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Scientists Marvel At 'Increasingly Non-Natural' Arctic Warmth (msn.com)
mmell writes: Recognizing that this is a dreadfully old story (at least by Slashdot standards), current developments make this once more a current story. Scientists studying the Arctic environment are used to seeing broad variations in average temperature readings, but recent results have been so far beyond the normal range that they are only able to conclude that they are being caused by human activity. The temperature data (which includes a great many days with readings above 0C) is bolstered by measurements showing that the Arctic ice shelf is both thinner and less extensive than has ever been previously recorded. I wonder if the Arctic ice cap will reform in the winter, or if it's possible that its absence will cause irreversible changes to the Earth's ocean currents (and by extension, Earth's climate)? "[A]fter studying the Arctic and its climate for three and a half decades, I have concluded that what has happened over the last year goes beyond even the extreme," wrote Mark Serreze, director of the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colorado, in an essay for Earth magazine. According to The Washington Post, the scientists' simulations predict some places in the high Arctic will rise over 50 degrees above normal. One chart, embedded in the report and shared by several meteorologists online, shows a "jaw-dropping and emblematic display of the intensity and duration of the Arctic warmth. It illustrates the difference from normal in the number of 'freezing degree days,' a measure of the accumulated cold since September."
Pettit's Ice Volume Death Spiral graphs are somewhat more understandable, but no less depressing.
https://sites.google.com/site/pettitclimategraphs/sea-ice-volume
~.~
I'm a peripheral visionary.
You're forgetting about the Thermohaline cycle: I temperatures rises and ice melts the salinity in the area between the isles and Scandinavia will plummet as the less dense fresh water will push back the warm salt water from the south. This will lead to colder temperatures so while the planet heats up, the most of north western Europe might get colder!
You are not taking into account any changes between then and now, but even worse, you have no data on the depth of the ice, only on the area. The square kilometers says nothing about the volume, this however, does: https://nsidc.org/cryosphere/q...
Just because one model (and your BBC article was about ONE model which contradicted other model) didn't accurately predict when all the ice will be gone, doesn't mean that you should throw all models in the bin. Right now, most models say that the ice will be mostly gone somewhere between 2040 - 2100.
Which part of that means it's perfectly OK to dump billions of tons of CO2 into the air now?
No sig today...
Yes, it may be shrinking a little, but the sampling period is extremely short, compared to our planet's age. This can or cannot be caused by humans
This is very true. However, in this case we are certain that it is, in fact, being caused by human activity. The Keeling curve leaves very little room for interpretation.
Those who advocate genocide deserve every protection afforded by law, and none afforded by common human decency.
" Venice DOES seem to have major problems with flooding, something that will be very expensive to fix"
Mainly because Venice is sinking:
http://www.livescience.com/191...
I always find this funny that so many studies say "The Arctic is warming and there should be no more ice cap by 2050". I remember some US scientists said there would be no ice in the Arctic by 2013, and look at this graph. The arctic ice cap is currently a little over 13 million square km.
Yes, it may be shrinking a little, but the sampling period is extremely short, compared to our planet's age. This can or cannot be caused by humans. But hey, anyway humans won't survive Earth, which is scheduled to disappear anyway in the next 5 billion years... Unless we disseminate elsewhere in our universe, we're doomed.
How can you link to a text that says "could be ice-free in summers" and claim it says "there would be no ice (full stop). The ice cap is not "shrinking a little", it's shrinking massively. "Currently" it's the middle of winter, when the sea ice is always expanding to nearly the same level (basically, it covers the arctic until it runs out of ocean). In the arctic ocean, the summer minimum is the most important measurement. That said, the arctic ice has been at or near record low for the entire winter, and for good measure in this year antarctic sea ice also is unusually low. The newly formed first-year ice is so thin that it melts very quickly in the summer, probably giving us another record low, and leading to more heating, as the sunlight is absorbed by the water, not reflected by the ice.
You have a point about the 5 billion years, but most of us have a somewhat shorter perspective - and even those with the long perspective may want to give us enough time to escape this doomed planet before things get really ugly.
Stephan
It's not "this weather is climate", it's "this weather could not possibly have happened without climate change".
Fanatically anti-fanatical
The objection is that it oversteps its role; that it's acting as an unaccountable agency and therefore it needs to be reigned in.
Based on your claim, I had a look around. As far as I can see, just about all of it is whining that the EPA rules will cost big companies money. Well, yes, that is true. It is much cheaper to operate if you can offload the true cost of operation onto other people.
Reigning in the EPA is not the same as eliminating the EPA or not wanting clean air and water.
I disagree. It's generally action from people who want to keep the profits private, but nationalise the costs.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
You should read articles before linking them.
"At Nipaatsoq, blowing glacial sands covered the farm in the early 1400's, sealing it until 1990, when two hunters reported seeing ancient wood protruding from an eroded stream bank.".
It wasn't uncovered by melting ice. It was buried under sand that the wind blew on top of it. Also
"Today the edge of Greenland's ice cap is only six miles from the old farm site. But in the mid-14th century, it probably was far closer."
There was more ice back then than today, not less.