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Arctic Sea Ice Hits Record Low
Titus Andronicus writes "Angela Fritz and Jeff Masters of Weather Underground analyze this year's record ongoing Arctic ice melt. Arctic sea ice extent, area, and volume are all at record lows for the post-1979 satellite era. The ice is expected to continue melting for perhaps another couple of weeks. Extreme sea ice melting might help cause greater numbers of more powerful Arctic storms, help to accelerate the melting of the Greenland ice sheet, and help to accelerate global warming itself, due to the increased absorption of solar energy into the ocean."
Time to buy shares in boats - or just buy boats.
It is all Bush's fault and don't you forget it.
It's here. Let's deal with it.
The Last Starfighter:
Lord Kril: Damage report!
Kodan Officer: Guidance system out. Auxiliary steering out.
Lord Kril: Divert! Divert!
Kodan Officer: She won't answer the helm! We're locked into the moon's gravitational pull. What do we do?
[sound of Lord Kril's eyepiece swinging over left eye]
Lord Kril: We die.
I'm not a global warming naysayer, but are humans solely to blame for this? How much of it would have happened anyway? (I'm thinking of the sun's 11-year cycle and the recent larger-than-normal volcano activity)
One thing I know, and that is that I am ignorant...
It is time to accept that this is happening. Time to make the most of it. There are remote communities that will be well positioned in the Canadian Arctic for incredible economical opportunities.
High Prices for Groceries could become a thing of the past once the ice opens up for longer periods of time.
The Northwest Passage has the potential to become more important than Panama
It may well be too late to stop the warming trend, we will have to make the best of it.
Honestly... THINGS CHANGE. So what does this mean? Easier shipping commerce by the Northern Route. This is BAD?
Seriously, what's the big deal about a glacier melting? It's not a work of fucking art, it's a large chunk of ICE!
I don't see a big down-side to melting ice.
Isn't this just hooting and hollering by people that just don't want CHANGE?
We say "all time low" when really what we mean is "for the past few years we've been keeping record of it". I love sensationalist stories like this. I'm not saying the ice hasn't melted a lot. I'm not saying the earth isn't warming. What I am saying is I doubt its the first in the millions of years of earth's history that it has gotten warm for a period. Then it'll get all cold for a while and everyone will be like "Oh no we stopped global warming too well...".
=D
Discuss.
The liberals are paying the scientists with government to make this stuff up so they have an excuse to destroy our way of life!! Liberals hate us and our way of life. They don't like us driving SUVs and eating meat. Don't believe their lies!!!
It's a hoax!!!!
---Technology will liberate us if it doesn't enslave us first.
Record 35 year lows. That's never happened before in our 4.5 billion year history, you can be sure!
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
Or melting ice could cause massive algae blooms, pull staggering quantities of carbon from the ocean and perpetuate our 800,000,000 year old oxygen/nitrogen atmosphere.
Nah. There can't be any mechanisms in the biosphere to prevent the Earth going Venus. It has been surviving by pure luck all this time until we came along and ruined it.
AUUUUUUUUUUGH!
DOOOOOOOOOOOM!
i wish i could urinate in my own anus and have music play from my colon as i flashed the peace sign and ate yogurt smeared across a dirty table.
As the Arctic Ocean summer ice declines there is developing evidence it is having an effect on the northern polar jet stream, slowing it down and causing the meanders to get larger. This has the effect of bringing colder weather further south and warmer weather further north and slowing down the speed at which the weather moves through. That would explain why a few years ago when Florida was having freezing weather Greenland was practically balmy.
As earth heats up, cooling mechanisms should increase. It's not instantaneous of course. Until the cooling mechanisms outpace the heating mechanisms, ice is going to keep melting year after year. The speed ice melts probably has more to do with surface area, ice depth, and cloud cover more than ambient temperature.
Right Sir http://www.bollywudfunda.com/2012/09/des-hoyaa-pardes-full-movie-gurdas-maan.html
Hi there,
First of all there is some doubt about the data on the Artic Ice shrinkage. The new ice recording tool MASIE from the NOAA does not seem to show any record low. Neither does the multisensor IMS measurer. So it seems it really depends at what thermometer you are looking...
Second of all, let's look at Antartica. the ice coverage seems to be above average (from the NATICE data). Funny the media is not talking about it...
The point here is not to deny climate change. It is to point out that the media coverage is skewered towards sensationnalist dramatic announcements and we do not get all the facts of the debate. And no good rational decisions come from a debate fuelled only by sensationnalistic coverage like this.
`grep' is the command, it goes first.
Also, enclose the multiple words you want to grep for in quotes, unless you intend to grep multiple files...
It is time to accept that this is happening. Time to make the most of it. There are remote communities that will be well positioned in the Canadian Arctic for incredible economical opportunities. http://www.bollywudfunda.com/2012/09/des-hoyaa-pardes-full-movie-gurdas-maan.html
Remember when there was a problem with acid rain?
Sulfur dioxide restrictions were implemented flexibly by a cap and trade system. The economic impact was obviously manageable, and the problem got addressed.
It's instructive to look at the political history of the idea of using market forces to distribute the effort of pollution reduction. Look up whose idea it was in the first place.
He actually proves the GP's point.
Per Capita (which is the graph he links to) shows the US trending down, and China trending up. That's nice, but considering that China has a population of around 1.3 billion versus the US population of around 305 million, even a moderate trend upwards has to be multiplied by over 4.
All of the other CO2 graphs show that China has put out more pollution than the US for a very long time. However 3 of them show that like the US, China too has been reducing their pollution as well. The only one showing an upward trend is the graph showing the kg of CO2 per kg of oil energy equivalent use.
captcha: illusion
I swear someone, somewhere has a really weird sense of humour.
If anyone doesn't get it:
Less sea ice > more air moisture > more snow.
So yes, global warming would cause the winters to be harsher in snowbound areas.
http://www.webcitation.org/6AKKakUIo
There was almost a million km more ice over last winter than there was in the previous low year of 2007.
There was also an exceptionally strong summer storm this year in early August (the time when ice is thinnest) that led to a lot of ice breaking up - hence the relative ice low.
http://earthsky.org/earth/powerful-summer-storm-in-arctic-reduces-sea-ice-even-more
Result is an at least 30 year low, but it is pretty consistent with the 60 year AMO/PDO ocean cycle:
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/ArcticIce/Images/arctic_temp_trends_rt.gif
So it doesn't actually look like this is a "death spiral" at least in the short term, more like a bit of seasonal variability in an otherwise 5 year upwards trend.
Drainage to river can cope with heavy storms - check
Able to supply food needs using mixture of conventional growing and hydroponics - check
Politically stable area which is a net food and energy exporter - check
Now I just need a few machine guns and a minefield and I'm all set to watch the fun.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
Isn't cap-and-trade a rather soft way to change things? What would you have instead? How would you make people paint their roofs white? By jailing everyone who haven't done so before some set date in a huge police operation? Or just setting up some roof-not-white-tax? Remember that a government always has a limited choice of methods, and that humanity will almost never just automatically move as one to achieve these kinds of things.
The only options I can think of right now are Carbon Tax, and limiting (extra) emissions by making them a criminal offense.
I also think your numbers on the impact of white-painting are wrong, but I'd be glad to see evidence for them!
The biosphere is to a degree self regulating because it has evolved that way. But there are no written guarantees that this will be true tomorrow.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
Why would you complain about China? Their per-capita CO2 emissions are still lower than that in USA. US emissions are detectable in Manchuria. So what?
Come on, am I supposed to take seriously someone who is supposed to have read a scientific paper but can't spell one of the key words?
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
I don't know the original source of your sea ice anomalies graph, here's the noaa one:
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/service/global/nh-seaice/201207.gif
2007 was not particularly bad, and it's clear there's a strong trend to the ice melting 2012 being the worst.
Looking at your temperature graph, the 100 year trend is up, the whole data trend is up, the 20 year trend is up, the 40 year trend is up, HOWEVER, if we take the 65 year trend, (which includes the drop from the second world war destruction), we get a downward trends. But why did you choose the 65 years trend? That clearly includes the peak around 1939 for the war buildup, without that peak, even that trend is up!
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/ArcticIce/Images/arctic_temp_trends_rt.gif
I don't know, are you hoping nobody will actually look at the links you provided? Because I don't see how you can come to that conclusion even from the links you provided. The shrinking ice is within the trend, and it's a clear trend of warming/shrinking.
If you want to see basically all the current graphical data available on sea ice in Arctis, you want Arctic sea ice graphs. Take a look!
Finally! A year of moderation! Ready for 2019?
Why is everyone so obsessed with bundling cause(s) and the need for solutions into one argument?
Regardless of whether or not global warming is cyclical, man-made or otherwise, surely there can be no argument against the benefits of reducing global CO2 emissions?
- John
It's hard to derive much meaning from CO2 pollution numbers per country, when the fact is that goods move between USA and China. I believe net transport is from China to USA. Many things are manufactured in China. So part of CO2 emissions in China is directly attributable to US.
Mitt Romney doesn't give a shit.
Instead of speculating on the basis of miniscule data, you're better off just shutting up and burning less stuff - which, incidentally, is exactly what needs to be done because we're a) running out of stuff to burn in some areas and b) we finally start bringing a few billion people from abject poverty into reasonable (though still very poor) living conditions who will need stuff to burn.
30 second research and google would have told you this has been eliminated as explanation , what, a million time now ? Even in year of big eruption volcano don't even scratch the quantity CO2 we emit as human. As for sun it has so long been eliminated. Why do people ask question which are easily answered by a cursory google search (and I am not even speaking of reading peer reviewed article linked as primary source in case one don't trust real climate or whatever).
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
http://www.climatedepot.com/a/17239/Dont-Panic-Arctic-Ice-Hits-Record-Low-Climate-Depot-Explains--Arctic-melting-hype
More lies from the Global Warming shills, whose very jobs depend on making everybody panic.
*groan* Why did I not read my post before I pressed "Submit"? It should have said "The problem is not that ...", obviously.
The earth is estimated to be 3.8 BILLION years old. Something observed since 1979 would be a "record" based on 0.000000009% of the life of the planet. No wonder climate science has such a bad reputation if such silliness makes its way into discussion. ANY discussion of numbers in units smaller than the shortest cycle of observed change is unscientific. Great Scott, we're developers and hardware makers. We, of all people, should know about a minimal statement of requirements.
"We receive as friendly that which agrees with, we resist with dislike that which opposes us" - Faraday
And which cooling mechanisms are these? According to TFA, melting the polar icecap actually removes an important cooling mechanism. Other mechanisms, such as the ocean's ability to abosrb CO2, are pretty much maxed out. Do you have a planet size air conditioner nobody else knows about?
With substantial removal of ice cover from land areas, we get increased erosion from previously inaccessible terrain, leading to increased amounts of certain minerals available in the ocean, which remove CO2 through carbonate formation. Another major mechanism for CO2 removal is the occurrence of global oceanic anoxic events, which leads to massive oceanic burying of organic carbon (there is some speculation that anoxic periods were responsible for the formation of some major oil deposits, as well as some extinction events).
Of course, geological mechanisms such as this function on geological time scales, so I wouldn't expect these effects to kick in on any timescale observable by our human civilization.
blah blah blah MIGHT CAUSE blah HORRIBLENESS blah CATASTROPHE blah AWFULNESS
Or ... it MIGHT NOT
When they say 'MIGHT', what exactly is the probability they are suggesting? Pretty much unknown ... like most climate related FUD.
"Consensus" in science is _always_ a political construct.
Given "Less sea ice > more air moisture > more snow" which in turn leads to "more snow > more sea ice > less air moisture > less snow". Eventually back to dryer winters in snowbound areas. It is called a feedback loop.
Just in case anyone does not understand feedback loops.
A lot of water mixing into the ocean will cause moire damage to the already imbalanced ecosystem, pollution, global warming and sea traffic may one of the factor behind this.
Our war against the oppressive arctic ice is nearly at an end.
The focus should be on enhancing our understanding of the climate model and figuring out how we might directly and actively control it.
Because a pound of cure is better then an ounce of prevention. Right?
Because skeptics are um skeptical. There are many of us who don't adopt a position of belief on this subject.
But those who call themselves skeptics have almost universally adopted a belief on the subject. That their 1-3 climate scientists are correct about climate science -- even thought they are creation scientists, but skeptics don't think about that.
As for those cries of economic armageddon from the ostensibly rational skeptics: they are also not founded in any reality. We have had various carbon trading and/or tax systems in place. In America. In Germany. The evidence is in, and just like the economists said, the net effect on the economy is negligible.
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
Humans could have no greater nor swifter impact on the CO2 balance than the evolution of white-rot fungus.
Gee. Let me draw an analogy. I once saw a forest fire. The forest burnt down. Therefore, if I intentionally light a fire and destroy another forest, that forest wasn't really effected by my actions. Because that other forest was destroyed by natural causes.
If you think climate scientists are too stupid to know about such things, then you are too incompetent to recognize how incompetent you are.
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
Everyone wants *everyone else* to deal with.
No everyone. Just you, and a minority in the world. That's right, we're burning up the world because of the tyranny of a small special interest group and a few loud gullible follows.
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
Whatever the degree of impact humans have on climate change is, there is no question that the climate changes wildly over time on it's own (it was warmer than it is now when the Vikings expanded to Greenland, and even briefly the North American mainland).
If the goal is to preserve a certain climate range, then the discussion shouldn't be about limiting our impact, but on increasing it (just in a more controlled way). Of course, this leads to all sorts of dangerous possibilities, but at least the discussion wouldn't be futile as is our current "Debate". It kind of reminds me of the two party system. Both sides make some valid points, but in the end they are ignoring the real issues.
Ok, before I get modded Troll, I'd like to appeal to your critical thinking logical side.
First, while I personally find this a bit saddening, lets ask a couple questions and make some observations.
1. Why is the ice cap cited as such a barometer of global warming?
2. Is the warming necessarily anthropogenic? Wouldn't it melt even if the warming was entirely natural?
3. What does an ice cap (which floats on water, which is an order of magnitude better conductor of heat than air)
3a. Where does this water get it's heat from? Hint: 75% of our surface is water. Does air affect ocean temps or something else?
3b. What is the heating role of CO2 in water. (ignore acidification)
4. If I showed you a temperature graph which showed temperatures are average while ice area is down, what would you infer?
( temperature graph )
4a. Could the ice pack be affected by say a storm that broke up the ice which facilitated melting?
So while the news is bad, we can't necessarily draw the conclusion that we've been told to draw. Low sea ice has nothing to with CO2. Global warming maybe, but not CO2.
Slashdot's rate-of-post filter: Preventing you from posting too many great ideas at once.
If you don't mind I will inherit your post title...
To the point: there are many ways to slice and dice this. Yes, China has a bigger population, but who are you to claim that each and every one of them does not deserve the same standard of living as yourself? You cannot point your finger at China and scream bloody murder when your own pollution is quadruple of the civilized world average. Just compare US to European developed nations, like Germany and France (using the same link, naturally).
So before "imposing trade sanctions on China", as GGP suggested, check the numbers to make sure you are not laughed out of the trade sanctions meeting.
Why do you spam a wall of text you probably didn't understand a word of?
We have a problem now - that there were problems in the past is not relevant - that there were periods where there were no problems in the past is not relevant.
We have a problem now.
We should do something about it.
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
In (Former) Soviet Russia!
Talk to the hand, cause Elder Romney don't want to hear it!
Global warming? we don't need no stinking global warming!
I killed da wabbit -Elmer Fudd
Basic fact of Nature on planet Earth that isn't going to change: Ice melts in summer, freezes when it's not summer.
Oh noooooooooes ice melts in the summer. It is the end of the world as we know it (well it is one end of the world, the north end) and it will all just freeze again in the winter so what is the big dooms day problem?
None of the co2 doomsday rapture claims in the article can be substantiated. They are just prognostications of people projecting their fears. There is no scientific basis to them. If you believe there is then you're not doing science, you're on the drug of "belief". If you have any actual hard evidence that there are any serious consequences that haven't happened before or any actual scientific evidence showing causation that humans went up there with blow torches or other means of "warming" the arctic then please provide the peer reviewed papers that show causation. Oh and papers that conjecture are not showing causation, you know a paper is conjecturing when they use conditional language like "could, might, maybe, will probably, ...". Thanks if you attempt to do actual science. No thanks if you are spout doomsday rapture nightmares you've incultcated.
Sunshine = Ice melting. Fall, Winter and Spring = Ice Frozen. Fact of Nature on Earth in the arctic and antarctic.
Besides the total ice volume on planet Earth is on a slight increasing trend, fact: http://wattsupwiththat.com/reference-pages/sea-ice-page.
The winter ice extent is missleading since the ice is gettng thinner. It's not the total ice area, it's also the VOLUME that is shrinking and NOT recovering!
Did anybody follow this link that was posted on the article....?
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/09/05/799761/death-spiral-watch-experts-warn-near-ice-free-arctic-in-summer-in-a-decade-volume-trends-continue/
Did anybody follow this link that was posted on the article
Uh, did you not read the post you replied to?
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
\It's like betting $100 on both teams in the Superbowl, then celebrating when you win.
I don't see that as a problem.
What is the worst thing that could happen if we try to prevent global warming: we have renewable sources of energy, more efficient food production and transportation infrastructure at a cost of investment capital.
What is the worst thing that could happen if we don't do anything: climate instability (for humans anyway) and we all go extinct.
I'd rather bet on global warming as existing and if I am wrong I still win big than do nothing and get shat on no matter the outcome.
Hopefully the Antarctic ice does not melt as well. We should try to convince poor insane Danforth to tell us what he saw out of the planes window.
You must gather your party before venturing forth.