Record ice loss in Arctic

dohboi · Light Sweet Crude Joined: Dec 05, 2005 Posts: 1149

Actually the worst possible case model in the IPCC report last spring showed the icecap not melting till sometime around 2075, with the median well into the next century and the best case out some centuries. For graphs and discussion, see especially "Climate Code Red"

So modeling done by many of the best minds in climate change from around the globe were off by decades at best, centuries for the optimistic views. But fortunately we have little Freddy on hand who now says he knows exactly what is and what isn't going to happen and exactly when it will and won't happen. Aren't we fortunate! Wink

Troyboy1208 · Posted: Tue Jun 03, 2008 3:54 pm Post subject: Re: Record ice loss in Arctic

The NSIDC has updated their website and the focus is on the melting in May:
Update on 2008 Melt Season

This little tidbit was disturbing:

Smudger · Posted: Tue Jun 03, 2008 5:47 pm Post subject: Re: Record ice loss in Arctic

june/july will be fascinating.

part of me is hoping this will wake everyone up but then we still have a decade to turn things around.

errorist · Tar Sands Joined: May 28, 2008 Posts: 49

I think we're in runaway global warming scenario and trying to fix it based on the little knowledge we have on the subject can turn out very ugly.

Imagine stopping the train at full-speed by derailing it with your metal cutter.

Cid_Yama · Posted: Tue Jun 03, 2008 6:30 pm Post subject: Re: Record ice loss in Arctic

wrong thread
_________________
In a time of deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.
- George Orwell

CamelJockey · Coal Joined: May 27, 2008 Posts: 16

The thing that people seem to forget about are positive feedback loops, namely the melting of permafrost and submarine ice which will release methane. I believe this is very real and we have already entered runaway global warming. The models scientists come up with (we have 10 yrs to turn it around, ice free arctic 40 yrs away, etc) dont take into account at all this threat, so they are not realistic at all, imo.

CamelJockey · Coal Joined: May 27, 2008 Posts: 16

Cid_Yama · Last edited by Cid_Yama on Fri Jun 06, 2008 9:03 am; edited 1 time in total

Actually most of them are sitting in front of their TVs watching god knows what and haven't even heard any of this.
_________________
In a time of deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.
- George Orwell

Smudger · Posted: Fri Jun 06, 2008 3:38 am Post subject: Re: Record ice loss in Arctic

Troyboy1208 · Posted: Fri Jun 06, 2008 8:34 am Post subject: Re: Record ice loss in Arctic

Man since June 1st there has been a major degree of melt going on. I watched the 30 day animation and there are a lot more red and yellow areas that used to be solid ice. When I look at the 365 day graph I noticed that they have not plotted the end of may yet or the beginning of june. They look to be about 1-2 weeks behind in plotting...They did update their satelite and they are calibrating it. That may explain the delay. I am curious to see how much more it dropped in the last several weeks
here is the link:
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/current.365.jpg

dohboi · Light Sweet Crude Joined: Dec 05, 2005 Posts: 1149

Yes, it looks like the plunge-off-the-cliff moment has arrived. There could be another up-tick, but right now it looks like the very rapid collapse of all that one-year ice we have predicted is well underway. The most up-to-date image I can find is the long, "tale of the tape" graph at Cryosphere Today, but you have to click on it to enlarge the graph, the scroll over to the right end. I measure the length from the beginning of this year and compare it with where we were last year, and we're lining up pretty exactly at this point.
tale of the tape

My question now is what will the near-term ramifications of an ice-free summer Arctic Ocean be on weather patterns in the northern hemisphere. Does anyone have any leads on models for this? I don't suppose they will be pleasant.

Troyboy1208 · Posted: Fri Jun 06, 2008 12:40 pm Post subject: Re: Record ice loss in Arctic

Models are useless at this point...nothing in history to compare it to...

dohboi · Light Sweet Crude Joined: Dec 05, 2005 Posts: 1149

I tend to agree. So is there any wild, seat-of-the-pants speculation about how this might affect No. Hemisphere weather patterns that anyone would care to share? What might the ice free summer Arctic Ocean do to the jet stream, for example?

dissident · Heavy Crude Joined: Apr 08, 2006 Posts: 389

The zonal winds are maintained by the north-south temperature gradient (and the rotation of the earth). So a warmer polar cap should reduce them assuming the low latitudes stay in the same temperature range. This is already the regular summer regime as the jet stream is stronger in winter. But there is another major contribution to the jet stream and that is baroclinic instability. Baroclinic eddies act to shape the jet stream producing its meridional meander. The tropics have been heating up faster than the extratropics as predicted by climate models and this feeds more baroclinic eddy formation and wilder thrashing of the jet stream.

The problem with heating up the polar cap is not its direct effect on middle latitude weather, but all of the surface and subsea permafrost melting that is and will release more greenhouse gases which then change the climate everywhere.

dohboi · Light Sweet Crude Joined: Dec 05, 2005 Posts: 1149

Wow, thanks for that great info, dis. Could you recommend any website, books... for further reading on these weather effects.

I completely agree that the really big, longer term (though maybe not so very long at the rate things are developing) effect will be the methane release as things un-freeze.

The prospect of runaway global warming from this thawing makes even someone like me, who has always been very hostile to any kind of conscious geo-engineering, wonder if we couldn't add something to the Arctic atmosphere that would increase reflectivity to mirror some of the activity of the ice cap we are losing. A kind of polar parasol!?