Sunday, April 20, 2008
Regarding sea ice in the southern hemisphere
Trolling through the National Climate Data Center's global climate report for March 2008 (issued four days ago), I noticed this interesting bit of news (bold emphasis added):
According to the National Snow and Ice Data Center, the March 2008 Northern Hemisphere sea ice extent, which is measured from passive microwave instruments onboard NOAA satellites, was below the 1979-2000 mean, but greater than the previous four years. This was the sixth least March sea ice extent on record. The past four years had the least March sea ice extent since records began in 1979. Sea ice extent for March has decreased at a rate of 2.8%/decade (since satellite records began in 1979) as temperatures in the high latitude Northern Hemisphere have risen at a rate of approximately 0.37°C/decade over the same period.
Meanwhile, the March 2008 Southern Hemisphere sea ice extent was much above the 1979-2000 mean. This was the largest sea ice extent in March (28.6% above the 1979-2000 mean) over the 30-year historical period, surpassing the previous record set in 1994 by 10.9%. Sea ice extent for March has increased at a rate of 4.2%/decade.
There have only been a few wire service stories written about the March report, and none of them mention the rising sea ice in the southern hemisphere. Probably too inconvenient.
11 Comments:
By 
D.E. Cloutier, at
Sun Apr 20, 10:52:00 PM:
Meanwhile, NPR this week had an article about Greenland's ice sheet:
"So the bottom line is that all that meltwater does lubricate the ice, but the effect on global sea level is less than a quarter of an inch per decade. Joughin says this rate is likely to increase a bit as Greenland heats up.
"'But it's not going to be a catastrophic effect, I don't think,' Joughin says. 'It's not likely to have major impacts over the next century. It may have a little impact but not a lot.'"
Link:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=89731348
By 
, at
Mon Apr 21, 12:52:00 AM:
Have a look at this set of photos of icebergs that we could see off the East Coast of NZ in 2006.
http://www.newzeal.com/theme/heli/Icebergflight.htm
These bergs had traveled 13500kms from the South of Antarctica to be visible in NZ waters for the first time in 75 years in near the middle of our summer. The largest of the 200 bergs was still over 1km long when it arrived.
Not a particularly heart"warming" sight for the Gorebullists.
JC
By randian, at
Mon Apr 21, 01:15:00 AM:
Am I the only person who thinks that declaring catastrophe from a mere 30 years of data is rather premature? I also have a sneaking suspicion that they have non-satellite data predating 1979 that doesn't match the preferred narrative, so they pretend it doesn't exist.
By , at
Mon Apr 21, 08:52:00 AM:
shhhhhh....nothing to see here, move along....
By , at
Mon Apr 21, 09:19:00 AM:
Tigerhawk,
There is information like this out there every day. This is why I think we really need to refocus our conversations about climate. Good management of resources and preventing pollution are admirable goals, but when someone starts talking about AGW its irrelevant wrt creating policital policy. Due to our lack of understanding about our climate.
By , at
Mon Apr 21, 09:23:00 AM:
The fundamental question that some of the more honest climatologists ask is what is the level of "solar forcing", i.e., the effect of the Sun's output on climate change.
There is a great deal of argument and research that has gone on about this, and surprisingly, the AGW advocates see "solar forcing" as minimal.
I was reading quite a bit about this a few weeks ago, and someone on a website discussing the low sunspot activity in the past year cited some anecdotal reporting that noted all the "open water" north of Norway (lack of ice) in the 1920's (spring-summer-fall), and how that was then seen as a "good thing" as it enhanced the fishing season.
Since then, the ice has largely returned.
And by the way, we are now in a sunspot minima era, which seems to indicate a reduced solar output. That may have something to do with the colder winter that was observed in North America this year.
Or not.
-David
By GreenmanTim, at
Mon Apr 21, 02:59:00 PM:
There is ice and then there is ice, I suppose. NASA reported in March that older, perennial sea ice was in sharp decline in the Arctic, even while younger ice may have increased.
http://greensleeves.typepad.com/berkshires/2008/03/ice-out.html
By Grumpy Old Man, at
Tue Apr 22, 09:44:00 AM:
You can't tell a blip from a trend, whether it's one year or 30.
Is Algor really getting fat, or is it just the steroids he's taking for his swelled head? Only time, or better analysis, will tell.
By , at
Tue Apr 22, 11:16:00 AM:
CELEBRATE EARTHDAY RECYCLE ALL YOUR ENVIROMENTALITS JUNK MAIL INTO TOILET PAPER AND MAKE SHRYLE CROW SQIRM
By JPMcT, at
Tue Apr 22, 06:57:00 PM:
So...Now there should be frenzied panic in the streets that sea levels will FALL!!!
With due respect for all the money Mr. Gore has made this year...if all the sea ice melted at once, sea levels would be essentially unaffected.
For atmospheric heat to melt such ice, calculations on the thermal energy necessary to melt ice/water mixes indicate that it would take hundreds of thousands of years.
Sorry, AL...I have to think of something else to cause panic...perhaps YOU as president!!
By , at
Wed Apr 23, 11:27:00 AM:
If sea levels are now found to be falling, can we ask Al-Gore to throw himself in the water as a public service? That might just be enough to even things out.
