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Greenland Ice Sheet Not Covered In Soot

An anonymous reader writes with word of a a new study of the Greenland ice sheet led by Dartmouth adjunct assistant professor Chris Polashenski, which maintains that the darkening sensed there by satellites is not caused by dust and soot deposited by forest fires and industry, but rather by the slow degradation of the sensors on the satellites themselves. [Polashenski] and his colleagues analyzed dozens of snow-pit samples from the 2012-2014 snowfalls across northern Greenland and compared them with samples from earlier years. The results showed no significant change in the quantity of black carbon deposited for the past 60 years or the quantity and mineralogical makeup of dust compared to the last 12,000 years, meaning that deposition of these light absorbing impurities is not a primary cause of reflectivity reduction or surface melting in the dry snow zone. Algae growth, which darkens ice, also was ruled out as a factor. Instead, the findings suggest the apparent decline in the dry snow zone's reflectivity is being caused by uncorrected degradation of sensors in NASA's aging MODIS satellites and that the declining trend will likely disappear when new measurements are reprocessed.

16 of 119 comments (clear)

  1. so this is how.... by ganjadude · · Score: 2, Funny

    this is how they will explain away the other post from earlier stating that ice is growing. Blame the sensors!

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    1. Re:so this is how.... by ganjadude · · Score: 2

      one mans feces is anothers mans fertilizer

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      have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
  2. Great lesson about... by r-diddly · · Score: 2

    ...observation of the truth. You're always looking through a sensor of some type.

  3. Photos of Greenland's "Dark Snow" .. by nickweller · · Score: 2

    These surface images do seem to show lots of " Dark Ice

  4. Global warming has been changed to Climate Change by Trachman · · Score: 2, Informative

    Conveniently Global Warming initiative somehow morphed into the Climate Change, or, more accurately, fight against Climate change. I have to believe that every educated person will agree that the only thing that is constant it is change itself, including climate. Climate is changing slowly, also changes in cycles and has many variables. And yes, human are f***king up the biosphere.

    NASA has issued new study saying that Antarctica stated that since 1992, a lot of ice has been added to the continent this is the link to NASA: https://www.nasa.gov/content/g...

    Most cynical opponents to those who were pushing Global Warming were citing that it was about the money and carbon tax in the particular.

    I am convinced that in my lifetime I will see another initiative related to the fight against Global Cooling. As such Climate Change is much more convenient because bureaucrats can fight any change irrespective of the direction of the change.

  5. "99%"of the scientists were non-existant by Trachman · · Score: 4, Funny

    Do you expect Retractions? There will be none. Part of the reasons is because those "99% of the scientists were non-existing from the beginning.

    What you witnessed is a classical social manipulation, human tendency to conform and to be part of the group. If television tells you that "99% of the scientists" believe that Global warming is real, then you will probably accept additional carbon taxes easier.

    The problem is that most of the scientists do agree that humanity is changing the earth. You no longer need to be a scientists to see that. For example, in Europe there are no more large populations of bears, tauruses, wolves and wild horses. These animals became extinct before industrial revolution. Last mammothes on Earth died when humans already knew how to write. Heck, some of the rhinoceros will probably be extinct this decade.

    However most of discussions were about a) bankrupting US coal industry and closing coal factories (while China opens new coal electric plant almost every week) and b) imposing additional taxes on the taxpayers of industrialized nations.

  6. Re:Ground truth by RightwingNutjob · · Score: 2

    What? You mean you can't just say "satellites" and magically your data becomes the gold standard? You mean you actually need to calibrate your satellite data to ground stations? Impossible.

    Next you're going to tell me that the buoys need to be taken out and calibrated to a NIST-traceable reference once or twice a year. That's crazy talk. Science=magic, and you must believe!

  7. Dark-er by jklovanc · · Score: 2

    Go anywhere that ice melts slowly and you will see that kink of darkness in the fall. That dark layer is covered up by snow next year.The question is whether or not the snow is darker that is was. Has that darkness been increasing? One set of photographs will not tell us that and even photographs over they years will not usually suffice as exposures, contrasts, medium will make a difference. To make a valid comparison there needs to be a common reference that is in all the pictures so that the brightness measurements can be calibrated. I seems that the satellite did not do that.

  8. Re:Global warming has been changed to Climate Chan by ganjadude · · Score: 2

    he said it does far more damage. not only focusing on a single output.

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    have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
  9. Then start fighting real pollution you moron by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    But here is one thing *I* do know. Pollution is bad for us both economically and physically.

    Then why are you not fighting pollution, instead of CO2 which plants need to live?

    The whole problem I have with you WarmMongers is that you in fact have essentially ended the fight against real pollution to tilt against the CO2 windmill, all for the sake of making a few people (not you BTW) rich.

    The EPA flooded a whole Colorado river system with toxins but people like you won't say boo about that because the EPA is on your "side". I'll bet you totally ignored THAT story despite countless river species outright kills and hundreds of miles of riverbank poisoned. That you dare to speak against pollution is frankly sickening.

  10. Re:Global warming has been changed to Climate Chan by fyngyrz · · Score: 3, Informative

    No. The ice is thickening. Not running into the water. The edges, in fact, are retreating due to shelf collapses (which may well be the normal course of things... we don't have any kind of a baseline si that we can tell.)

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  11. Watch the snow outside in winter by FeelGood314 · · Score: 2

    As it melts it gets darker. The water flows through the snow to the bottom while the impurities generally stay on the surface. When we get the next snow fall the snow is bright and white again and then as it melts it gets darker again.

    Now if the second melt doesn't melt all of the second snow fall be for another fall and you dig into the snow you will see two bands where the previous melts extended to.
    However if a melt melts all the way past the last snow fall you will notice the snow surface suddenly get darker when all the impurities of the layers meet.
    So if the snow has been melting faster on greenland than it has been accumulating I would expect the snow to be getting darker and the darkness "jumping" each time the melting reaches then next melt band.

    At least that is my experience watching our weird Ottawa winters.

  12. Re:Global warming has been changed to Climate Chan by buchner.johannes · · Score: 4, Informative

    Conveniently Global Warming initiative somehow morphed into the Climate Change, or, more accurately, fight against Climate change. I have to believe that every educated person will agree that the only thing that is constant it is change itself, including climate. Climate is changing slowly, also changes in cycles and has many variables. And yes, human are f***king up the biosphere.

    Your stage of denial is 3, and you are implying a appeal to nature fallacy. Here are the relevant links:
    http://grist.org/climate-energ...
    http://grist.org/climate-energ...

    NASA has issued new study saying that Antarctica stated that since 1992, a lot of ice has been added to the continent this is the link to NASA: https://www.nasa.gov/content/g...

    See here: http://grist.org/climate-energ...

    Most cynical opponents to those who were pushing Global Warming were citing that it was about the money and carbon tax in the particular.

    ... are you arguing that now? Do you think scientists are warning about human-made global warming for money and the carbon tax?

    I am convinced that in my lifetime I will see another initiative related to the fight against Global Cooling. As such Climate Change is much more convenient because bureaucrats can fight any change irrespective of the direction of the change.

    Here is some information about various cooling claims:
    http://grist.org/climate-energ...
    http://grist.org/climate-energ...
    http://grist.org/climate-energ...
    http://grist.org/climate-energ...

    --
    NB: The message above might reflect my opinion right now, but not necessarily tomorrow or next year.
  13. Somehow? - Here's how.... by TapeCutter · · Score: 2

    Conveniently Global Warming initiative somehow morphed into the Climate Change

    Yes the US government deliberately changed the terminology in the early 2000's, both phrases are technically correct but have different meanings, both phrases have been (properly) used by researchers since the 1950's. Frank Luntz (GWB's political advisor) suggested the change in official communications to sow doubt about the science in a now infamous memo. It backfired, so the GOP tried to pin the charge of "doublespeak" on the scientists.

    --
    And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
  14. Re:Retractions from the pro-Global Warming crowd? by TapeCutter · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Yes, they claim to have found a slight accounting error in the work that attributes the inputs for the observed sea level rise, it was found with new satellites, improved data resolution, and longer time scales. That small portion of the rise must now be accounted for 'elsewhere', it probably won't be until we make similar measurement improvements 'elsewhere'. Remove the politics and this paper is only interesting to beancounter geeks, it does not challenge existing theories or observations, let alone disprove them. Most importantly, it does not change the observed sea level rise.

    This paper is actually a continuation of the valuable and ongoing work that the 'climategate' beat up was desperately trying to discredit and disrupt via character assassination. ie - Robust climate data. Climate data sets are collected, cleaned, maintained and published by NASA and other organisations, here's a list of the main data sets used by climate researchers. The IPCC does not perform or fund research or data collection, it summarises existing peer-reviewed publications into various reports aimed at different audiences.

    Anyone who genuinely wants to debunk global warming should start here, trust me, climate scientists will respond with collective sigh of releif should anyone succeed.

    --
    And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
  15. Re:Retractions from the pro-Global Warming crowd? by BCGlorfindel · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Anyone who genuinely wants to debunk global warming should start here, trust me, climate scientists will respond with collective sigh of releif should anyone succeed.

    RealClimate.org maybe wouldn't be the best place to start. There's a lot of very aggressively close minded chaps dominating the forums. I know, who'd have thought that could happen on an internet forum?

    Real climate is also co-founded by Michael Mann, whom I really take some issue with. Tell me I'm making a mountain out of a mole hill, but his paleo reconstructions of temperature have really bothered me in the past. Nothing to do with the results, not as much to do even with his methodology now that his later work is addressing and correcting problems. The presentation and usage of the 'hide the decline' trick in graphs is just disgusting. When your paleo reconstruction ends around 1900, just end the graph there. If your paleo reconstruction doesn't show the same temperature rise since 1900 as instrumental, then show that too. What you DO NOT DO, is paste in the instrumental record with a thick enough line to hide the paleo reconstruction since 1900. Even further, don't point to the overlapped instrumental part of the graph as startling and clear evidence of an abrupt trend in the data starting at 1900.

    If your wanting to have an open and honest discussion about the evidence, that's a difficult environment. Even scientists with a decent publishing record within the field like Lindzen are put under a microscope for criticism for not conforming to the 'consensus'. Even researchers widely embraced and accepted like Mauritsen have their results heavily disputed and interpreted there. When statisticians like McShane and Wyner take issue with the statistical methods in Mann and others work, Mann takes to his blog for the 'final' word while leaving out any response to their real and legitimate questions and arguments. I'm not anticipating that it's going to be a particularly receptive audience as you seem to believe.