Decline of Arctic Ice, No Longer An Early Warning

While sea level rise probably is the best measure of heat absorbed by the Earth, that is, until there is no ice to melt, it is very much an after the fact indicator. The clathrate already is hitting the fan, so to speak.

Unfortunately, we have been ignoring more advanced notice; and, now, warns Hell and High Water author Romm, “the Arctic ice isn’t going to recover, and we are headed for ice free summers in the foreseeable future.”

Arctic Sea Ice Extent
We are on our way to an ice-free Arctic Ocean in the summer. It is a very big tipping point. This is very, very bad news. End of transmission.

American Progress Cartoon

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This entry was written by jcwinnie, posted on 2009-8-19 at 8:45 am, filed under cartoon, climate, denial, environment, risk, thermodynamics, world and tagged , , . Bookmark the permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post. Both comments and trackbacks are currently closed.

2 Comments

  1. jcwinnie
    Posted 2009-8-22 at 8:58 am | Permalink

    “The world’s oceans this summer are the warmest on record,” reports USA Today, mainstream American media not noted for informative reporting on Climate Change in past years.

    The National Climatic Data Center, the government agency that keeps weather records, says the average global ocean temperature in July was 62.6 degrees. It is the hottest since record-keeping began in 1880. The previous record was set in 1998.

    Meteorologists blame a combination of a natural El Nino weather pattern on top of worsening man-made global warming. The warmer water could add to the melting of sea ice and possibly strengthen some hurricanes.

    The Gulf of Mexico, where warm water fuels hurricanes, has temperatures dancing around 90 degrees. Most of the water in the Northern Hemisphere has been considerably warmer than normal. The Mediterranean is about three degrees warmer than normal. Higher temperatures rule in the Pacific and Indian Oceans.

    It’s most noticeable near the Arctic, where water temperatures are as much as 10 degrees above average. (My emphasis)

    Breaking heat records in water is more ominous as a sign of global warming than breaking temperature marks on land. That’s because water takes longer to heat up and does not cool off as easily, said climate scientist Andrew Weaver of the University of Victoria in British Columbia.

    “This is another yet really important indicator of the change that’s occurring,” Weaver said.

    More at Toad Hall, a.k.a., Climate Progress.

  2. jcwinnie
    Posted 2009-9-10 at 9:54 am | Permalink

    Sea Ice Decline
    “Atmospheric circulation patterns in August helped spread out sea ice, slowing ice loss in most regions of the Arctic. NSIDC scientists expect to see the minimum ice extent for the year in the next few weeks. While this year’s minimum ice extent will probably not reach the record low of 2007, it remains well below normal: average ice extent for August 2009 was the third-lowest in the satellite record. Ice extent has now fallen below the 2005 minimum, previously the third-lowest extent in the satellite record.”

    Professor Romm takes it in stride — since it is what he predicted, see “NSIDC: Record low Arctic ice extent unlikely in 2009.”

    Since the 2009 arctic extent AREA is no longer that close to 2008 levels, which set the record for minimum ice VOLUME, it seem unlikely 2009 will set a volume record (see “Will we see record low Arctic ice VOLUME this year?“).

2 Trackbacks

  1. By The Climate in the Cryosphere – After Gutenberg on 2009-10-18 at 7:09 pm

    [...] To repeat, the clathrate already is hitting the fan, so to speak. It is time to buy a clue: it was Professor Romm in the library with an uncharacteristically blunt instrument. [...]

  2. By No Hope in Hogging – After Gutenberg on 2009-11-2 at 4:27 pm

    [...] 111) about such a commitment to life on the Planet as we know it, a follow-up question could be: Is Professor Romm entirely rational if he expects that now they will do something [...]

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