Antarctic Ice Discussion

[Gray-Wolf]

Just as an aside what do the 'GW club' stand to gain by being believed KL? Will they win over the majority of science to the idea that man is altering climate?

 

Will the world become a better place by accepting the 'GW' evidence?

 

Who will profit if 'GW' should win?

 

I think the consensus is that sea ice only grows 2m in open ocean? I've been using Summer rates of loss/type of loss as a way to look at the 'new Arctic' ice behaviour?

 

Do I detect a willingness to call your climate/weather credentials into question here KL or can you really not yet understand how a warming planet can give rise to cold anoms as global changes begin to occur? Say the Gulf stream was interrupted by massive collapse in Greenland (and we lost 1/2 mile of ice from the thickness due to catastrophic summer melt) what would happen to NW Europe?

 

Anyhoo's! with so many denier hopes would be dashed if the Weddell extension became a casualty of it's own success and Southern Ocean fringe got ripped off during one of the winter storms? With the losses in sea ice cover around the rest of Antarctica over winter be glossed over and the low extent be blamed on the 'Storm' (seems to be the 'new' poorly sited station' over the past 2 years for all things Cryospheric)

[Methuselah]

Absolutely brilliant how GW causes warming causing cooling ,talk about having your your cake and eating it !

Well, the first thing I learned about AGW theory (way back in the late 1970s) was that one of the first manifestations of global warming would be an increased amount of snowfall over Antarctica...It's 'good' that the 'Warmist Conspirators' got something right?

[Gray-Wolf]

Well, the first thing I learned about AGW theory (way back in the late 1970s) was that one of the first manifestations of global warming would be an increased amount of snowfall over Antarctica...It's 'good' that the 'Warmist Conspirators' got something right?

 

But Pete! it's 'snow' so that means cold!!!

 

So what if temps have gone from -40c to -2c and the air now holds four times as much water vapour as the old cold air did snow is snow and so means 'cold'!!!

 

So what if fresh water freezes at higher temps than salt water ice is ice and so means cold!!!

[stewfox]

But Pete! it's 'snow' so that means cold!!!

 

So what if temps have gone from -40c to -2c and the air now holds four times as much water vapour as the old cold air did snow is snow and so means 'cold'!!!

 

So what if fresh water freezes at higher temps than salt water ice is ice and so means cold!!!

 

Tend to agree. A average temp of -12c that goes to -8c could seem more ice/snow including sea ice.

 

The juries out on the causes of increase sea ice but its not difficult to explain it in a warming world.

[ANYWEATHER]

Well, the first thing I learned about AGW theory (way back in the late 1970s) was that one of the first manifestations of global warming would be an increased amount of snowfall over Antarctica...It's 'good' that the 'Warmist Conspirators' got something right?

So with all the so called "new research "Does that  make all what you learnt in the late "70,s" DEBUNK??  

[Methuselah]

So with all the so called "new research "Does that  make all what you learnt in the late "70,s" DEBUNK??  

I'll have none of your cheek, AW!  

[knocker]

Breakup Continues on the Wilkins Ice Shelf

An ice shelf is a thick plate of ice attached to a coastline on one side and floating over the ocean on the other side. Many ice shelves fringe Antarctica, including the Wilkins Ice Shelf on the Antarctic Peninsula, which underwent a series of breakup events in 1998, 2008, and 2009.

 

Just as earthquakes can sometimes leave landscapes more prone to future quakes, the breakups on the Wilkins Ice Shelf left it vulnerable to further disintegration. In addition, the sea ice that had long pressed the shelf up against the coastline moved out, putting the remnants of the shelf in direct contact with open water. Ocean waves went to work on the ice, and in early 2013 the fracturing continued.

 

 

http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=81174

[Gray-Wolf]

https://www.geo.umass.edu/climate/papers2/deconto_nature.pdf

 

I think that this paper raises a lot of interesting points on how the world 'cooled' to allow the initial glaciation of the southern continent and also how important the CO2 'feedback loop' was as the ice sheet grew.

 

also note they used a decrease in CO2 ppm as 56ppm per million years.....compared that with the speed at which humanity is increasing the CO2 burden but also note at the speed of change then compared to the speed of change we have witnessed over 100yrs (instead of 'millions of years')

[BornFromTheVoid]

Back to highest on record for the time of year

http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/antarctic.sea.ice.interactive.html

[stewfox]

Back to highest on record for the time of year

http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/antarctic.sea.ice.interactive.html

Which keeps the global ice extent above the long term average, which its been for some time.

 

http://www.climatechangefacts.info/Today-Global-Ice-Area-and-Trends.html

[BornFromTheVoid]

Antarctic sea ice area now lower than this time in 1979, a clear confirmation of AGW, I'm sure keithlucky will agree

[BornFromTheVoid]

Cryosat maps the largest recorded flood event beneath the Antarctic ice Sheet

 

 

2 July 2013

ESA’s CryoSat satellite has found a vast crater in Antarctica’s icy surface. Scientists believe the crater was left behind when a lake lying under about 3 km of ice suddenly drained.

 

Far below the thick ice sheet that covers Antarctica, there are lakes of fresh water without a direct connection to the ocean. These lakes are of great interest to scientists who are trying to understand water transport and ice dynamics beneath the frozen Antarctic surface – but this information is not easy to obtain.

 

One method is to drill holes through kilometres of ice to the water – a difficult endeavour in the harsh conditions of the polar regions.

 

But instead of looking down towards the ice, a team of European scientists is looking to the sky to improve our understanding of subglacial water and its transport.

 

By combining new measurements acquired by CryoSat with older data from NASA’s ICESat satellite, the team has mapped the large crater left behind by a lake, and even determined the scale of the flood that formed it.

 

From 2007 to 2008, six cubic kilometres of water – about the same amount that is stored in Scotland’s Loch Ness – drained from the lake, making it the largest event of its kind ever recorded.

 

That amount of water equals a tenth of the melting that occurs beneath Antarctica each year.

 

 

More here http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Observing_the_Earth/CryoSat/CryoSat_maps_largest-ever_flood_beneath_Antarctica

 

 

[pottyprof]

Interesting read BFTV.  What's causing this ice to melt above the lakes?  Any ideas?

 

Perhaps our internal engine is a bit too warm?

 

Who knows?

[mikeworst]

Talking of Grace this latest study using data from Grace showing sea level rising at less than 2mm per year. No acceleration and no need to panic then.http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2013/07/baur_gghs2012.pdf

Edited July 3, 2013 by mikeworst

[Methuselah]

But, still, rising it is...

[BornFromTheVoid]

Pottyprof, perhaps its just a settling of the ice sheet as the pressure from the water is removed, rather than melting?

 

 

Talking of Grace this latest study using data from Grace showing sea level rising at less than 2mm per year. No acceleration and no need to panic then.http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2013/07/baur_gghs2012.pdf

 

Hi Mike. Genuine question. Did you arrive at that conclusion yourself based on reading the slide show, or because that's the conclusion that someone of WUWT came to?

What that paper does, is discuss the average contribution of continental mass changes to sea level rise (ice sheets melts, river run-off, etc) between 2002 and 2011.

Because of the short time frame, detection an accelerating trend would be near impossible, and secondly, there are other things, such as thermal expansion, which contribute a lot to sea level rise but are not taken into consideration in the slide show.

Besides, the second last slide actually suggests 1.2 +/-0.6mm/year SLR from changes on land masses, not 2mm

[mikeworst]

Well bftw your own counter argument would in turn discount any positive detection of the opposite.

If detecting An accelerating trend is impossible, well then what is possible?

 

The study compares results to static, conventional sea level tide gauges and is in agreement with those. The slide show is not the paper but a summary.

[BornFromTheVoid]

Well bftw your own counter argument would in turn discount any positive detection of the opposite.

 

Not sure I understand what you're saying here. Could you rephrase?

 

If detecting An accelerating trend is impossible, well then what is possible?

 

It's only impossible to detect the acceleration (to a statistically significant level) of the land mass contribution to SLR, due to the short time frame. This is because natural variability will overwhelm some of the trends, and because the acceleration might not be strong enough to be detectable over just a decade. It is still very much possible to say that sea level is rising (due to land mass changes) and with more time and data, perhaps that there is an accelerating trend too.

 

The study compares results to static, conventional sea level tide gauges and is in agreement with those. The slide show is not the paper but a summary.

 

Have you a link to the actual paper? I'm not saying it's wrong or anything like that, only that it's only viewing one aspect of sea level rise when there are others of importance.

[Gray-Wolf]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-23144184

 

I remember the discussions about the changes to the ice surface as the lake filled and drained but this data brings the scale of the event  into even clearer focus?

[BornFromTheVoid]

Seeing as nobody ever posts the Antarctic sea ice extent, here it is.

 

[Gray-Wolf]

I take it the recent 'dip' is due to heavy weather in the Southern ocean nibbling away at the ice edge?

 

If it does turn into a stormy winter down there it may well impact the final ice max total as recent years have had increases in extent pushing north into the southern ocean where it is at risk of having storms flush it into the warmer waters?

[knocker]

Scientists Image Vast Subglacial Water System Underpinning West Antarctica’s Thwaites Glacier

AUSTIN, Texas — In a development that will help predict potential sea level rise from the Antarctic ice sheet, scientists from The University of Texas at Austin’s Institute for Geophysics have used an innovation in radar analysis to accurately image the vast subglacial water system under West Antarctica’s Thwaites Glacier. They have detected a swamp-like canal system beneath the ice that is several times as large as Florida’s Everglades

 

 

http://www.jsg.utexas.edu/news/?p=4487

Edited July 9, 2013 by knocker

[Crepuscular Ray]

The Pine Island Glacier has calved an extensive berg from where there's been a fissure extending for several years:

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-23249909

[Gray-Wolf]

Another 'winter Calve'??? I'd noted a drop in extent and wondered if they were having some 'heavy weather' down there and this would suggest, to me at least, that this is the case? The Seasonal Sea ice is not very good at 'damping out' swells so a pounding Southern Ocean Storm may have contributed to it's breaking off?

[songster]

When you consider the mass of ice involved in an ice sheet that thick, I doubt the weather has any influence at all - certainly the presence of sea ice will be irrelevant. Tides might possibly affect the timing of the fracture, anything else just has too little energy.