence in melt occurs between the two climate scenarios. Under the high emissions pathway by 2100, melt on several ice shelves approaches or surpasses intensities that have historically been associated with ice shelf collapse, at least on the northeast Antarctic Peninsula.
The continent of ice is not listening.
re: dbstealey October 13, 2015 at 1:57 pm
I couldn’t find the reply button for your comment but in regards to your photo praising John Daly, you are aware aren’t you that those signs are referring to John Daly the American golfer and were taken at a British Open.
Tom,
Yes, and I should have put my usual smiley face next to it. Sorry. ☹
db,
You threw some BS at me with those photos? I hope the citations are good. I don’t want to be the third “idiot” in that idiotic exchange you and steve jones started…
Dahlquist,
It was an attempt at humor. I should have put my usual smiley face under it. My misteak.
I’ve posted that ‘John Daly’ pic several times now, with a humorous comment. My apologies for assuming everyone had read those posts. It was intended to lighten up the comment, that’s all.
Again, I’m sorry I didn’t make it more clear. It wasn’t aimed at you personally, so please don’t take it that way.
db
Just joshing with you back. Any relation to the famous db… The parachutist?
Yes, it does seem as if you have gained a devoted follower in mr. Jones. AKA Smith and Jones. Seems as if it started on the 6th oct when I read an older article that I had let pass. His style seems familiar, but I can’t put my finger on who just yet.
You never need apologize to a fellow joker.
So… it’s going to double, from zero to zero? Last I checked there was no Antarctica-wide ice sheet surface melting. Any surface melting is on the peninsula, and any other melting is from below, whether geothermal or from warmish currents. Sublimation, yes, but not “surface melting.”
They could have said “quadrupled” – 2×0 = 4×0. Still zero.
“Last I checked there was no Antarctica-wide ice sheet surface melting.”
Did you actually check? There seems to be lots of references to Arctic ice-sheet surface melting – from all round the continent. Here is one http://lgge.osug.fr/~picard/melting/
One paper talks about an index of time (days) multiplied by area where melting occured (km2). The mean over 9 years was 24 million d.km2, the maximum year in their study was 1986. This is not zero. I do not know what you had in mind when you commented. Needless to say the authors of this paper were not talking nonesense, but were describing an actual thing.
Did you even look at the data presented at your linked site? Virtually all of the melt shown was ice SHELF melt, not ice SHEET melt. My point was, and still is, that the SHEET is not subject to surface melting. Sublimation, yes, but the combination of air temperature and non-reflected sunlight has to exceed the freezing point for there to be surface melt. Most of the surface melt they show is at the Ross Ice SHELF, the Ronne-Filchner ice SHELF, the Amery ice SHELF, the Shackleton ice SHELF, the West ice SHELF, the Fimbul ice SHELF, Larsen C ice SHELF, Riiser-Larsen ice SHELF, Wilkins ice SHELF and George VI ice SHELF, with occasional minor detection of “melt” in other coastal areas – in the “ablation zone” at the edge of the SHEET. The ablation zone is not always where melt occurs either – part of the ablation of the sheet in the ablation zone includes calving.
While temperatures in mid-Austral summer can sometimes exceed 0C in the ablation zone, even in mid-summer the coastal temps are usually below freezing, and it’s an extremely rare event for anywhere on the ice SHEET to exceed the freezing point.
The Antarctic Peninsula doesn’t have ice sheet. It has some glaciers but not sheet, until you get to Marie Byrd Land, which isn’t on the peninsula – and that’s melting from below.
And let’s not forget that parts of Antarctica, including the tip of the peninsula, are outside the Antarctic Circle. “Melt” or “warm temperatures” in zones outside the Antarctic circle are not representative of Antarctica, which remains the “coldest place on Earth.” no matter how much warming NOAA wants to manufacture.
Correction: Ellsworth Land has some ice sheet too, and some of Palmer Land might be considered covered with ice sheet, even though it’s mostly mountainous, implying glacier… but all still subject to the dynamic of West Antarctica.
Oh yes – you may have picked up a minor linguistic slip in the press release that is not in the original paper. The authors say “antarctic-wide surface meltiing” and refer frequently to “ice-shelf”. It does look as though the press release has added “ice-sheet” into that phrase without realising the significance. It makes no differrence to the science, of course. Just another example of why we should be suspicious of press releases and always checkl the original. The paper is clearly not talking about melting that does not occur.
jstalewski,
They say: Antarctica-wide ice sheet surface melting.
That implies that the Antarctic is losing ice. It’s not.
The Antarctic is adding ice year over year. How could it not? The temperature is far below the freezing point of water.
And thanks for correcting the misinformation posted here by a couple of alarmist parrots. You’re forcing them to trot back to their alarmist blogs for more talking points. But nothing takes the place of measurements, and the fact is that polar ice is completely normal. They’ll have to find something else to panic about.
dbstealy – ” Antarctica-wide ice sheet surface melting. That implies that the Antarctic is losing ice. It’s not.”
Surface melting during some periods of the year does not imply net ice loss. You would need to balance losses and gains, and the melting is only a loss.
You are welcome.
@seaice sez:
You would need to balance losses and gains, and the melting is only a loss.
Antarctic ice gains exceed losses, and by quite a lot:
You are welcome.
All interesting stuff. However, to a contributor including the author all ignore the simple geological fact that ice has been continuously and more importantly in an extraordinarily regular fashion for well nigh on 1,000,000 years. The oldest ice recorded is about 840,000 years BP at Dome C and not yet on bottom. In fact the ice accumulation on continental Antarctica has been removing water from the system since accumulation began. Sea level studies covering the same time show that the sea level was up to 16 metres higher and as much as 150 m lower on a cyclical basis but this sea level movement is at odds with the constant accumulation of ice as indicated by all of the Antarctic ice cores. All weather/climate measurements pale into insignificance when aligned against the actual ice accumulation rates which are remarkably consistent over a long period of time. There is no episodic melting except amongst the most recent but peripheral glaciers hence the confusion by Woods Hole.
Oh look scary model based speculation that falls down flat when reality is introduction , that would be climate ‘science’ in action.
Easy life , push out any old BS and kickback and to count grant cash , no actual effort nor scientific integrated required.
Although to be fair most in climate ‘science’ simply lack the ability to work in any other way .
Has there been any modeling done on if this trend continues on if the ice and snow continues to accumulate at pole that is land bases rather than ocean? For instance could the weight destabilize the rotation of the earth? The wobble would be pronounced. Then of course, if it did melt, would that make the oceans more or less salty, or would it make them less acidic, from the co2? So many questions, so little time on the supercomputer. What would the heat uptake be with all that newly released water and increased co2 levels combined with a warm climate? What would happen to plant life under under those conditions?
The increased frequency and range of these panic releases has an element of desperation about them.
Its as if the Human GW lobby is trying to bury any doubts with an autumnal litter of press releases, none of any great substance.
Exactly. And I can understand the motive of people like Obama, who fans the flames of this stupid “ice” false alarm in order to push his carbon tax. But what I don’t understand is the dwindling clique of lemmings who get nothing out of the “ice” scare. They are no more than unpaid parrots.
Every natural event is twisted by them to try and convince rational folks that Arctic ice is vanishing, or the Polar bears are starving because they don’t have enough ice to hunt from, or any of the other truly wacko, swivel-eyed false alarms they constantly flog like a dead horse. What do they get out of it, except well-deserved ridicule?
Here is a chart showing Arctic ice, Antarctic ice, and global ice areas:
http://www.climate4you.com/images/NSIDC%20GlobalArcticAntarctic%20SeaIceArea.gif
We see that Arctic ice has taken a dip, while at the same time Antarctic ice is rising. Since the Antarctic contains ≈10X the volume of Arctic ice, why should anyone worry about these natural fluctuations?
And look at global ice. It is right on its long term average. There is as much polar ice on the planet as there has been since satellite measurements began. Try telling that to the eco-religionists who cherry-pick only the factoids that support their confirmation bias. But they won’t listen, because their beliefs trump scientific measurements. No wonder their numbers are dwindling.