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Jim Hunt

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2650 on: July 28, 2015, 02:47:00 AM »
"The most revolutionary thing one can do always is to proclaim loudly what is happening" - Rosa Luxemburg

Shared Humanity

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2651 on: July 28, 2015, 04:00:18 AM »
Those are some pretty big slabs of MYI.

Tommy

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2652 on: July 28, 2015, 05:01:59 AM »
I don't know if you folks saw this, but this is all about the Arctic
(Ignore the first minute or so, that's just dramatic intro.)
Probably more for the laymen among us, as a good overview of the state, and importance of the Arctic. The interviews may be a few years old, I can't tell from the info. provided.

Scientists these days are displaying thinly disguised alarm.
We can avoid the worst of the coming changes if people wake up.

30 minutes video.

"Arctic Emergency: Scientists Speak on Global Warming "
« Last Edit: July 28, 2015, 05:51:57 AM by Tommy »

stackmaster

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2653 on: July 28, 2015, 05:10:30 AM »
Took a minute to pull up the modis terra image from today posted above by Jim Hunt...at 250m resolution it looks to me like the strong majority of MYIce cubes are presently big chunks of ice cube shaped slush in the making.  As in right now making...I wonder if the cute little cyclone has stirred up some significant enough wave action to shatter almost everything down to 10 miles or much less and it only has to drift apart for us to really see a snap change in all that MYI from epic to kibble.

greatdying2

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2654 on: July 28, 2015, 05:53:00 AM »
Well the 2 large floes nearest shore, which people were watching a few days ago, have started to get shredded. Meanwhile, the rest of the floes are also moving closer to shore...

Here are July 22 & 27:
The Permian–Triassic extinction event, a.k.a. the Great Dying, occurred about 250 million years ago and is the most severe known extinction event. Up to 96% of all marine species and 70% of terrestrial vertebrate species became extinct; it is also the only known mass extinction of insects.

greatdying2

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2655 on: July 28, 2015, 06:02:12 AM »
A close-up of one of them. I guess this isn't exactly "poof"...
The Permian–Triassic extinction event, a.k.a. the Great Dying, occurred about 250 million years ago and is the most severe known extinction event. Up to 96% of all marine species and 70% of terrestrial vertebrate species became extinct; it is also the only known mass extinction of insects.

helorime

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2656 on: July 28, 2015, 06:10:30 AM »
Deja View  ;)
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

stackmaster

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2657 on: July 28, 2015, 06:16:44 AM »
Nice work, it's been fun watching those big fellas that strayed from the pack.  If you compare the state of the large stray floes from 5 days ago you can see that today many larger floes that are not at the ice edge look just as bad as the examples that are blowing apart today did not so long ago.  Makes me wonder what the next week has in store.

epiphyte

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2658 on: July 28, 2015, 06:17:23 AM »
Hi everyone, haven't posted here in a long time. But been following for a while. I'm suprised there isn't more discussion about the imminent weather change. The rapid change from HP to LP is a pretty dramatic switch (certaintly one of the most impressive since I started arctic watching). What are people's thoughts on the effect of this switch?

From my basic understanding I would guess there are two camps:

1) The momentum built up in July (e.g substantial melt pond water) will be unstoppable and retardation of the melt rate will be megre (although I think its pretty unlikely that we are going to continue to see consecutive centuries).

2) Its still early enough in the year for the weather to have a significant impact (I suppose its even possible with the very low uppers for some temporary refreezing of surface melt water) and cause the melt rate to significantly slow.

 

Just a hand-waving opinion - but my impression is that late-season storms after the kind of weather we've been having up till now will increase the total melt. in a weeks time most of the summer's energy will already be in the system. Storms will just bring more of it in contact with the surface at northern latitudes (from both above and below) than would otherwise be the case if  the CAB went gentle into that good night.

greatdying2

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2659 on: July 28, 2015, 06:22:49 AM »
Perhaps one can actually see the region(s) of active melt on this SST anomaly map? E.g. This blue area, same region as above, is it cooled due to heat of melting?

Ditto other, much larger areas on the Atlantic side and elsewhere?

Or are the blue areas just ice extending beyond the average extent?

http://www.moyhu.blogspot.com.au/p/blog-page.html
« Last Edit: July 28, 2015, 06:42:44 AM by greatdying2 »
The Permian–Triassic extinction event, a.k.a. the Great Dying, occurred about 250 million years ago and is the most severe known extinction event. Up to 96% of all marine species and 70% of terrestrial vertebrate species became extinct; it is also the only known mass extinction of insects.

epiphyte

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2660 on: July 28, 2015, 06:23:37 AM »
A close-up of one of them. I guess this isn't exactly "poof"...

Totally stole my thunder dude - I've been fitting that one for it's casket for weeks ;)

greatdying2

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2661 on: July 28, 2015, 06:25:57 AM »
A close-up of one of them. I guess this isn't exactly "poof"...

Totally stole my thunder dude - I've been fitting that one for it's casket for weeks ;)

 :)  Might need several smaller caskets instead.
The Permian–Triassic extinction event, a.k.a. the Great Dying, occurred about 250 million years ago and is the most severe known extinction event. Up to 96% of all marine species and 70% of terrestrial vertebrate species became extinct; it is also the only known mass extinction of insects.

epiphyte

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2662 on: July 28, 2015, 06:30:56 AM »
Deja View  ;)

Or even (as Yogi Berra would have it) "Deja Vu all over again"  ;D

12Patrick

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2663 on: July 28, 2015, 07:44:28 AM »
 Is this the return of the Arctic Dipole?
  The Arctic Dipole is a low pressure weather system situated over the North Pole. It pulls more warm water in through the Bering strait and it pushes ice out the Fram strait while sitting there grinding the ice up like the blades on a blender to bits and pieces. It is one of the events that lead to record low ice extent in 2007... Question is how long will this one last and will it lead to another record low extent this year???? Time will tell...


Neven

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2664 on: July 28, 2015, 07:56:27 AM »
A close-up of one of them. I guess this isn't exactly "poof"...

More like "boom".  ;D
The enemy is within
Don't confuse me with him

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12Patrick

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2665 on: July 28, 2015, 08:02:30 AM »
A close-up of one of them. I guess this isn't exactly "poof"...

More like "boom".  ;D

Remember the video game Asteroids back in the late 70"s? This reminds me of that...

seaicesailor

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2666 on: July 28, 2015, 08:09:49 AM »
A close-up of one of them. I guess this isn't exactly "poof"...

Sort of " poof preconditioning". It seems these will go with something stronger than in Laptev, like this storm grinding.

Jim Hunt

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2667 on: July 28, 2015, 08:23:03 AM »
The floe on which O-Buoy 11 and it's friends are sat now looks as though it's adrift in open water:

http://GreatWhiteCon.info/resources/arctic-sea-ice-images/summer-2015-images/#OBuoy11

IMB buoy 2014I
is at 75.89 N, 141.40 W. It's just clocked up 50 cm of surface melt, and slightly over 100 cm of ice remain.
« Last Edit: July 28, 2015, 03:29:31 PM by Jim Hunt »
"The most revolutionary thing one can do always is to proclaim loudly what is happening" - Rosa Luxemburg

LRC1962

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2668 on: July 28, 2015, 08:39:03 AM »
A song from my infantile years comes to mind.
All by myself,
nobody loves me.
I'm all by myself,
nobody loves me .....
"All truth passes through three stages: First, it is ridiculed; Second,  it is violently opposed; and Third, it is accepted as self-evident."
       - Arthur Schopenhauer

Jim Hunt

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2669 on: July 28, 2015, 08:54:31 AM »
I reckon we can now officially declare that the Northern Sea Route is "ice free"

http://forum.arctic-sea-ice.net/index.php/topic,854.msg58432.html

The Northwest Passage still has a way to go:
« Last Edit: July 28, 2015, 01:32:17 PM by Jim Hunt »
"The most revolutionary thing one can do always is to proclaim loudly what is happening" - Rosa Luxemburg

seaicesailor

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2670 on: July 28, 2015, 09:16:25 AM »
A close-up of one of them. I guess this isn't exactly "poof"...

More like "boom".  ;D

However note that most of the big floes inside the pack seem intact in size and shape. So it may be a poof for these two after all, they should be way more fragile in these warmer waters.

The main herd is more dispersed too, will major carnage come next?

6roucho

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2671 on: July 28, 2015, 09:31:32 AM »
Scientists these days are displaying thinly disguised alarm.
We can avoid the worst of the coming changes if people wake up.
Can we really? There's nothing we can do to save the Arctic sea ice, which may mean that there's nothing we can do to prevent catastrophic climate change. The Arctic is one of the major systems contributing to global climate and weather. It's in the process of changing in a binary way from an icy to an ice-free state. The time for waking up was perhaps twenty years ago.

iceman

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2672 on: July 28, 2015, 11:58:57 AM »
.... The thin blue line surrounds the periphery of broken, structureless icecover for day 203, 2012.
.... Third week of July, 2012, there was  much more ice extent in the Chukchi and ES seas, even though within the whole blue bordered area (3.7 mKm2) individual floes looked more dispersed than in the current green one.

This is very instructive as to the interaction between ice conditions and weather.  If memory serves, GAC 2012 romped over a wide swath of that "broken, structureless icecover" in the course of causing a huge ice detachment.

iceman

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2673 on: July 28, 2015, 12:12:33 PM »
A close-up of one of them. I guess this isn't exactly "poof"...

More like "boom".  ;D

Remember the video game Asteroids back in the late 70"s? This reminds me of that...

The floe have met their fate.

crandles

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2674 on: July 28, 2015, 12:25:39 PM »
More like "boom".  ;D

Who is throwing dynamite?

More like Crrrraaack Crraack crack crack crack crack crack  ;D

Jim Hunt

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2675 on: July 28, 2015, 01:35:40 PM »
The floe have met their fate.

Which reminds me of (only marginally off topic!) 70s music:

"The most revolutionary thing one can do always is to proclaim loudly what is happening" - Rosa Luxemburg

Neven

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2676 on: July 28, 2015, 01:41:36 PM »
I had to think of the very same thing, Jim!  But it's a different song: ;)



Although the lyrics of Watcher of the Skies fit better, of course:

Creatures shaped this planet's soil
Now their reign has come to end
Does life again destroy life, do they play elsewhere?
Do they know more than their childhood games?
The enemy is within
Don't confuse me with him

E. Smith

Jim Hunt

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2677 on: July 28, 2015, 01:44:53 PM »
I had to think of the very same thing, Jim!  But it's a different song: ;)

Great minds think alike! Or fools seldom differ?

"The foe have met their fate" => Supper's Ready => Watcher of the Skies
"The most revolutionary thing one can do always is to proclaim loudly what is happening" - Rosa Luxemburg

Tommy

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2678 on: July 28, 2015, 02:19:41 PM »
Quote
Jim Hunt
The floe and which O-Buoy 11 and it's friends are sat now looks as though it's adrift in open water:

Thanks for posting this and the link with the map. I had hard time figuring out where these things are earlier from their webpage (silly scientists. worst communicators in the world :) )

(My cartoon for today below. I knocked it together in Photoshop over morning coffee this morning, from that latest buoy image above. )
« Last Edit: July 28, 2015, 05:41:55 PM by Tommy »

Shared Humanity

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2679 on: July 28, 2015, 02:39:09 PM »
I reckon we can now officially declare that the Northern Sea Route is "ice free"

http://forum.arctic-sea-ice.net/index.php/topic,854.msg58432.html

The Northwest Passage still has a way to go:

No ice is being transported through the Nara yet. It looks like that big slab of fused ice doesn't want to break up.

Tommy

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2680 on: July 28, 2015, 02:41:43 PM »
Quote
Groucho
The time for waking up was perhaps twenty years ago.

Yes.
This is from a long article I wrote for the group 'Students for Alternatives to Genetic Engineering' in about 1996, for the Home page of the website we created back then. The article was about GMOs but also had a section called "More Pollution" and touched on the dangers.

"Scientific advancement is a powerful tool with many benefits, however, science shows us that the more powerful a technology is, the more caution needs to be exercised in its usage...
The 20th century provides ample evidence worldwide that the current education system is seriously lacking something fundamental and universal. The serious problems facing humanity today are the result of partial knowledge, and fragmented development in education. Thus, scientists have repeatedly created technologies which are detrimental to health and the environment, and society has administered their destructive force indiscriminately. Genetic engineering is another in the list of dangerous technologies that result from the ongoing tradition of partial knowledge in our educational institutions."
-- S.A.G.E. website 1996.
(SAGE website was followed by journalists and others, because we updated with most recent scientific research very effectively every week or so, some of those journalists got the US National Award for Ethical Journalism, and e-mailed me at one point to praise our site, but SAGE is now defunct because no-one listened and we ran out of steam.)

I had letters read out on national UK BBC radio in the 1980s, in which I talked about alternative technology and dangers of nuclear power (that was before Chernobyl and Fukushima.)

I designed kinetic sculptures in the early 1980s that would have used wind and solar power, and some would have followed the sun, moon around the sky, and close up at night etc., and other ways to indicate the symbiotic nature of man and environment. It was too expensive, and I went off on a different artistic track anyway, which from then, until now, has been more like a homage to the nature we are loosing, and a sort of prayer of gratitude in a way, to Earth and the Universe, rather than some of the political/activist messages that may have creeped into my art when I was younger. You can see some of that later art here. I still have tons more to upload yet ----> http://www.satwagraphics.com/painting1.html

I also stood as a candidate for UK MP in the 1990s, for a political party that promoted sustainable living and alternative technology.

I worked on sustainable buildings many times, in fact helped to build aspects of this eco-village in the early 2000s when it was still mostly just a field (started by a good friend of mine.)
Abundance EcoVillage (it is now more advanced than the pictures here, which are old, and the village is bigger now.)
---> http://www.abundance-ecovillage.com/
My friend, Lonnie Gamble, who started the eco-village, then helped with the development of the largest completely off-the-grid building on any university campus in the world, about a mile from Abundance EcoVillage. The building has classrooms, offices, bathrooms, everything, and has zero emissions, with all waste water, etc. re-cycled, purified for plants, washing, and other usages, permaculture and food growing all around it, all construction materials and wood from sustainable sources, and even generates extra electricity for the campus. (The campus has the largest Sustainable Living degree, student body in the world.)
It is the most advanced building in the world --->

Many have moved ahead, to what we call deep ecology now, because nobody listened to us back in the 80s and 90s, in fact we were widely ridiculed, and I doubt they will listen now.

Yes, it is probably too late for the Arctic, and, according to scientists, that will affect the whole world.

The only solutions now are a form of 'deep ecology' that we have been proposing for decades now.
« Last Edit: July 28, 2015, 05:21:12 PM by Tommy »

12Patrick

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2681 on: July 28, 2015, 02:59:57 PM »
OUCH! The arctic dipole is forecast to be over the Arctic 5 days now. It arrived yesterday on the 27th...  This is the forecast on 8/1/15 ... Not good folks not good.. http://earth.nullschool.net/#2015/08/01/1500Z/wind/isobaric/250hPa/overlay=mean_sea_level_pressure/orthographic=-90.00,90.00,450


plinius

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2682 on: July 28, 2015, 03:36:38 PM »
Well, looks like quite an "Anti-"dipole. High over the siberian arctic, low over Beaufort extending far. I would not underestimate the impact on the European side. More important than the warm air advection is that 10C warm waters might be driven directly under the ice front:
http://www7320.nrlssc.navy.mil/hycomARC/navo/arcticsst_nowcast_anim30d.gif

Watch the space between Spitzbergen and Franz-Josef-Land (and also the West Spitzbergen current).


weatherdude88

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2683 on: July 28, 2015, 05:33:23 PM »
OUCH! The arctic dipole is forecast to be over the Arctic 5 days now. It arrived yesterday on the 27th...  This is the forecast on 8/1/15 ... Not good folks not good.. http://earth.nullschool.net/#2015/08/01/1500Z/wind/isobaric/250hPa/overlay=mean_sea_level_pressure/orthographic=-90.00,90.00,450

12Patrick,

Quite the opposite. Your link is not a dipole. A anomalously cold pattern appears to be locking in place in the arctic for the month of August. The latest guidance suggest ice retention versus ice export. We may even sea ice extent growth in the Beaufort this month. It appears to be a very boring end to the melt season.

plinius

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2684 on: July 28, 2015, 05:41:44 PM »
depends on how much ice dies on the European side. A lot of warm water appears to be driven under the ice from north atlantic and Barents. No need to export the ice if you can melt it out in situ.

And apart from this: I would not call the first week of August "End of the melt season".

weatherdude88

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2685 on: July 28, 2015, 05:49:11 PM »
depends on how much ice dies on the European side. A lot of warm water appears to be driven under the ice from north atlantic and Barents. No need to export the ice if you can melt it out in situ.

And apart from this: I would not call the first week of August "End of the melt season".

plinius,

SST's in August average above -1.8 Celsius in the western and Siberian side of the arctic, so of course you will have melt throughout the month of August. (Water has a very high heat capacity and therefore will trump air temperatures) Additionally the wind profiles suggest ice transport from the eastern side to the Beaufort which is the mechanism that could increase extent in that region. Let's be realistic. If this pattern locks in place there will be a dramatic slowdown. SST's in the northern Atlantic are colder then the previous 5 melting seasons. So I fail to see how SST's from the northern Atlantic or Barents will have a significant effect.
« Last Edit: July 28, 2015, 06:15:02 PM by weatherdude88 »

cesium62

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2686 on: July 28, 2015, 05:59:56 PM »

"Thus, scientists have repeatedly created technologies which are detrimental to health and the environment...," -- S.A.G.E. website 1996.

Technologies are passive.  Business has repeatedly exploited technologies in ways that are detrimental to health and the environment.  Business likes to exploit a shared commons for its personal gain.

6roucho

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2687 on: July 28, 2015, 06:08:41 PM »
Quote
Groucho
The time for waking up was perhaps twenty years ago.

Yes.
This is from a long article I wrote for the group 'Students for Alternatives to Genetic Engineering' in about 1996, for the Home page of the website we created back then. The article was about GMOs but also had a section called "More Pollution" and touched on the dangers.

"Scientific advancement is a powerful tool with many benefits, however, science shows us that the more powerful a technology is, the more caution needs to be exercised in its usage...
The 20th century provides ample evidence worldwide that the current education system is seriously lacking something fundamental and universal. The serious problems facing humanity today are the result of partial knowledge, and fragmented development in education. Thus, scientists have repeatedly created technologies which are detrimental to health and the environment, and society has administered their destructive force indiscriminately. Genetic engineering is another in the list of dangerous technologies that result from the ongoing tradition of partial knowledge in our educational institutions."
-- S.A.G.E. website 1996.
(SAGE website was followed by journalists and others, because we updated with most recent scientific research very effectively every week or so, some of those journalists got the US National Award for Ethical Journalism, and e-mailed me at one point to praise our site, but SAGE is now defunct because no-one listened and we ran out of steam.)

I had letters read out on national UK BBC radio in the 1980s, in which I talked about alternative technology and dangers of nuclear power (that was before Chernobyl and Fukushima.)

I designed kinetic sculptures in the early 1980s that would have used wind and solar power, and some would have followed the sun, moon around the sky, and close up at night etc., and other ways to indicate the symbiotic nature of man and environment. It was too expensive, and I went off on a different artistic track anyway, which from then, until now, has been more like a homage to the nature we are loosing, and a sort of prayer of gratitude in a way, to Earth and the Universe, rather than some of the political/activist messages that may have creeped into my art when I was younger. You can see some of that later art here. I still have tons more to upload yet ----> http://www.satwagraphics.com/painting1.html

I also stood as a candidate for UK MP in the 1990s, for a political party that promoted sustainable living and alternative technology.

I worked on sustainable buildings many times, in fact helped to build aspects of this eco-village in the early 2000s when it was still mostly just a field (started by a good friend of mine.)
Abundance EcoVillage (it is now more advanced than the pictures here, which are old, and the village is bigger now.)
---> http://www.abundance-ecovillage.com/
My friend, Lonnie Gamble, who started the eco-village, then helped with the development of the largest completely off-the-grid building on any university campus in the world, about a mile from Abundance EcoVillage. The building has classrooms, offices, bathrooms, everything, and has zero emissions, with all waste water, etc. re-cycled, purified for plants, washing, and other usages, permaculture and food growing all around it, all construction materials and wood from sustainable sources, and even generates extra electricity for the campus. (The campus has the largest Sustainable Living degree, student body in the world.)
It is the most advanced building in the world --->

Many have moved ahead, to what we call deep ecology now, because nobody listened to us back in the 80s and 90s, in fact we were widely ridiculed, and I doubt they will listen now.

Yes, it is probably too late for the Arctic, and, according to scientists, that will affect the whole world.

The only solutions now are a form of 'deep ecology' that we have been proposing for decades now.
Fascinating stuff Tommy, although I fear I've dragged both of us off topic. I had similar experiences as a Green Party activist in the UK in the 90s, trying to convince party members that climate change was a more crucial issue than nuclear disarmament. I think we should be very alarmed. We're conducting an experiment with the production copy of our environment, under the control of random commercial and political interests. Interesting times.

Tommy

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2688 on: July 28, 2015, 06:18:48 PM »
Quote
cesium62
Technologies are passive.  Business has repeatedly exploited technologies in ways that are detrimental to health and the environment.  Business likes to exploit a shared commons for its personal gain.

Yes, but you must be aware that scientists have repeatedly, time and time again, defended those technologies, and in many cases aggressively promoted them, and repeatedly ridiculed people who question those technologies. Even today.

But yes, the 3 headed monster, of scientists with limited understanding of the whole, along with politicians, and businessmen have created the mess we are in today, with the Arctic for example.
Many scientists, including some here, are not in that camp, and I admire them greatly, but you can't deny the overall pattern of arrogance amongst many scientists over the decades, shutting down other voices, by acting like they are the only ones who understand the world. Not all of them, but the most vociferous and influential have done it for decades. It's not just industry scientists. Scientists cannot possibly understand the world, (unless they go deeper than science) because the nature of science is one-sided, completely piecemeal, and poorly connected partial knowledge. That state of mind (which we all have, by the way), that is disconnected from the whole - overly objective oriented - is what has brought us to the brink today.
Anyway, it's all good. It's just change.  I hope you have the solutions.

--- from an Artist.
(PS. An artist founded the political Green Party in the 1960s, which helped start the whole green movement worldwide, not a scientist.  ;) )


« Last Edit: July 28, 2015, 06:31:08 PM by Tommy »

Tommy

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2689 on: July 28, 2015, 06:34:05 PM »
Quote
Fascinating stuff Tommy, although I fear I've dragged both of us off topic.
I had similar experiences as a Green Party activist in the UK in the 90s
-Groucho

Yes, sorry for taking it off-topic. I'll stop there.
(and it is great that you were trying as well, way back when, Groucho.)

The only reason I mention any of this is because we are in an international emergency in my opinion, and I try to tell it like it is, but it can be scary to some folks, so I don;t want people to think it is completely hopeless.

Sorry for going off topic folks, I'll get back to making cartoons about the Arctic !

:)

Tommy.
« Last Edit: July 28, 2015, 07:55:55 PM by Tommy »

cesium62

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2690 on: July 28, 2015, 06:41:50 PM »
depends on how much ice dies on the European side. A lot of warm water appears to be driven under the ice from north atlantic and Barents. No need to export the ice if you can melt it out in situ.

And apart from this: I would not call the first week of August "End of the melt season".

plinius,

SST's in August average above -1.8 Celsius in the western and Siberian side of the arctic, so of course you will have melt throughout the month of August. (Water has a very high heat capacity and therefore will trump air temperatures) Additionally the wind profiles suggest ice transport from the eastern side to the Beaufort which is the mechanism that could increase extent in that region. Let's be realistic. If this pattern locks in place there will be a dramatic slowdown. SST's in the northern Atlantic are colder then the previous 5 melting seasons. So I fail to see how SST's from the northern Atlantic or Barents will have a significant effect.
depends on how much ice dies on the European side. A lot of warm water appears to be driven under the ice from north atlantic and Barents. No need to export the ice if you can melt it out in situ.

And apart from this: I would not call the first week of August "End of the melt season".

plinius,

SST's in August average above -1.8 Celsius in the western and Siberian side of the arctic, so of course you will have melt throughout the month of August. (Water has a very high heat capacity and therefore will trump air temperatures) Additionally the wind profiles suggest ice transport from the eastern side to the Beaufort which is the mechanism that could increase extent in that region. Let's be realistic. If this pattern locks in place there will be a dramatic slowdown. SST's in the northern Atlantic are colder then the previous 5 melting seasons. So I fail to see how SST's from the northern Atlantic or Barents will have a significant effect.

Extent transferred into the Beaufort is often extent transferred out of some other region.  The light winds will tend to push Beaufort ice south toward shore where the sea and air remain relatively warm.  Climate Reanalyzer shows a cyclone blowing off the CAA and a patch of wind to stir things up on the north side of the Beaufort, carrying in some moisture as well.  Temperatures remain warm near Russia and north of Greenland.  Winds should scour the ice off the east coast of Greenland, pushing it South.

In any event, pushing the MYI south is bad for the long term health of the arctic ice.

helorime

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2691 on: July 28, 2015, 06:45:39 PM »
Quote
you can't deny the overall pattern of arrogance amongst many scientists over the decades, shutting down other voices, by acting like they are the only ones who understand the world. Not all of them, but the most vociferous and influential have done it for decades. It's not just industry scientists. Scientists cannot possibly understand the world, (unless they go deeper than science) because the nature of science is one-sided, completely piecemeal, and poorly connected partial knowledge.

I think the view that scientists are arrogant as a group is mistaken.  Scientists make observations, develop hypotheses, design experiments, collect data and interpret the results.  We (I am a scientist.... though a molecular geneticist not a climate scientist) are constantly retesting, double-checking, checking each other and refining our methods and understanding.  We have a large body of knowledge and understanding.  It is like any other area of expertise.  People generally don't say surgeons are one-sided and arrogant in thinking that they understand how to make incisions modify thing and then seal up what they have done, why look at 50 years ago!  They used to do things differently then so they cannot possibly understand what they are doing.

We talk about probabilities and what seems to be the most likely.  No scientist when pressed, will say they are 100% certain of anything, because there is always more information that can be gathered, and unexpected events that can happen - unlike people who base their views on opinion and belief.

It never fails to astound me that so many people recognize expertise, skills, and knowledge in other areas yet easily dismiss science and scientists if they find that the information contradicts their beliefs.  In my area, molecular biology and genetics, the big ones are evolution, vaccinations, and GMO, all wildly misunderstood by many individuals and those individuals are completely unwilling to learn anything about how those processes work.

Climate scientists have the best understanding of climate, and the vast majority are very concerned about human-driven climate change, which is what we are watching here, happenening in the arctic, in this forum.

<modifed because I sent it off too fast, and never got back on topic>
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

seaicesailor

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2692 on: July 28, 2015, 06:58:32 PM »
Quote
you can't deny the overall pattern of arrogance amongst many scientists over the decades, shutting down other voices, by acting like they are the only ones who understand the world. Not all of them, but the most vociferous and influential have done it for decades. It's not just industry scientists. Scientists cannot possibly understand the world, (unless they go deeper than science) because the nature of science is one-sided, completely piecemeal, and poorly connected partial knowledge.

I think the view that scientists are arrogant as a group is mistaken.  Scientists make observations, develop hypotheses, design experiments, collect data and interpret the results.  We (I am a scientist.... though a molecular geneticist not a climate scientist) are constantly retesting, double-checking, checking each other and refining our methods and understanding.  We have a large body of knowledge and understanding.  It is like any other area of expertise.  People generally don't say surgeons are one-sided and arrogant in thinking that they understand how to make incisions modify thing and then seal up what they have done, why look at 50 years ago!  They used to do things differently then so they cannot possibly understand what they are doing.

We talk about probabilities and what seems to be the most likely.  No scientist when pressed, will say they are 100% certain of anything, because there is always more information that can be gathered, and unexpected events that can happen - unlike people who base their views on opinion and belief.

It never fails to astound me that so many people recognize expertise, skills, and knowledge in other areas yet easily dismiss science and scientists if they find that the information contradicts their beliefs.  In my area, molecular biology and genetics, the big ones are evolution, vaccinations, and GMO, all wildly misunderstood by many individuals and those individuals are completely unwilling to learn anything about how those processes work.

Climate scientists have the best understanding of climate, and the vast majority are very concerned about human-driven climate change, which is what we are watching here, happenening in the arctic, in this forum.

<modifed because I sent it off too fast, and never got back on topic>

Amen.
Let us not forget also that we are watching this interesting melting season thanks to amazing technologies enabled by amazing scientific discoveries. Scientists have developed AGW theory and keep digging in to understand and predict. Slowly and methodically.
On topic

So what is with this inverse dipole? Is this really going to chill things up for a while?
I really doubt the "boring halt". Would not be boring after all.

ChrisReynolds

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2693 on: July 28, 2015, 07:52:31 PM »
Hi everyone, haven't posted here in a long time. But been following for a while. I'm suprised there isn't more discussion about the imminent weather change. The rapid change from HP to LP is a pretty dramatic switch (certaintly one of the most impressive since I started arctic watching). What are people's thoughts on the effect of this switch?

Well, we did announce the switch a while back, but interestingly it seems high pressure is rebuilding on the American side again. Today a more persistent cyclone is being forecast (it was there already, but more persistent now).

Quote
From my basic understanding I would guess there are two camps:

1) The momentum built up in July (e.g substantial melt pond water) will be unstoppable and retardation of the melt rate will be megre (although I think its pretty unlikely that we are going to continue to see consecutive centuries).

2) Its still early enough in the year for the weather to have a significant impact (I suppose its even possible with the very low uppers for some temporary refreezing of surface melt water) and cause the melt rate to significantly slow.
 
You've got it exactly right. This is the big question for the coming week.

Check out the AO prediction ensemble.
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/daily_ao_index/ao_index_ensm.shtml
Still predicting negative, but seems to be going up at the end of the forecast, or at least the 11 members diverge, some spreading upwards. However scroll down that page and look at the long lead 14 day forecast, accuracy. Since the AO went negative predictions at around 14 day lead have consistently been overshoots with a higher predicted AO index than what actually happened (black line). Same applies at 10 days.

Last night (21:55) on BBC News 24 the forecaster said expectation for August was for a continuation of the cool wet weather we've had since the dipole set up struck in early July. Weather that is typical for north west Europe during Low AO index dominated summers.
http://iopscience.iop.org/1748-9326/8/4/044015/article

I've just been looking at GFS, and ECWMF. They differ towards the end of the series in early August. However GFS still shows isobars relatively tight, and tending to follow the Siberian coast, with the gradient being from high over the Arctic Ocean to low over Siberia, that is all that is needed to drive a dipole type flow. Being able to average all of the GFS or ECWMF predictions (as I can with NCEP/NCAR for past data) would be invaluable.

There was talk of a change that I replied to recently, on the 22 July.
http://forum.arctic-sea-ice.net/index.php/topic,1149.msg57643.html#msg57643
The last three days average still show the pattern typical of the 2007 to 2012 summer SLP anomaly pattern. As is to be expected it is rather more broken than a longer period average, but it is similar to what I have seen in summers dominated by the Arctic Dipole in the JJA average.

My gut feeling (totally non scientific!) is that August 2015 will probably see roughly the same pattern as in the 2007 to 2012 August average, attached.

jdallen

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2694 on: July 28, 2015, 08:01:49 PM »
depends on how much ice dies on the European side. A lot of warm water appears to be driven under the ice from north atlantic and Barents. No need to export the ice if you can melt it out in situ.

And apart from this: I would not call the first week of August "End of the melt season".

plinius,

SST's in August average above -1.8 Celsius in the western and Siberian side of the arctic, so of course you will have melt throughout the month of August. (Water has a very high heat capacity and therefore will trump air temperatures) Additionally the wind profiles suggest ice transport from the eastern side to the Beaufort which is the mechanism that could increase extent in that region. Let's be realistic. If this pattern locks in place there will be a dramatic slowdown. SST's in the northern Atlantic are colder then the previous 5 melting seasons. So I fail to see how SST's from the northern Atlantic or Barents will have a significant effect.
Disagree; SSTs at or near freezing have little impact on melt at this point in the season.  The heat already in the water and down-welling radiation will be hard at work through September.
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12Patrick

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2695 on: July 28, 2015, 08:15:46 PM »
depends on how much ice dies on the European side. A lot of warm water appears to be driven under the ice from north atlantic and Barents. No need to export the ice if you can melt it out in situ.

And apart from this: I would not call the first week of August "End of the melt season".

Correct..Typically it ends on the 12th of Sept..

Peter Ellis

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2696 on: July 28, 2015, 08:24:31 PM »
We (I am a scientist.... though a molecular geneticist not a climate scientist) are constantly retesting, double-checking, checking each other and refining our methods and understanding.

Cool - what's your specific field?  I work on molecular genetics of reproduction and sex chromosome biology :-)

12Patrick

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2697 on: July 28, 2015, 08:26:37 PM »
depends on how much ice dies on the European side. A lot of warm water appears to be driven under the ice from north atlantic and Barents. No need to export the ice if you can melt it out in situ.

And apart from this: I would not call the first week of August "End of the melt season".

plinius,

SST's in August average above -1.8 Celsius in the western and Siberian side of the arctic, so of course you will have melt throughout the month of August. (Water has a very high heat capacity and therefore will trump air temperatures) Additionally the wind profiles suggest ice transport from the eastern side to the Beaufort which is the mechanism that could increase extent in that region. Let's be realistic. If this pattern locks in place there will be a dramatic slowdown. SST's in the northern Atlantic are colder then the previous 5 melting seasons. So I fail to see how SST's from the northern Atlantic or Barents will have a significant effect.
depends on how much ice dies on the European side. A lot of warm water appears to be driven under the ice from north atlantic and Barents. No need to export the ice if you can melt it out in situ.

And apart from this: I would not call the first week of August "End of the melt season".

plinius,

SST's in August average above -1.8 Celsius in the western and Siberian side of the arctic, so of course you will have melt throughout the month of August. (Water has a very high heat capacity and therefore will trump air temperatures) Additionally the wind profiles suggest ice transport from the eastern side to the Beaufort which is the mechanism that could increase extent in that region. Let's be realistic. If this pattern locks in place there will be a dramatic slowdown. SST's in the northern Atlantic are colder then the previous 5 melting seasons. So I fail to see how SST's from the northern Atlantic or Barents will have a significant effect.

Extent transferred into the Beaufort is often extent transferred out of some other region.  The light winds will tend to push Beaufort ice south toward shore where the sea and air remain relatively warm.  Climate Reanalyzer shows a cyclone blowing off the CAA and a patch of wind to stir things up on the north side of the Beaufort, carrying in some moisture as well.  Temperatures remain warm near Russia and north of Greenland.  Winds should scour the ice off the east coast of Greenland, pushing it South.

In any event, pushing the MYI south is bad for the long term health of the arctic ice.
  cesium62 I agree with your analysis here... The wind direction around the low dictates this and surrounding air temps around the arctic are very hot....
« Last Edit: July 28, 2015, 09:37:38 PM by 12Patrick »

Greenbelt

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2698 on: July 28, 2015, 08:50:44 PM »
I wonder if the Chukchi Sea (in summer at least) is the new Fram Strait; that is, a place where ice can be transported to its doom.

helorime

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Re: The 2015 melting season
« Reply #2699 on: July 28, 2015, 09:25:18 PM »
Quote
Cool - what's your specific field?  I work on molecular genetics of reproduction and sex chromosome biology :-)

My specific area is mitochondrial DNA Replication, particularly in yeast, but I did my PhD in a DNA tumor virus lab where we worked on DNA replication in general as well as oncogenesis.  I am a University professor and teach Virology, molecular and Cellular Biology, Genetics, Cancer Biology, an even non-majors bio here and there.  I also have some expertise in feline genetics.

I started watching this forum in 2012, and spend a lot of time trying to convince conservative friends that climate change is not fake and a conspiracy manufactured by Obama and scientists who are brain-washed liberals, aimed to destroy American industry (I'm not kidding).

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.