Con-Climate Science Fudged - But Why?

[IanC]

Don't tell anyone but the low sea ice extent was do to a really powerful storm that broke up the sea ice. Since then it is growing at record levels...And as you can see in the photo of the three subs at the North Pole back in 1987....that won't be happening again any time soon.

But don't tell anyone OK...

Wonderful, wonderful posting - absolutely laugh out loud funny!

I think we've just established that your claims to be a scientist are more likely to refer to Astrology or Tarot than Geography of Physics!!

Im confused by your post. are you saying that the storms and wind werent a major factor in ice loss this summer? or do you disbelieve that the Arctic Ocean is icing up at the fastest rate since they have been tracking it? or do you just have a problem with the anecdotal photo of the subs?

 

[Saigon]

Ian C-

I think the situation with the Arctic Ice are fairly well known by most people who have any interest all in this topic.

Westwall's apparent theory that "everything is ok now - it was just a storm" is beyond being funny. It left funny an hour ago, and was last seen at the corner of Deranged and Dishonest.

Which he knows, of course - it's just theatre.

Meanwhile, back in the real world, Arctic ice is this week 1.35 million square miles below the 1979 to 2000 mean for this time of year.

It must have been a big storm.

 

[IanC]

Estimates of recent changes in Antarctic land ice (Figure 2) range from losing 100 Gt/year to over 300 Gt/year. Because 360 Gt/year represents an annual sea level rise of 1 mm/year, recent estimates indicate a contribution of between 0.27 mm/year and 0.83 mm/year coming from Antarctica. There is of course uncertainty in the estimations methods but multiple different types of measurement techniques (explained here) all show the same thing, Antarctica is losing land ice as a whole, and these losses are accelerating quickly.

Is Antarctica losing or gaining ice?

please, please, PLEASE tell me that you wouldnt use SkepticalScience as a source or a link! after all the shenanagans they have had in the last couple of years their credibility is just about as low as it can go.

old papers with high levels of uncertainty projected that Antarctica was losing mass. newer and reanalysed data do not.

 

[Saigon]

Ian C -

Again, I think the situation in Antractica is fairly well understand by anyone with any interest in the topic. I can post material from a half dozen different organizations, but the facts aren't going to look much different.

Eastern Antarctica is cold, and is gaining ice. Western Antarctica is warming and is losing ice. Most analysts agree that the end result is a net loss.

This story from Yahoo news provides a very good and quite detailed analysis:

"As the mission gathered data, it showed that Western Antarctica was losing ice mass and East Antarctica was in ice-mass balance — gaining mass in the interior but losing just as much mass around the edges."

Antarctic sea ice at record high, but that doesn

 

[IanC]

Ian C-

I think the situation with the Arctic Ice are fairly well known by most people who have any interest all in this topic.

Westwall's apparent theory that "everything is ok now - it was just a storm" is beyond being funny. It left funny an hour ago, and was last seen at the corner of Deranged and Dishonest.

Which he knows, of course - it's just theatre.

Meanwhile, back in the real world, Arctic ice is this week 1.35 million square miles below the 1979 to 2000 mean for this time of year.

It must have been a big storm.

is he saying everything is OK? or is he saying that there is not enough data to say that the recent minimums are unusual? the arial photography before the satellites went up in the 70's suggest that ice levels in 79 were higher than normal, whether because of the preceding cool climate or because weather and wind conditions did not allow ice to escape, I dont know. many climate patterns have a cyclic variation and we dont know if there is one in the Artic, how long it is, or where in the cycle we started or are in now.

even climate models predict the reforming of Arctic ice should the boogeyman of an ice free summer ever actually happen. what is not clear to me is why this is so important to you alarmists. if (a big if) this decline of ice is due to warmer temps, the main question is still tying CO2 to the warming and quantifying the amount, which you havent done.

 

[IanC]

Ian C -

Again, I think the situation in Antractica is fairly well understand by anyone with any interest in the topic. I can post material from a half dozen different organizations, but the facts aren't going to look much different.

Eastern Antarctica is cold, and is gaining ice. Western Antarctica is warming and is losing ice. Most analysts agree that the end result is a net loss.

This story from Yahoo news provides a very good and quite detailed analysis:

"As the mission gathered data, it showed that Western Antarctica was losing ice mass and East Antarctica was in ice-mass balance — gaining mass in the interior but losing just as much mass around the edges."

Antarctic sea ice at record high, but that doesn

ten years ago the stories all said that Antarctica was losing mass, a lot of mass, both on the peninsula and on the continent.

five years ago, the peninsula was still losing fast but the continent not so much.

now, it is the peninsula is losing in most areas but the continent is gaining mass and the overall mass balance is up.

just as I predicted years ago, the GRACE and other altimetry measurements were skewed to read high loss. the more years of readings, the better are the adjustments, and the lower are the ice losses, until now the readings show mass gain in Antarctica. I didnt expect fanfare in the media but I certainly could have hoped for more openness from NASA and some of the other agencies which have the data.

 

[Saigon]

Ian -

I ust don't think this really hangs together as a theory:

or is he saying that there is not enough data to say that the recent minimums are unusual?

Some people will never, ever believe that humans play a part in climate change. They will deny anything and everything they see or hear in order to cling to a political idea. Any apparently contradictory evidence will be triumphed, and all supporting evidence dismissed out of hand as being biased. We've seen recently posters laud a particular scientists work one week - only to dismiss him out of hand a few weeks later when it turned out hs findings contradicted their position.

I think for the overwhelming majority of the population, the Arctic Ice situation is clear and unequivocal. I don't really see how anyone could claim this issue is still debatable, and it is clear that scientific opinion on this topic is as close to universal as we are ever likely to see on any topic. We do not know everything, and we need more data and observation yet, but I don't think it is an exaggeration to say that the basic case has been proven beyond reasonable doubt.

Although satellites may only have been up since 1979, we have a good amount of data going back to at least the 1950s. That isn't a long time, of course, but even so...

"The vast polar ice cap, which regulates the Earth's temperature and has been a permanent fixture in our understanding of how the world works, has this year retreated further and faster than anyone expected. The previous record, set in 2007, was officially broken on 27 August when satellite images averaged over five days showed the ice then extended 4.11 million sq km, a reduction of nearly 50% compared to just 40 years ago."

The staggering decline of sea ice at the frontline of climate change | Environment | The Guardian

 

[IanC]

saigon- we talked earlier on some thread about solar influence on warming. here is a link to an article where one prominent scientist is asked point blank whether a steady but high solar component could be heating the globe even if it wasnt 'increasing'. there is also some dialogue on ocean equilibration times.

Muscheler retracts? Offers a NEW excuse for why solar activity can’t be responsible for post-70′s warming | Watts Up With That?

 

[Saigon]

Ian C -

now, it is the peninsula is losing in most areas but the continent is gaining mass and the overall mass balance is up.

Really?

Because NASA claims....

Gravity data collected from space using NASA's Grace satellite show that Antarctica has been losing more than a hundred cubic kilometers (24 cubic miles) of ice each year since 2002.. The latest data reveal that Antarctica is losing ice at an accelerating rate, too. How is it possible for surface melting to decrease, but for the continent to lose mass anyway? The answer boils down to the fact that ice can flow without melting.

NASA - Is Antarctica Melting?

 

[IanC]

The vast polar ice cap, which regulates the Earth's temperature and has been a permanent fixture in our understanding of how the world works, has this year retreated further and faster than anyone expected.

first, the ice didnt melt until weather conditions pushed it out.

second, the Arctic Ice Cap regulates our temperature???????? hahahahahahahahahaha

the majority of input and output of energy happens in the tropics. what little energy there is at the poles is mostly due to atmosheric circulation of heat in cells (Hadley,???, Polar). the dog wags the tail, not the other way around

 

[Saigon]

Ian C -

So as is so often the case on these threads, what it comes down to is that the experts are wrong.

 

[Saigon]

double post

 

[IanC]

Ian C -

now, it is the peninsula is losing in most areas but the continent is gaining mass and the overall mass balance is up.

Really?

Because NASA claims....

Gravity data collected from space using NASA's Grace satellite show that Antarctica has been losing more than a hundred cubic kilometers (24 cubic miles) of ice each year since 2002.. The latest data reveal that Antarctica is losing ice at an accelerating rate, too. How is it possible for surface melting to decrease, but for the continent to lose mass anyway? The answer boils down to the fact that ice can flow without melting.

NASA - Is Antarctica Melting?

Key Issues about Antarctic Ice Sheet Mass Balance
 The wide range of published values of the rate of Antarctic
net mass change (+50 to -250 Gt/yr) showed a large uncertainty
in the current (and recent) contribution to sea level rise (-0.1 to
+0.7 mm/yr). Range is about 15% of input.
 Report s of large and accelerating rate of mass loss since
the early 1990s are unconfirmed. Overview and Assessment of Estimates of the Mass Balance
of the Antarctic Ice Sheet: 1992 to 2009, Zwally and Giovinetto, In
Surveys in Geophysics special issue on Cryosphere and Sea Level Change,
May 2011.

from http://www.waisworkshop.org/presentations/2011/Session4/Zwally.pdf but you can google Zwally's paper. Zwally is an alarmist, so for him to admit that Antarctica is gaining ice mass is something akin to Michael Mann admitting that the Medieval Warm Period was warmer than today. concluding sentence-

Antarctica: Overall, ice sheet now has
small positive balance (+38 Gt/yr)!

 

[Saigon]

Ian C -

"Their reanalysis provides much lower estimates of net change in ice, ranging from +27 to -40 billion tons per year. For 1992 – 2001 they are prepared to go even further, estimating a loss of
only 31 billion tons per year. These still sound like huge numbers, but to put it in perspective, 2400 billion tons of snow falls in Antarctica each year, so we’re dealing with a gain or loss in the range +1.1 to -1.7%."

Antarctic ice – more accurate estimates | Digging in the Clay

The good news here is that climatologists are being open and honest about what they are finding. I would like to think everyone could agree on that.

There is clearly a range of uncertainty between +1.1% and -1.7%, and NASA appear to be going with the lower end of that scale as being more likely.

That said, having read a couple of stories about this research, I am not entirely sure why you brought it up.

Zwally goes on to say:

This week, after reviewing his own new data, NASA climate scientist Jay Zwally said: "At this rate, the Arctic Ocean could be nearly ice-free at the end of summer by 2012, much faster than previous predictions."

Arctic Sea Ice Gone in Summer Within Five Years?

So is he right or wrong about that?

 

[IanC]

Ian C -

"Their reanalysis provides much lower estimates of net change in ice, ranging from +27 to -40 billion tons per year. For 1992 – 2001 they are prepared to go even further, estimating a loss of
only 31 billion tons per year. These still sound like huge numbers, but to put it in perspective, 2400 billion tons of snow falls in Antarctica each year, so we’re dealing with a gain or loss in the range +1.1 to -1.7%."

Antarctic ice – more accurate estimates | Digging in the Clay

The good news here is that climatologists are being open and honest about what they are finding. I would like to think everyone could agree on that.

There is clearly a range of uncertainty between +1.1% and -1.7%, and NASA appear to be going with the lower end of that scale as being more likely.

That said, having read a couple of stories about this research, I am not entirely sure why you brought it up.

Zwally goes on to say:

This week, after reviewing his own new data, NASA climate scientist Jay Zwally said: "At this rate, the Arctic Ocean could be nearly ice-free at the end of summer by 2012, much faster than previous predictions."

Arctic Sea Ice Gone in Summer Within Five Years?

So is he right or wrong about that?

I am sorry that I cant seem to get my point across to you.

dire and exaggerated claims were made about Antarctica. as more and better data came in the cliams have become less and less. just this year Zwally has stated that Antarctica is gaining 48GT/yr. and Zwally is no 'denier' scientist trying to thwart consensus. he is just trying to back pedal away from previous claims.

when you are talking about the Arctic sea ice you have to consider the conditions. the icemaker in my fridge is full most of the time but if I have a party and the container is emptied it takes a while to produce more ice, and it will empty more easily until it has stabilized. the Arctic flushed its ice in 2007 because of storms and it did so again this year, before it built up the multi-year ice.

if you have a study that shows how it is ice melting from air temps that have caused most of the ice loss rather than ice lost through storms and the warm water churned up to the surface by storms, then please show it.

 

[IanC]

I hope this works.

as you can see there is not a whole lot of time spent at a temperature capable of melting ice.

 

[Saigon]

dire and exaggerated claims were made about Antarctica. as more and better data came in the cliams have become less and less. just this year Zwally has stated that Antarctica is gaining 48GT/yr. and Zwally is no 'denier' scientist trying to thwart consensus. he is just trying to back pedal away from previous claims.

Well, that's good news, obviously.

Whenever we see predictions downgraded that must be a sign that we are getting closer to a real picture, and also that we are seeing real science, and not science produced to meet a predetermined political conclusion, as is so often asserted here.

It's unfortunate that the same good news does not seem to be present in the Arctic, where the same research team are predicting ever more dire consequences for the Arctic Ice.

Given Zwally seems to be reliable - is this finaly the piece of evidence that is going to win over the last remaining sceptics?

 

[IanC]

dire and exaggerated claims were made about Antarctica. as more and better data came in the cliams have become less and less. just this year Zwally has stated that Antarctica is gaining 48GT/yr. and Zwally is no 'denier' scientist trying to thwart consensus. he is just trying to back pedal away from previous claims.

Well, that's good news, obviously.

Whenever we see predictions downgraded that must be a sign that we are getting closer to a real picture, and also that we are seeing real science, and not science produced to meet a predetermined political conclusion, as is so often asserted here.

It's unfortunate that the same good news does not seem to be present in the Arctic, where the same research team are predicting ever more dire consequences for the Arctic Ice.

Given Zwally seems to be reliable - is this finaly the piece of evidence that is going to win over the last remaining sceptics?

hahahaha

tell me again just how storm lost ice in the Arctic makes any impact on AGW theory.

are you saying it is the temperature change that is responsible for the ice loss? if that is the case then prove the amount attributable to CO2. Antarctic sea ice gain or land ice gain doesnt disprove AGW, nor does Arctic sea ice loss or land ice loss prove AGW.

 

[Saigon]

tell me again just how storm lost ice in the Arctic makes any impact on AGW theory.

It doesn't - which was why I thought Westwall's theory that it did hilarious, remember?


The melting of Arctice and Antarctic ice, on the other hand, is absolutely vital to our understanding of climate change. Arctic ice is this week 1.35 million square miles below the 1979 to 2000 mean for this time of year. Storms did that?

Laugh at that idea as much as you like.

 

[Saigon]

btw, Since we seem to be changing topic again - you do back Zwally's research on the Arctic, right?