-Submitted by David Drumm (Nal), Guest Blogger
A recent article in the Daily Mail, and picked up by other media, claims an increase in Arctic ice foretells a cooling trend. The article boasts of a 60% increase in sea ice over the minimum that occurred in 2012. While the actual numbers from IARC-JAXA Information System (IJIS) show, as of yesterday, only a 50% increase, this is still a significant expansion.
Professor Judith Curry, climatologist and chair of the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at the Georgia Institute of Technology, referred to the title as melodramatic and said of the content of the article: “the ‘cooling’ aspect has been overplayed.” Last year, University of Reading climate scientist Ed Hawkins predicted that “there would be MORE Arctic sea-ice in 2013, compared to 2012.”
An important tool used in analyzing random data is the statistical phenomenon known as reversion to the mean, or regression to the mean. The extent of sea ice at the end of the annual melt, mid to late September, set a extreme minimum in 2012. Using reversion to the mean, it is more likely that the the extent in 2013 will be larger. Exactly what happened. The following graph indicates the variability of sea ice extent and the clear downward trend.
Cherry picking short-term results while ignoring long-term trends is a hallmark of misleading climate reporting. Long-term data needs to be analyzed to average out cyclical dependencies. There is a strong natural variability in sea ice extent and separating the natural from the greenhouse gases requires decades long timescales.
Climate science is an undertaking fraught with complex interactions and unknown cycles with unknown effects. It will take time and money to improve our understanding. However, improvement is mandatory if we are to be responsible conservators of our world.
Climate scientists estimate the amount of sea ice loss due to greenhouse gasses is between 50-70%.
H/T: Dana Nuccitelli, Steven Novella, Climate Dialogue, Alexis Sobel Fitts, Phil Plait.
Did you even read this part before you posted the comment above? “…Including the GIA correction has the effect of increasing previous estimates of the global mean sea level rate by 0.3 mm/yr.”
Looks like Joe doesn’t really understand adjustments for variability, otherwise known as errors of measurement. From the web site he cites, at the University of Colorado, we can see the timeline, complete with seasonal signals removed. Um…..which way is that line trending since 1992? See a pattern there?
Interesting.
JB links to an academic report that shows that GMSL is increasing at a higher rate that previously calculated. Who’da thunk it.
and it really doesn’t matter. Fires are measured by acreage burnt not how many million dollar homes that were destroyed.
Fires acreage burnt is not increasing
“which ones were caused by lightning or careless humans and those fires which start from other causes? ”
Aren’t the number and severity of fires greatly dependent on land management policies?
Yes and in the careless human category often times a control burn gets out of hand and produces a major fire.
Thanks Bron and you bring up a very important, relatively new, but
NOW WELL UNDERSTOOD FACT
“Also note that GIA can cause subsidence far away from the source of the old ice sheet, and that there are even larger cases of uplift and subsidence unconnected to GIA that are 10-20 times larger. For example, large parts of New Orleans are subsiding more than 10 mm/year—three times the current rate of GMSL—and so they see a much higher rate of sea level rise that has nothing to do with climate change.
Prior to release 2011_rel1, we did not account for GIA in estimates of the global mean sea level rate, but this correction is now scientifically well-understood and is applied to GMSL estimates by nearly all research groups around the world. Including the GIA correction has the effect of increasing previous estimates of the global mean sea level rate by 0.3 mm/yr.”
http://sealevel.colorado.edu/content/what-glacial-isostatic-adjustment-gia-and-why-do-you-correct-it
Joe Blow:
interesting stuff.
We must do something Ulak, the land bridge from Siberia to Alaska is sinking into the ocean. I know we can stop burning wood so it will keep CO2 out of the atmosphere and prevent rising seas.
Better yet lets pray to the gods and offer sacrifices. Still better lets have our wisest shamans take a tithe from us so it will reduce our wood burning.
Hey Mr. Two Tropical Cyclones making landfall at the same time, maybe you missed this
Major Hurricanes are not increasing
F3-F5 Tornadoes are not increasing
Droughts are not increasing
Floods are not increasing
Fires are not increasing
Global warming has paused for the last 15 years
Those are the facts boys which ever way you want to slice it and dice it. But the science is settled LOL
The point is without the DAILY RECORDING of different WEATHER statistics you CANNOT define what the CLIMATE is over the long term trend.
Therefore Weather=Climate
Joe Blow has warped his mind with perverted politics, not science:
(HP).
What is climate? Climate is the “average weather” over a period ranging from months to thousands or millions of years. Climate Change is a departure from the expected average weather patterns, which are also known as the “climate normals”.
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/abrupt/story1.html
Weather= Climate
When we talk about climate change, we talk about changes in long-term averages of daily weather.
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/noaa-n/climate/climate_weather.html
There is a built in flip-flop variability mechanism in the current global climate system caused by axial precession(rotation of the Earth’s axial tilt).
This is incorrect CO2 and CO2 mainly from the burning of fossil fuels is the only way climate changes. The only flip flop going on here is that as CO2 Increases we see a decline in major weather events.
And the key to it all is as CO2 is increasing we see a decrease in all the things that is suppose to become worse. And after YEARS of claiming you have to look at the long term trend, now every time there is a storm like Super Storm Sandy (BARELY A CAT 1 Hurricane) or as DREDD points out a typhoon and a hurricane making landfall at the same time ROTFLMFAO, it is a sign of Global Warming, I mean Climate Change.
Otteray Scribe 1, September 17, 2013 at 10:32 am
… the difference between climate variability and climate change …
=============================
Climate variability is important to understand.
There is a built in flip-flop variability mechanism in the current global climate system caused by axial precession(rotation of the Earth’s axial tilt).
The last mass extinction event 65 million years ago wiped out the dinosaurs and brought about the epoch of the rise of mammals.
Each ~26,000 years the axial tilt makes one revolution, going from 0 to 180 then to 360 degrees to complete (ibid, link).
At 180 degrees ~13,000 years into the cycle, the winter months in the northern hemisphere become summer months, then go back to summer months in another ~13,000 years (ibid, link).
That has happened 2,500 times since the Fifth Mass Extinction 65 million years ago (65 million divided by 26,000 = 2,500).
That is normal, natural climate variation.
Joe, your comments are ranging further and further afield from reality. How many times do you have to be told the weather is different from climate change? There are too many variables that cause weather events such as tornadoes and hurricanes, which are unrelated to a steady increase in average global temperatures and greenhouse gases. As for fires, are you prepared to sort out which ones were caused by lightning or careless humans and those fires which start from other causes?
The Koch crime family is not taking any chances that climate related taxes might be passed:
Source of quote, and an interesting read. Seems it is cheaper to buy lobbyists and congresscritters than do something that might slow the destruction of the planet: http://grist.org/news/koch-brothers-hire-lobbyists-to-fight-carbon-tax-save-poor-and-old-people/
“which ones were caused by lightning or careless humans and those fires which start from other causes? ”
Aren’t the number and severity of fires greatly dependent on land management policies?
JB:
Whereas the data shows “little trend.”
Droughts Anyone
The picture of expanding drought painted by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change may not be quite as arid as it looks. A technique commonly used to estimate the severity of a drought may actually overestimate the effects of dry spells, new research suggests. Worldwide climate data combined with a more refined technique for assessing droughts reveal that they haven’t expanded as much in recent decades as previously thought.
http://news.sciencemag.org/earth/2012/11/recent-drought-trends-not-so-cut-and-dried
Snowfall Anyone
MONDAY 20 MARCH 2000
According to Dr David Viner, a senior research scientist at the climatic research unit (CRU) of the University of East Anglia,within a few years winter snowfall will become “a very rare and exciting event”.
“Children just aren’t going to know what snow is,” he said.
November to April snow extent was the highest on record this year, and has increased sharply since CO2 hit James Hansen’s global warming tipping point of 350 PPM.
There is no long term trend, and no indication that snowfall correlates with CO2 in any way.
http://climate.rutgers.edu/snowcover/table_area.php?ui_set=1&ui_sort=0
Fires Anyone
Year-to-date statistics
2013 (1/1/13 – 9/17/13) Fires: 38,037 Acres: 4,000,555
2012 (1/1/12 – 9/17/12) Fires: 46,636 Acres: 8,561,803
2011 (1/1/11 – 9/17/11) Fires: 60,264 Acres: 7,685,285
2010 (1/1/10 – 9/17/10) Fires: 47,249 Acres: 2,731,603
2009 (1/1/09 – 9/17/09) Fires: 68,786 Acres: 5,551,983
2008 (1/1/08 – 9/17/08) Fires: 67,680 Acres: 4,700,220
2007 (1/1/07 – 9/17/07) Fires: 70,192 Acres: 7,961,052
2006 (1/1/06 – 9/17/06) Fires: 82,246 Acres: 8,796,733
2005 (1/1/05 – 9/17/05) Fires: 49,261 Acres: 8,014,389
2004 (1/1/03 – 9/17/04) Fires: 59,251 Acres: 7,702,156
10-year average
2004-2013 Fires: 58,960
Acres: 6,570,578
http://www.nifc.gov/fireInfo/nfn.htm
Global Tropical Cyclones Anyone ?
Tropical cyclone accumulated cyclone energy (ACE) has exhibited strikingly large global interannual variability during the past 40-years. In the pentad since 2006, Northern Hemisphere and global tropical cyclone ACE has decreased dramatically to the lowest levels since the late 1970s. Additionally, the frequency of tropical cyclones has reached a historical low. Here evidence is presented demonstrating that considerable variability in tropical cyclone ACE is associated with the evolution of the character of observed large-scale climate mechanisms including the El Nino Southern Oscillation and Pacific Decadal Oscillation. In contrast to record quiet North Pacific tropical cyclone activity in 2010, the North Atlantic basin remained very active by contributing almost one-third of the overall calendar year global ACE.
http://models.weatherbell.com/tropical.php