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The Icelandic Families Tracking Climate Change With Measuring Tape (undark.org)
Gloria Dickie, writing for Undark Magazine: A 30-meter Komelon-branded measuring tape, a pencil, and a yellow paper form are all Hallsteinn Haraldsson carries with him when he travels to the Snaefellsnes Peninsula in western Iceland. But unfurling the measuring tape before me at his home in Mosfellsbaer, a town just outside of Reykjavik, he says it is a significant upgrade from the piece of marked rope he used to bring along. With 11 percent of the landmass covered in ice, rapidly ebbing glaciers are threatening to reshape Iceland's landscape, and Haraldsson, 74, is part of a contingent of volunteer glacier monitors who are at the frontlines of tracking the retreat. Every autumn, Haraldsson, often accompanied by his wife and son, sets off on foot to measure the changes in his assigned glacier.
Their rudimentary tools are a far cry from the satellites and time-lapse photography deployed around the world in recent decades to track ice loss, and lately, there's been talk of disbanding this nearly century-old, low-tech network of monitors. But this sort of ground-truthing work has more than one purpose: With Iceland's glaciers at their melting point, these men and women -- farmers, schoolchildren, a plastic surgeon, even a Supreme Court judge -- serve not only as the glaciers' guardians, but also their messengers. Today, some 35 volunteers monitor 64 measurement sites around the country. The numbers they collect are published in the Icelandic scientific journal Jokull, and submitted to the World Glacier Monitoring Service database. Vacancies for glacier monitors are rare and highly sought-after, and many glaciers have been in the same family for generations, passed down to sons and daughters, like Haraldsson, when the journey becomes too arduous for their aging watchmen. It's very likely one of the longest-running examples of citizen climate science in the world. But in an age when precision glacier tracking can be conducted from afar, it remains unclear whether, or for how long, this sort of heirloom monitoring will continue into the future. It's a question even some of the network's own members have been asking.
Their rudimentary tools are a far cry from the satellites and time-lapse photography deployed around the world in recent decades to track ice loss, and lately, there's been talk of disbanding this nearly century-old, low-tech network of monitors. But this sort of ground-truthing work has more than one purpose: With Iceland's glaciers at their melting point, these men and women -- farmers, schoolchildren, a plastic surgeon, even a Supreme Court judge -- serve not only as the glaciers' guardians, but also their messengers. Today, some 35 volunteers monitor 64 measurement sites around the country. The numbers they collect are published in the Icelandic scientific journal Jokull, and submitted to the World Glacier Monitoring Service database. Vacancies for glacier monitors are rare and highly sought-after, and many glaciers have been in the same family for generations, passed down to sons and daughters, like Haraldsson, when the journey becomes too arduous for their aging watchmen. It's very likely one of the longest-running examples of citizen climate science in the world. But in an age when precision glacier tracking can be conducted from afar, it remains unclear whether, or for how long, this sort of heirloom monitoring will continue into the future. It's a question even some of the network's own members have been asking.
We even got a new highest waterfall several years back. The highest used to be Glymur, at the bottom of Hvalfjörður (very pretty waterfall, BTW, strongly recommend the hike out to it). But Morsárjökull (a terminal glacier of Vatnajökull, the giant glacier in the southeast) receded up a cliff, leaving a series of waterfalls - Morsárfossar - which are taller than Glymur (but not as pretty).
Jesus: "Son of a
True enough, it is the oceans that rise to swallow the islands, islands rarely sink into the oceans.
”But in an age when precision glacier tracking can be conducted from afar, it remains unclear whether, or for how long, this sort of heirloom monitoring will continue into the future. It's a question even some of the network's own members have been asking.”
If nothing else, it’s still a good excuse for an outing.
#DeleteChrome
"Such findings werenâ(TM)t uncommon during that period: In the 1930s, many of the countryâ(TM)s glaciers had retreated significantly due to an unusually warm climate, but beginning in 1970, they advanced once more until human-caused climate change beat them back again."
So in the 1930s it was natural, but now oh noes it's the evil mankind making them retreat.
I smell B.S.
If you want to follow the money, who has more to gain: scientists looking for research money or the fossil fuel industries?
Even most FF companies accept AGW. Exxon was one of the few (along with Koch) that funded denialists, but they stopped when they were caught with their pants down: Using one set of projections to lie to the public, while using very different projections for their own internal financial forecasting.
How can they conclude that these glacier measurements are changing because of rising temperatures, when it's just as likely that it's due to natural periodic fluctuations in the melting point temperature of ice, or else due to natural expansion and contraction of all the rocks forming the island?
I get the idea. I'm afraid you do not. Snow doesn't melt instantly. And in fact in the vast majority of the world, snow and water do not land on glaciers and the land downstream does not flood every spring.
Even if you think landing on the glacier somehow changes this. Remember, every bit of snow that lands on the glacier melts every year (or at least the same amount of water) PLUS MORE. As such, someone living downstream from a glacier already gets more water every year than someone who does not. In fact the sign was very clear that the melting glacier itself was what provided enough water for the communities downstream. Something they would not have if the glacier was gone.
Of course it's also something they wouldn't have if the glacier weren't melting. But that text wouldn't fit the agenda of those who wrote the sign.
The government outspends any company hundreds to one in this area
That's 100% false.
https://www.statista.com/topic...:
Oil (and gas) companies are among the largest corporations worldwide. Among the top ten companies worldwide based on revenue, six are in the oil industry. In 2016, Anglo-Dutch giant Royal Dutch Shell reported almost 234 billion U.S. dollars of revenue. Thus, Shell was the third-largest company worldwide based on revenue in 2015. ExxonMobil from Irving, Texas generated a revenue reporting some 219 billion U.S. dollars in 2016. However, ExxonMobil claims the highest market value within this industry, as well as having the second-highest market value of all companies worldwide in 2015.
https://www.nationalpriorities...: In fiscal year 2015, the federal budget is $3.8 trillion.
So, no, the fossil fuel industry is probably larger than the entire US budget, making your statement 100% false.
I don't respond to AC's.
I was at a glacier recently, and there was a sign talking about how if the glacier kept melting due to global warming, it would vanish and no longer be able to be a source for water for the rivers it fed, and all the problems people downstream would have due to lack of water.
What they seemed to miss was the idea that if the glacier was NOT melting, there would also be no water downstream....
The size of a glacier is dependent on the balance between the snow it receives each year and the amount of melt over the year. If the glacier is growing it's receiving more snow than is melting. If the glacier is shrinking it's receiving less snow than is melting. If it shrinks to the point of disappearing then melt that keeps rivers going late in the summer/fall will also disappear changing the pattern of water flow often to the detriment of those who depend on the river.
Iceland has actually risen out of the Atlantic ocean with the retreat of the ice since the end of the last ice age.
The sheer weight of the ice sitting on top of it during the ice age caused the island to sink down.
This can be seen around the coastal areas where the coast is flat and then rises dramatically to a plateau.