Greenland - What Do We Know, What Is The Long Term Future And Is There Any Evidence Of A Melt Out?

[be cause]

  .... and then Jesus said  'Love one another ' ....  so they crucified Him  ... 

[BornFromTheVoid]

I'm bored with this nonsense, as I'm pretty sure everyone else is too.

 

Finally, some sense!

. 

As the globe warmed up to around the 40s, the Arctic warmed more rapidly. The change would have been dramatic for the time, but actual extent glacial, ice sheet and sea ice loss wouldn't have been as bad as current conditions, at least that what the book suggests.

[knocker]

Left: Map of the mass balance today (in mm water equivalent per day). Right: The average mass balance for today’s calendar date over the period 1990-2011.

http://www.dmi.dk/dmi/en/print/index/gronland/indlandsisens_massebalance.htm

[knocker]

Dark Snow has Landed

 

SISIMIUT, Greenland – What started as an improbable vision months ago, struggled through a protracted and difficult fundraising process, and seemed to many a reach too far, has now touched down on the Greenland ice sheet, and begun a citizen-science effort that may help redefine how science is done and communicated to a wider public.

The Dark Snow Project team, Professor Jason Box, Dr. Marek Stibal, Rolling Stone writer Jeff Goodell, and myself, landed on, photographed, and took samples from the Greenland ice sheet on June 25.

 

http://climatecrocks.com/2013/06/27/dark-snow-has-landed/

 

Background.

 

Edited June 28, 2013 by knocker

[knocker]

June 2013 Greenland albedo is ranked 3rd lowest since 2000

 

http://www.meltfactor.org/blog/?p=1032

[pottyprof]

June 2013 Greenland albedo is ranked 3rd lowest since 2000

 

http://www.meltfactor.org/blog/?p=1032

 

Interesting find there knocker.  Wonder when it will become habitable again?

[knocker]

video "Dark Snow Team in Greenland"

 

[knocker]

A touch of whimsy maybe but still...............

 

AGU Student Video Contest: What Color is a Glacier?

[knocker]

Greenland steep fluctuations of 2013 warm and cold

Greenland melt of 2013 year has had fits and starts.

 

It’s been dipping in and out of abnormal warmth and cold.

 

The drama began with very low pre-melt albedo March to -mid-April due to a snow drought that made high melt in 2013 seem more than likely. Then, an about face, a lot of snow and relatively cold weather washed over Greenland for the next 6 weeks (20 April – early June)!

 

Melt then came on strong 3 June yet was punctuated 22 June by a return of cold weather that has remained in place and is forecast through at least 8 July. 

 

It now seems more than likely 2013 won’t hit 2012 melt record, this after 6 summers in a row of negative North Atlantic Oscillation that favored Greenland heating. The persistence of that pattern had me wondering if, for example, the drop in Arctic sea ice or the complete ablation of snow cover on land had ~permanently altered large scale atmospheric circulation. Yet, what we see with 2013 suggests a more complex situation with extreme fluctuations of warm and cold.

 

 

http://www.meltfactor.org/blog/?p=1099

 

Greenland and North Atlantic Temperature Anomalies Jan-June 2013

[knocker]

Greenland ice sheet ablation area albedo above average, upper elevations below average

 

A delayed melting at low elevations and probably some summer snowfall blanketing the Greenland ice sheet ablation area with (highly reflective) fresh snow have resulted in an important slow down of Greenland melting. This pattern is in contrast to this time last year (in 2012) when record melting was emerging

 

http://www.meltfactor.org/blog/?p=1116

Edited July 6, 2013 by knocker

[Gray-Wolf]

I supose the thing is the 'lowered albedo' horizon is just below the fresh snow so any resumption in the upland melt will reveal , slowly, this 'darkening' and we are back to square 1? We need cold that lasts the whole season so that 'dirty snow' lays buried and can gain more coverage over winter?

 

A ticking time bomb awaiting the next 'record warmth' across the tops?

[knocker]

Rate of Greenland ice sheet sea level contribution declining this week, approaching average

 

 

http://polarportal.dk/en/greenland-ice-shelf/nbsp/total-mass-change/

[knocker]

GRACE-cast: Greenland ice sheet mass loss *this week* turns toward average

 

In my new position, Professor of Glaciology at the Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland (GEUS), I’ve started to gather momentum working with a fine group of people to establish for the first time, a Greenland ice sheet total mass balance product that estimates what the GRACE satellite measures and posting the estimate on-line 2-3 months ahead of the GRACE processing.

 

Our new “Nowcast†of Greenland ice sheet mass balance has as little as 24 h delay from realtime.

 

http://www.meltfactor.org/blog/?p=1120

Edited July 6, 2013 by knocker

[knocker]

The daily contribution from all points on the ice sheet (top) and the amount accumulated from September 1 until now (bottom). The blue curves show this season’s mass balance measured in gigatonnes (Gt; 1 Gt is one billion tonnes and corresponds to 1 cubic kilometre of water). For comparison the mean curves from the period 1990-2011 are shown (in grey) with two standard deviations on either side. The red line shows the corresponding curve for the 2011-2012 season, when there was very high summer melt in Greenland.

 

http://polarportal.org/en/greenland-ice-shelf/nbsp/surface-conditions/

Edited July 9, 2013 by knocker

[knocker]

The contribution of the Greenland ice sheet to sea-level rise will continue to increase

New research has shown surface ice melt will be the dominant process controlling ice-loss from Greenland. As outlet glaciers retreat inland the other process, iceberg production, remains important but will not grow as rapidly.

 

 

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2013-07/bas-tco070913.php

[Polar Maritime]

GREENLAND’S SUMMER MELT UNDERWAY

• Credit: NASA Earth Observatory image by Jesse Allen and Robert Simmon, using Landsat 8 data from the U.S. Geological Survey. Caption by Holli Riebeek.

Springtime introduces a new palette to the icy, white landscape of Greenland. Pools of blue water begin to dot the surface of the ice sheet as the top layer of snow and ice melts. The ponds provide an important indicator of how much the ice sheet is melting in a given year.

In 2013, melt ponds were initially slow to appear along the edge of the ice. The first pools were visible in Landsat 8 images in early June, says Mahsa Moussavi, a Ph.D. student at the University of Colorado who is monitoring the ponds. Meltwater accumulates as pools in depressions in the ice, and the extent and depth of these ponds and the rate at which they grow and shrink tells scientists how quickly the ice is melting. Despite the late start, melting in 2013 has been rapid, occurring at a faster pace than the 1981-2010 average. http://visibleearth.nasa.gov/view.php?id=81569

 

[knocker]

Best keep in mind PM that this was on the 21st June as I think it has arrested a tad since then.

 

Left: Map of the surface mass balance today (in mm water equivalent per day). Right: The average surface mass balance for today’s calendar date over the period 1990-2011.

 

http://www.dmi.dk/en/groenland/maalinger/greenland-ice-sheet-surface-mass-budget/

Edited July 11, 2013 by knocker

[songster]

Not for long...

 

http://nsidc.org/greenland-today/images/greenland_melt_area_plot_tmb.png

[knocker]

The next few weeks should be interesting. I'm wondering whether all the rubbish from the Canadian fires that is spreading around the globe will impact on the Greenland albedo.

 

Current mass balance.

 

Left: Map of the surface mass balance today (in mm water equivalent per day). Right: The average surface mass balance for today’s calendar date over the period 1990-2011.

Edited July 13, 2013 by knocker

[Gray-Wolf]

Anything that helps bring down last years snow cover , and uncovers the 'dirty horizon', will surely make an impact?

[knocker]

The bridge over Watson River one year on: peace and quiet

http://polarportal.org/en/nyheder/arkiv/news/the-bridge-over-watson-river-one-year-on-peace-and-quiet/

[knocker]

Part of the Dark Snow project.

 

The snow we saw at the top of the Greenland sheet last week was relatively fresh – there’s been a cold spell that delayed this year’s melting season somewhat, without too much evidence of black carbon soot. That may change as the melt season moves along.

Our samples were designed to focus on the melt layer from 2012, when record setting melt may have been accelerated by soot from wildfires like the one described here by Dr. Jeff Masters.

Dr. Jeff Masters – WeatherUnderground

 

http://climatecrocks.com/2013/07/14/dr-jeff-masters-quebec-fire-second-largest-in-record/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter

[knocker]

Melt widespread all round ice sheet

 

Left: Map of the surface mass balance today (in mm water equivalent per day). Right: The average surface mass balance for today’s calendar date over the period 1990-2011.

Edited July 15, 2013 by knocker

[knocker]

Left: Map of the surface mass balance today (in mm water equivalent per day). Right: The average surface mass balance for today’s calendar date over the period 1990-2011.

 

[knocker]

Be very interesting what the analysis comes up with.

 

So what does climate science look like? Hard work in scenic locations? McKenzie Skiles joins Dark Snow project in Greenland: "I study the impact that dark impurities have on snow melt..." She was delighted to get snow samples to test connections between the intense forest fires of 2012 and the simultaneous record melt in Greenland. This snow hydrologist from Alaska manages the Snow Optics lab (part of NASAs Jet Propulsion Laboratory) in California.