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jai mitchell

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1750 on: January 05, 2017, 05:42:38 PM »
On Sunday the 8th, the GFS shows a powerful atmospheric river event impacting California. It also shows how our climate 2.0's wavy polar jet opens the gate for moisture and heat to transfer, in a stunningly direct way, from the Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ) to the Arctic. :o

Yep, you got it, surface transport from the tropics up to the mid-latitudes, then the water vapor moves to higher elevations and is directed through cut-off lows and increased blocking patterns at that elevation over into the Arctic.

If we see the lower elevation water vapor transport moving further and further northward over several seasons we will know (more than we do now) that we have crossed a climate tipping point and are moving rapidly into a form of equable climate, though I don't believe that there is any paleoclimate analog to describe the rapid (geologically scaled) warming of the last century. 
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Bill Fothergill

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1751 on: January 05, 2017, 06:25:58 PM »

... all at once is irrelevant if the rate of warming is substantially worse at the moment vs previous warming events; don't need to accumulate a freshwater lake if a trickle is instead a gushing torrent from the ice sheet itself ...
I'm not trying to minimise the future impacts of the ongoing GIS melt, I am merely suggesting  that, owing to the flow-rate limitations imposed by the Greenland topography, it is unlikely to happen in jaw-dropping instalments such as happened with the YD or the 8.2 kYear events. These were associated with pronounced jumps in mean global sea level, whereas today we are likely to see a steadier contribution to SLR from Greenland. For example, see the abstract to this pay-walled paper. It documents a jump in the 0.8 - 2.2 metre range associated with the 8.2 kY event.)

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0012821X11003177

Obviously the current warming rate is pretty impressive compared to most other times within the Holocene, but I'm not certain how different it is from the warming at the transition out of the Pleistocene.



Personally, when it comes to abrupt surges in SLR, I'm more worried about the WAIS and the Peninsula. I think there will be some "interesting" events unfolding down there over the coming decades; Thwaites, PIG, Larssen - take your pick, they're all under imminent threat of destabilisation.

It might seem counter-intuitive, but, as a consequence of its topography, the vast majority of 'bergs from Greenland are calved on the Western flanks of the island. Indeed, it was one of these monsters which took out the unsinkable RMS Titanic almost 105 years ago. The region where these wander into the Atlantic goes by the rather descriptive sobriquet of "Iceberg Alley". (See the earlier post from A-Team.)

Bill Fothergill

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1752 on: January 05, 2017, 06:31:31 PM »
Dammit! I clicked "post" instead of "preview".

I had meant to include a link to NASA's "Vital Signs" page. This gives a good idea of SLR variation over the last 140+ years. Graph 1 is more recent and taken from satellite measurements, whereas the second graph is based on tidal gauge readings.

http://climate.nasa.gov/vital-signs/sea-level/

kiwichick16

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1753 on: January 05, 2017, 08:06:16 PM »
@  bill fothergill............looking at your longterm graph this is perhaps an argument to be made that AGW started approximately 8000 years ago with the spread of agriculture as witnessed by the significant spike in temperature at that time .....and that our activities since then have held the temperature up higher than they would have been without our ever increasing disruption of the planets ecosystems

http://history.aip.org/climate/impacts.htm

Bill Fothergill

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1754 on: January 05, 2017, 08:24:06 PM »
... perhaps an argument to be made that AGW started approximately 8000 years ago with the spread of agriculture ...

Yep, the name most associated with this hypothesis is undoubtedly Bill Ruddiman.

http://stephenschneider.stanford.edu/Publications/PDF_Papers/Ruddiman2003.pdf

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plows,_Plagues_and_Petroleum

I've only read overviews of the book, but the .pdf is quite interesting. I first came across it a few years ago in my local library.

magnamentis

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1755 on: January 05, 2017, 08:26:58 PM »
Quote
GIS has many outlets on all sides, meaning the freshwater is spread out
Actually Greenland is quite mountainous (to 3694 m, Gunnbjørn Fjeld) along much of its eastern-central and northern coast, meaning the ice sheet is quite thin and very little ice is calved on that side today (except way to the south). A much larger fraction of the discharge now and near-term seems to be from the western side -- and that water is swept up and around far to the north before eventually circling down, by that time at a higher salinity. Arctic Ocean ice melting as it exits the Fram may provide a larger source of freshwater but whether the Irminger Current pools it over the proposed AMOC slowdown site is another matter.

In past melt-out episodes inferred from Be10 and Al26 exposure ratios, almost all of the remnant ice is left on the eastern side. The GRIP ice core is the only one to have obtained a bedrock carbonate-to-granite sample.

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v540/n7632/full/nature20146.html Dec 2016

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/311484731_Greenland_was_nearly_ice-free_for_extended_periods_during_the_Pleistocene free full

true that while considering how much it takes to melt glaciers in much lower latitudes one can assume that when we think about greenland iceshield melting the ice on higher mountains will still take a few centuries to melt, hence short term it's more about lower altitudes which to a good part are in i kind of basin. after all we shall have cold winters in greenland, especially at altitudes above 500-1000m above sea-level for quite some time to come.

kiwichick16

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1756 on: January 05, 2017, 08:49:01 PM »
@  bill fothergill ......thanks for that Bill

Gray-Wolf

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1757 on: January 05, 2017, 09:14:26 PM »
We had become concerned that the Amoc might be faltering but the current battle between ice edge and drifted warm Atlantic waters makes me wonder if we need worry?

If WACCy is what we are seeing then a displaced early vortex over the snowfields will drive such an exchange each Autumn/early winter from now on. Surely such an influx will subsidise any losses due to a slowing of the current and provide an ever further reach into our side of the pole and so limit ice growth ( as we are seeing ) ever closer to the pole esp. after any B.O.E.?
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jdallen

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1758 on: January 05, 2017, 09:32:28 PM »
We had become concerned that the Amoc might be faltering but the current battle between ice edge and drifted warm Atlantic waters makes me wonder if we need worry?

If WACCy is what we are seeing then a displaced early vortex over the snowfields will drive such an exchange each Autumn/early winter from now on. Surely such an influx will subsidise any losses due to a slowing of the current and provide an ever further reach into our side of the pole and so limit ice growth ( as we are seeing ) ever closer to the pole esp. after any B.O.E.?
I've always questioned whether a slowdown of the AMOC would occur.  The heat exchange will still take place, and in fact, may actually increase somewhat when we reach a year round ice free Arctic Ocean.  The mechanical changes in density will still be there to drive circulation, perhaps even *increase* it.  The lack of a fresh water lens will reduce the strength and eventually probably eliminate any halocline, opening up more convective movement.
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Gray-Wolf

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1759 on: January 05, 2017, 09:46:07 PM »
Thanks jd that is my take on things. Heat will always head to cold so when that heat increases then so does the exchange surely?

If we are to become ever more 'extreme' in this exchange until some closer parity is achieved then equator and pole will have forged an uncomplicated exchange ( like in your bath when you top up the 'hot'?).

We might be too focused on the end of orbital driven glaciations and not as open to what is actually happening out there today? We might well know the end point but the pathway will be novel to our circumstances ( both speed of GHG increases and a move to an open Arctic Basin over a matter of decades?).

The sudden uptick in warm ,humid air masses into Arctic regions shows us just how fast change can occur ( and that change can compound when year on year forcings continue without respite?).

I honestly feel we have now moved from trying to warn folk what might lie ahead to a time where all we can do is provide a running commentary highlighted with the knowledge we acquired whilst trying to warm folk?

Neven does well to focus on his 'here and now', maybe we could all do with a period of 'pull back' whilst we reacquaint ourselves with our 'here and now's'?

We lost the " warn them and we can avoid......" but we will not lose the war!! :)

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bbr2314

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1760 on: January 05, 2017, 10:05:11 PM »
Thanks jd that is my take on things. Heat will always head to cold so when that heat increases then so does the exchange surely?

If we are to become ever more 'extreme' in this exchange until some closer parity is achieved then equator and pole will have forged an uncomplicated exchange ( like in your bath when you top up the 'hot'?).

We might be too focused on the end of orbital driven glaciations and not as open to what is actually happening out there today? We might well know the end point but the pathway will be novel to our circumstances ( both speed of GHG increases and a move to an open Arctic Basin over a matter of decades?).

The sudden uptick in warm ,humid air masses into Arctic regions shows us just how fast change can occur ( and that change can compound when year on year forcings continue without respite?).

I honestly feel we have now moved from trying to warn folk what might lie ahead to a time where all we can do is provide a running commentary highlighted with the knowledge we acquired whilst trying to warm folk?

Neven does well to focus on his 'here and now', maybe we could all do with a period of 'pull back' whilst we reacquaint ourselves with our 'here and now's'?

We lost the " warn them and we can avoid......" but we will not lose the war!! :)

what lies ahead is, IMO, winter, thanks to all that humid air advecting over the formerly dry areas of Canada/Russia, combined with AMOC slowdown...



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Bill Fothergill

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1761 on: January 06, 2017, 12:24:50 AM »
RE: The NSIDC Arctic Sea Ice News & Analysis dated Jan 5th 2017

This has just been released, and is certain to furrow some brows in consternation. The opening sentence reads ...

"Sea ice in the Arctic and the Antarctic set record low extents every day in December, continuing the pattern that began in November."

The next section begins ...

"Arctic sea ice extent for December 2016 averaged 12.10 million square kilometers (4.67 million square miles), the second lowest December extent in the satellite record."

A couple of days ago, I noticed the NSIDC monthlies file had been updated, and was gob-smacked to see that the 2016 extent came in fractionally higher than 2010. I therefore squirted off a quick email to the NSIDC help desk. Rather than trying to paraphrase, my email and the speedy response are appended below...

"Hi there,

I hope you all had a great time over the festive season, and that it is not too onerous to be back at work!

Apologies if you have been receiving multiple emails in a similar vein to this, but I am having great trouble reconciling the NSIDC's December 2016 monthly value for Arctic Sea Ice Extent of 12.09 million sq kms with either the daily values or the Charctic 5-day values.

ftp://sidads.colorado.edu/DATASETS/NOAA/G02135/Dec/N_12_area_v2.txt

ftp://sidads.colorado.edu/DATASETS/NOAA/G02135/north/daily/data/NH_seaice_extent_nrt_v2.csv

http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/charctic-interactive-sea-ice-graph/

I am aware of your FAQ which warns that the average of the published daily values will not necessarily match the published monthly value, and that the daily values available for December 2016 are Near Real Time figures rather than Final values.

http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/faq/#averaging

http://nsidc.org/data/docs/noaa/g02135_seaice_index/#monthly_format

However, the 2016 NRT daily figures are so far below the equivalent Final value figures for 2010, it is difficult to see how the monthly average for 2010 could conceivably be lower than that registered for 2016.

The fact that the monthly Area shown for 2016 is about 830 thousand sq kms lower than that recorded for 2010 merely serves to reinforce the suspicion that there could be something funny about the results. Obviously, the lower Area in 2016 could be explained simply by a difference in the concentration, but all the other reporting agencies also show the 2016 December Extent as being considerably lower that its 2010 equivalent.

Again I apologise if there is nothing wrong with the numbers, but I just felt that it may be worth you guys taking another look prior to the publication of the January 2017 Sea Ice News & Analysis.

Best wishes Bill Fothergill"

"Dear Bill,

Thank you for contacting NSIDC. Indeed we have received a couple of similar questions in the recent past, but it is because of these questions that we can make our products better; they are much appreciated. We will address this shortly in the latest version of the Arctic Sea Ice News and Analysis post that is slated to be published momentarily. In short, this is an artifact of the way that the Sea Ice Index calculates the monthly means. This can be best explained with an example:

Imagine one 10 x 10 km grid cell (100 sq km). Over a 30-day month, it is covered by 100% on 5 days and the other 25 days it is ice free. So the daily sea ice extent is 100 sq km on 5 days and 0 sq km on 25 days. If you just average those 30 values together:

(5x100 sq km + 25x0)/30 = 16.67 sq km

So your monthly average extent in this method is 16.67 sq km.

If you do it the way the Sea Ice Index does it, you average 100% ice on 5 days and 0% on 25 days;

(5x100% +25x0)/30 = 16.67%

So the average monthly concentration is 16.67%. Since that is >15% that grid cell is considered “ice-covered” for the month and the extent is the area of that grid cell, or 100 sq km.

Thus, in this example the one method - average each daily total extent - gives you a value of 16.67 sq km. In the other method - calculated a monthly average field and then calculating total extent - gives you a value of 100 sq km

Moving forward, we will make a decision on best practices. Thank you for your attention to these details, please let me know if you have any questions.

Regards,  Greg"


It will be interesting to see if there is some alteration to the technique as a result of the bizarre outcome in December. To see this in its full glory, set the Charctic options to only display 2010 and 2016, and the use the zoom function to display only December.

How 2016 can then be declared as second lowest means there is some serious mismatch between the daily/monthly representation algorithms.



Tigertown

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1762 on: January 06, 2017, 12:25:47 AM »
When things got stormy in Dec., I posted a GIF of the warm water current going past Svalbard and reaching out toward waters north of FJL. I thought maybe that the rough seas, waves, and wind were pushing the warm surface and near surface waters further in that direction. I think now, though, there is more going on than that. There seems to be an accumulation of the warm waters that is building up in this area, slowly reaching further into the Arctic and accumulating heat to a greater depth than before. It's like the warm water is running out of anywhere else to go.
Looking at 49 cm down from 11-5 to 12-5 to 1-5-17   CLICK IMAGE
And a look at how the temp. and depth that it drops at increased (from 12-10 to now)
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DrTskoul

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1763 on: January 06, 2017, 01:21:10 AM »
....

How 2016 can then be declared as second lowest means there is some serious mismatch between the daily/monthly representation algorithms.

Thanks for following it up Bill....

Tealight

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1764 on: January 06, 2017, 01:43:06 AM »
@Bill

We discussed the NSIDC monthly extent calculations several times on the forum. The 15% threshold is just terrible for a very dispersed and mobile icepack. For that reason Wipneus and myself provide area values on our websites. Neven will likely integrate them on the ASIG soon.


If you still want official NSIDC figures you have you check the Sea Ice Index and select Sea Ice Concentration
http://nsidc.org/data/bist/bist.pl?annot=1&legend=1&scale=100&tab_cols=2&tab_rows=2&config=seaice_index&submit=Refresh&mo0=12&hemis0=N&img0=extn&mo1=12&hemis1=N&img1=conc&year0=2016&year1=2010

DrTskoul

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1765 on: January 06, 2017, 01:49:43 AM »
The point is that the 15% threshold is _even _ worse when monthly avarages are calculated according to.their.algorithm.

sidd

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1766 on: January 06, 2017, 06:00:05 AM »
Re: Ruddiman

I do not usually post in this thread, forgive me for interjecting but I was searching for Ruddiman's research site and i saw a comment in this thread, so i though i would post some links.

His site is www.evsc.virginia.edu/ruddiman-william-f/

His latest review article in Reviews of Geophysics is available at researchgate and well worth reading.

There is a nice 2014 Tyndall Lecture by him at



sidd

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1767 on: January 06, 2017, 07:21:23 AM »
When things got stormy in Dec., I posted a GIF of the warm water current going past Svalbard and reaching out toward waters north of FJL.
is that a new ocean current what the fuck

Tigertown

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1768 on: January 06, 2017, 07:50:23 AM »
It was there before, and it split at that point, on the Greenland facing side of Svalbard. Part turned back and some went past Svalbard. I just don't believe it has ever remained this strong in the winter and caused such accumulation of heat several hundred meters deep until the last couple years and to an extreme this year. It shows no intention of backing off even now.

https://earth.nullschool.net/#current/ocean/surface/currents/overlay=sea_surface_temp_anomaly/orthographic=-5.05,77.83,2347/loc=7.502,78.137
« Last Edit: January 06, 2017, 07:57:17 AM by Tigertown »
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bairgon

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1769 on: January 06, 2017, 09:19:10 AM »
I mean, (insert swear word) the Nares is STILL EXPORTING ICE!

Actually, it started going backwards on 3rd Jan which corresponds with 50kmh SW winds up the strait. The wind direction is forecast to reverse tomorrow and they continue from the NE up to the end of the forecast period. It will be interesting to see if the normal export will recommence, as there appears to be a lot of refreeze.

I'm using the Sentinel images from http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/kennedy.uk.php.

Wind: https://earth.nullschool.net/#2017/01/07/0000Z/wind/surface/level/orthographic=-59.66,81.71,3000/loc=-66.658,80.867 - which also looks like it will export more ice out of Fram and onto that warm water near Svalbard.

oren

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1770 on: January 06, 2017, 09:55:54 AM »
@Bill
We discussed the NSIDC monthly extent calculations several times on the forum. The 15% threshold is just terrible for a very dispersed and mobile icepack.
Thanks Bill. I am guessing their algorithm counted the whole FJL area / Barents Bite, and probably some Chukchi areas, all the battleground locations, as ice-covered in the average. Totally unsuitable to the new ice regime.

crandles

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1771 on: January 06, 2017, 11:12:59 AM »
Their explanation:

Quote
Thus, when sea ice is retreating or advancing at a high rate over the course of the month, as was the case for December 2016, the Sea Ice Index monthly average can yield a larger extent than from simply averaging daily extent values.

Interesting they think it is retreat/advance rather than movement causing same piece of ice to be counted 2-6 times rather than once.

Retreat/advance (without movement effects) seems to me that monthly measure might mean that for Dec it is mainly calculating area for 27th of month when there are only 5 days left rather than an average for the entire month. While the daily extent measure was closer at the end of the month, it was still well below 12.279 vs 12.358.

That is relatively close compared to

average of 30 daily numbers = 11.468
monthly number 12.09

so yes it does look like they are right the main reason is fast advance (retreat) rather than movement which is only a fairly small factor.

Or is that a bad way to try to differentiate size of those effects?

seaicesailor

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1772 on: January 06, 2017, 11:29:30 AM »
Using the same algorithm for sea (water) extent, the resulting sea extent in a beach during an hour of high tide and calm seas can be lower than at an hour with low tide but very rough seas.
This index precisely fails for the Arctic in very dynamical moments when the ice is under attack near the minimum or maximum. It was absurd in September too
« Last Edit: January 06, 2017, 11:53:05 AM by seaicesailor »

Lord M Vader

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1773 on: January 06, 2017, 12:08:00 PM »
An EXTREMELY surprising result from NSIDC!!! December 2016 had the SECOND lowest average SIE behind 2010 according to NSIDC(!!!!!!!!) :o :o :o :o :o :o

Personally, at a first glance I thought it was a glitch in the estimation but no...

Here is NSIDC explanation for the difference in numbers and why 2016 didn't have the first place:

"because of the way in which the Sea Ice Index algorithm calculates the monthly extent. The algorithm calculates the monthly average total extent from the monthly average gridded concentration field. Thus, when sea ice is retreating or advancing at a high rate over the course of the month, as was the case for December 2016, the Sea Ice Index monthly average can yield a larger extent than from simply averaging daily extent values."


Peter Ellis

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1774 on: January 06, 2017, 12:19:00 PM »
Yeah, you'd get pretty much the same effect from ranking all days of the month in order and taking the value at the 15th percentile (i.e. 85% of all days lower than that value, and 15% higher).  Thus during the melt season, the "monthly average" roughly represents the 4th-5th of the month, and during the freeze-up it represents ~the 25th-27th of the month.

Still weird that December can set a record every single day and still come second in the monthly average.  What that means is that it caught up during the first half of the month and then slowed down again.

A-Team

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1775 on: January 06, 2017, 03:52:17 PM »
Is there a purpose served in further tracking of this obscure, obsolete, low resolution rubbish? The size and quality of pixels NSIDC using here is outdated and inappropriate (see wayne's ASIB comments) to the intrinsic size of ice features such as leads.

Sacrificing accurate assessment of the current situation for the sake of long-term consistency (downward trend: are there any convince-able persons left the outside world?), surely that is a backwards-looking agenda.

Below, the boundary between thick and thin ice (green) as determined by U Bremen SMOS is overlain on high resolution sea ice concentration (bluish white) U Hamburg AMSR2. Ice thicker than a half meter is given a gray overtint.

While numerous satellite products are providing a nearly identical edge between open water and ice (with the exception of Hycom thickness which seems to include slurry, grease ice and nilas), only SMOS seems to be accurately tracking growth of new ice oceanwide. Here UB's five grades of intermediate thickness are consolidated to define the position of the 0.5m thickness boundary.

In past years including 2012, that line would have reached the coast by now. In the past, new ice has been capable of ~2 m of growth with 0.5 m only representing roughly a quarter of the season. This year, the line is going nowhere. The time series below shows some back-and-forth but provides no observational support for significant or consistent region-wide thickening of ice during the last 36 days in the Chukchi, Bering Strait and Beaufort.

FishedOut summarized this in a nutshell: a big El Nino burped out heat stored in the ocean since the previous one, leading to too much warm water vapor being advected both north and south (wip's graph), the Arctic is piling on after-effects of its own, making the air and water at its two  portals too warm, and this together with the long-term trend proved enough to tip over the climate. That makes for a good default scenario; we'll soon see if the coming melt season continues to be consistent with it.
« Last Edit: January 06, 2017, 03:58:43 PM by A-Team »

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1776 on: January 06, 2017, 04:53:11 PM »
When things got stormy in Dec., I posted a GIF of the warm water current going past Svalbard and reaching out toward waters north of FJL. I thought maybe that the rough seas, waves, and wind were pushing the warm surface and near surface waters further in that direction. I think now, though, there is more going on than that. There seems to be an accumulation of the warm waters that is building up in this area, slowly reaching further into the Arctic and accumulating heat to a greater depth than before. It's like the warm water is running out of anywhere else to go.
Looking at 49 cm down from 11-5 to 12-5 to 1-5-17

I have always had a point of contention with SST and SST anomalies. The issue is that to do an effective analysis, you need to also look at areas where ice is forming, melting, contracting from or migrating towards. If you look at that animation, it would appear that the SST is dropping rather quickly in the Barents south of FJI. I do not believe this is the case. It is that ice is finally forming in the Barents around FJI. While this new ice is no doubt forming because surface waters have dropped enough to allow ice to form, I have to believe that the waters just below the surface are still anomalously warm. In that region north of Svalbard, no ice has yet formed and the edge of this warm water which is extending towards FJI is parallel to the shallow shelf. It does not form further north because these warmer, saltier waters move deeper as they spill into the deeper water. I suspect this warm water can be found under the new ice.

Tigertown

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1777 on: January 06, 2017, 06:23:52 PM »
@Shared Humanity        First of all, I should say that animation is for 49 cm depth, as I think actual surface temps. are deceptive, just as you stated.
I was mainly pointing to the accumulation where the warm water is gathering past Svalbard. As far as south of FJL, it's a matter of picking a spot and checking the depths at intervals. Here is one south of FJL, picked randomly, and it has especially cooled for the first 90 or so meters down over the last couple months. The current that turns at Svalbard, though, does not completely turn with every molecule of water, and a small percentage goes the other way, where the yellow streak is. That area is being steadily supplied with warmth that other areas are not, and more so this year than past years. I checked.

Random point south of FJL
« Last Edit: January 06, 2017, 06:31:18 PM by Tigertown »
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Jim Williams

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1778 on: January 06, 2017, 06:48:12 PM »
I fear 2017 winter-spring will bounce higher than 2016 . . .

I'd liked to see this graph with the day split at about day 200 rather than the first of the year.  I think seeing the DMI 80 degrees north with the division in the middle of Summer would make it much more obvious what has happened.

Bill Fothergill

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1779 on: January 06, 2017, 07:11:03 PM »
@ Tealight & A-Team

Yep, like many people, I question the intrinsic value of the extent measurement and its somewhat arbitrary 15% cut-off value. (I particularly enjoy Wayne's frequent vitriolic criticisms of the approach on the ASIB.)

As many (most? all?) of the readers here realise, it (i.e. Extent) is something of an anachronism from the maritime world. Back in days of yore (when I was still a young thing) ships lacked the ability to get near real time satellite information regarding ice conditions, and were also deficient in terms of on-board ice-detecting radar. In those days, locations with ice concentrations as low as 15% were still places one did not want to be. One might almost think in terms of "here be dragons" - ships needed to be where the ice wasn't!

I understand that area measurements can have their own problems - such as with coastal masks and discrimination between melt-ponds and open water - but, even with the ridiculously high temps being experienced above 70N, I don't think there are too many Boreal melt-ponds in December.

What may have gone unnoticed was the fact that the NSIDC monthly average for area came in at around 830 thousand sq kms below 2010 - the previous record low. (Mentioned in my #1761 from yesterday.) That seems closer to a realistic representation for December.

The .gif below is a simple Charctic diagram showing only 2010 & 2016 and zoomed to limit the display to December. Even if one sets aside reservations about how meaningful the extent metric is under today's conditions, it additionally calls into question the credibility of a monthly averaging technique which identifies 2010 as having a lower average extent.
« Last Edit: January 06, 2017, 08:10:32 PM by Bill Fothergill »

Bill Fothergill

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1780 on: January 06, 2017, 07:16:53 PM »
@ Crandles & Lord Vader

You may be interested (or possibly not  ;)) in the additional explanatory material contained within the email reply I received from NSIDC.

See #1761 from yesterday

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1781 on: January 06, 2017, 07:17:07 PM »
Big waves in the Barents today,with some over 8 m at 12 sec...
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jai mitchell

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1782 on: January 06, 2017, 07:30:31 PM »
Just look at that WV pouring in over Chukchi Peninsula!
 :o

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1783 on: January 06, 2017, 07:56:07 PM »
this entire page is one of the best reads ever, thanks to all the skilled contributors :-)  8)

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1784 on: January 06, 2017, 08:26:17 PM »
Lurker here (knew nothing 3 weeks ago and loving the discussion/information on this forum)- thought I'd throw this up regarding moisture over Chukchi (forecast of next 72 hrs). Seems so easy for warm moisture to get to the arctic nowadays.


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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1785 on: January 06, 2017, 09:57:47 PM »
Just look at that WV pouring in over Chukchi Peninsula!
 :o
Yes and look on the Atlantic side - a consistently much warmer than normal gulf of Mexico has been providing a potent source for Atlantic-side intrusions.

To me it seems like the earth is asking the Arctic to cool her down.  Hopefully the cooling can happen fast enough and the arctic can start building her cold back again and thereby breaking the trend A-Team discusses above.  Unfortunately, net enthalpy in the earth system is increasing, with the sinks (e.g. our oceans) are so filled with heat and the atmosphere so ladened with GHG.  We really could have used an ongoing la nina to deposit some of the heat into the deep pacific ocean, but that's not what's forecasted.

Lord M Vader

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1786 on: January 06, 2017, 10:14:16 PM »
Thanks Bill Fothergill! :) Very interesting reading indeed! :) I had missed that post....

Tigertown

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1787 on: January 06, 2017, 10:16:14 PM »
10 m winds.
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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1788 on: January 06, 2017, 10:28:55 PM »
Wowie zowie. Great stuff, particularly the animations, just outstanding.

jai mitchell

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1789 on: January 06, 2017, 11:32:50 PM »
Just look at that WV pouring in over Chukchi Peninsula!
 :o
Yes and look on the Atlantic side - a consistently much warmer than normal gulf of Mexico has been providing a potent source for Atlantic-side intrusions.

To me it seems like the earth is asking the Arctic to cool her down.  Hopefully the cooling can happen fast enough and the arctic can start building her cold back again and thereby breaking the trend A-Team discusses above.  Unfortunately, net enthalpy in the earth system is increasing, with the sinks (e.g. our oceans) are so filled with heat and the atmosphere so ladened with GHG.  We really could have used an ongoing la nina to deposit some of the heat into the deep pacific ocean, but that's not what's forecasted.

I believe I have worked out an aerosol reduction mechanism that works to expand the tropical WV expansion due to the increased upper tropospheric rainfall event that those aerosols produce.  A removal of this allows for wider heat dispersal (in the absence of rainfall) along the meridional.  for more info see: http://forum.arctic-sea-ice.net/index.php/topic,784.msg96262.html#msg96262

&

exerpt here:
http://forum.arctic-sea-ice.net/index.php/topic,1384.msg96264.html#msg96264

Quote
Does moisture content of atmospheric layers (troposphere/stratosphere) change or affect their height at the poles?

Funny, I was just reviewing "Observational Evidence for Aerosols Increasing Upper Tropospheric Humidity" by Riuttanen et al.  see: http://www.atmos-chem-phys.net/16/14331/2016/acp-16-14331-2016.pdf

I have been analyzing regional impacts of SO2 emission reductions on the tropopause height. A known effect, though the granual regional impacts are not well known, only a global average which is next to useless.

however, seeing the movement of tropical water vapor from the West extratropics all the way to the arctic this year makes me even more confirmed that we are seeing a great shift in the tropopause height, which produces a stronger meridional (North-South) gradient to move tropical water vapor and heat further into the arctic than ever before. (edit note: this appears to be a function of high temperature industrial process Aerosols which move more rapidly into the mid/upper troposphere as opposed to open fire (coal/biomass) aerosols which appear - during Winter especially - to stay predominantly in the lower/mid troposphere)

This paper was a bit of a Surprise to me though, The significant increase in upper tropospheric water vapor (humidity) would seem (at first glance) to cool this region.  I think the real issue here is that the expansion of the tropics is happening at the tropical edge, and the upper tropospheric (humidity) dynamics are limited there, while the boundary layer impacts of reduced AOD and cloud reflectivity levels are impacted more directly with reductions in SO2 emissions.  Not sure though.

So yeah, I would figure that, in the tropics at least, increased humidity at the upper troposphere would lead to a lowering of the tropopause height

--------------
post edit, the effect of increased rainfall in the upper troposphere of the tropics would work to effectively move latent heat from the upper altitudes to the lower altitudes, greatly increasing lower troposphere temperatures and cooling upper troposphere temperatures (in the tropics) this effect has been observed quite clearly in the MSU channel temp analyses. 

By  cooling the upper troposphere this way, the expansion of tropical waves of heat and water vapor in the meridional are reduced through a reduction in the Coriolis effect impact on the lower tropopause heights (for more see Francis & Vavrus (2012)  (resulting from increased aerosol emissions).  However, the reverse produces MORE meridional movement as well as increased total water vapor.  This is especially true since the amount of reductions in Aerosols are primarily derived from modernizations of industrial processes, high-thermal comubstion systems which have a much greater impact in the upper troposphere, as opposed to the low-temp building heating and cooking usage that produces the low lying fog that we are seeing in the winter months (and is also, consequently the source for the lack of cooling in the early 1900's since these processes were greatly diminished as a portion of total aerosols with more similar low-temp combustion events producing things like the 'london fog' but not the greater cooling impact.

This is the primary reason that we are currently seeing greater expansions of tropical moisture into the mid latitudes now and since the last two weeks of 2015 (though it has been observed since China slowed it's coal consumption growth in early 2013.

postscript:  Wow, fantastic graphic Faceplant!  Welcome!
« Last Edit: January 07, 2017, 01:11:17 AM by jai mitchell »
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magnamentis

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1790 on: January 07, 2017, 12:01:46 AM »
We really could have used an ongoing la nina to deposit some of the heat into the deep pacific ocean, but that's not what's forecasted.

that would only help deniers to refuse action and even physically (matter of factly) only postpone the problem into the future. IMO that would be even worse because the then resulting speed of change would be even higher than now, i mean once the so "stored" heat would break out once and forever at one point into the future. there are no miracles, we were and are heating the planet up and that heat is now and will even more explode into our faces.

there is two things we can do without being able to avoid the fact:

- stop the problem to increase

- seriously pondering over the consequences and how to manage them best, kind of foresight :-)

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1791 on: January 07, 2017, 01:32:57 AM »
Is there a purpose served in further tracking of this obscure, obsolete, low resolution rubbish? The size and quality of pixels NSIDC using here is outdated and inappropriate (see wayne's ASIB comments) to the intrinsic size of ice features such as leads.

Sacrificing accurate assessment of the current situation for the sake of long-term consistency (downward trend: are there any convince-able persons left the outside world?), surely that is a backwards-looking agenda.

Below, the boundary between thick and thin ice (green) as determined by U Bremen SMOS is overlain on high resolution sea ice concentration (bluish white) U Hamburg AMSR2. Ice thicker than a half meter is given a gray overtint.

While numerous satellite products are providing a nearly identical edge between open water and ice (with the exception of Hycom thickness which seems to include slurry, grease ice and nilas), only SMOS seems to be accurately tracking growth of new ice oceanwide. Here UB's five grades of intermediate thickness are consolidated to define the position of the 0.5m thickness boundary.
The SMOS/AMSR2 overlay animation really should be the new standard in tracking sea ice development. It provides so much information at a glance.
The NSIDC measurements are totally non-interesting, except as a score-keeping curiosity. The changes are coming too fast now making the baseline much less relevant.

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1792 on: January 07, 2017, 01:40:02 AM »
magnamentis i fully agree.  Our planet is at or already past the holocene limit for absorbing excess heat.  So, i find myself in a position similar to others on this forum - hoping that the speed of changes that we are currently seeing in the arctic and elsewhere will be enough to wake folks up.   before the energy momentum against us will be too great.   With PDO switched firmly to positive the pacific won't be ameliorating anytime soon.  Our awakening can't happen soon enough.

FishOutofWater

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1793 on: January 07, 2017, 03:17:41 AM »
Tigertown & others, that current through the Fram into the Arctic has been long studied as has the more tortuous pathway through the Barents. The older Arctic report cards also discussed periods where more warm water than normal surged into the Arctic.

What's happened this year is that there is less ice, warmer temperatures and more heat in the north Atlantic into the sub Arctic seas. So now when the winds increase the currents into the Arctic we see the shocking amount of heat that is flowing through the Fram and on the edge of the continental shelf.

Perhaps a surge of cold icy water from the build of fresh water in the Beaufort sea will lead to a reversal in 2018, but summer 2017 looks like a new record low for the ice unless stormy weather saves it. There is too much heat and too little ice.

As for the NSIDC's methodology for the month it misrepresents the effects of storminess alternating from the Atlantic to the Pacific side of the Arctic this December. There was less ice than 2010 but it sloshed more from one side to the other this December. It's a ridiculous methodology if 2016 is lower every day of the month but the monthly metric is higher for 2010 because the ice moved back and forth over a larger area. The coarse grid size makes the problem even worse.

In the long run, however, who cares? The downward spiral continues no matter how it is measured.

TenneyNaumer

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1794 on: January 07, 2017, 03:38:35 AM »
Meltwater runoff from the ice sheet itself is at the point of bypassing, or already has, glacier outflow in contributing to decreasing mass balance. That will only continue as the altitude of the ice sheet decreases and is exposed to warmer temperatures.  I don't believe the topography of Greenland is going to be much of a restraint on meltwater runoff.

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1795 on: January 07, 2017, 03:52:52 AM »
The warm water accumulated around Svalbard has peaked for this time of year like never before, but there is more warm water in the Barents that is being pushed around right this moment by high wind and waves. By the time that is finished a pushing will begin from the N.P. outward toward the Barents and Svalbard, that will thin the pack out. The doomed Ice going down the Fram can't make it to bottom of Greenland, as a warm current is meeting it as it reaches the southern half of the continent.

P.S. If you want some better news, there is some pretty solid ice between the pole and the Bering Strait. Just don't look too hard for any elsewhere. (Sorry, I didn't make that sound like very good news, after all.)

Edit: NSIDC showed a 24k loss in SIE on the 5th and JAXA a roughly 34k loss on the 6th.
« Last Edit: January 07, 2017, 04:54:54 AM by Tigertown »
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Bill Fothergill

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1796 on: January 07, 2017, 12:44:09 PM »
Re: Ruddiman
...
There is a nice 2014 Tyndall Lecture by him at




Thanks for that Tyndall Lecture link. I am watching it in 15 minute chunks - 2 down, 2 to go.

Gray-Wolf

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1797 on: January 07, 2017, 01:54:41 PM »
In the long run, however, who cares? The downward spiral continues no matter how it is measured.

I suppose that back in the 80's/90's the 15% cutoff wasn't an issue but now , with the whole basin fragmented and mobile by seasons end, it adds in to large an error?

I am sure it will be sorted but any downward revision of data will not please the trumpettes/wattsarians?
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Steven

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1798 on: January 07, 2017, 01:58:49 PM »
you'd get pretty much the same effect from ranking all days of the month in order and taking the value at the 15th percentile (i.e. 85% of all days lower than that value, and 15% higher).  Thus during the melt season, the "monthly average" roughly represents the 4th-5th of the month, and during the freeze-up it represents ~the 25th-27th of the month.

Not quite.  If you look at the NSIDC sea ice extent data for previous years, their monthly extent number for December is usually pretty close to the daily extent for December 20th or 21st.  So their monthly extent number is usually close to the 35th percentile of the daily values for that month.

Trying to understand this intuitively:  Imagine that the sea ice concentration for a certain grid cell is 0% during the first 20 days of December,  15% on December 21st,  and then gradually increases to 90% (say) by December 31st.  In that case, the December average sea ice concentration for that grid cell was slightly greater than 15%, whereas the daily threshold of 15% for that grid cell was reached on December 21st.
« Last Edit: January 07, 2017, 02:30:27 PM by Steven »

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Re: The 2016/2017 freezing season
« Reply #1799 on: January 07, 2017, 02:21:17 PM »
considering the fact that 3 of the major possible short and mid-term contributor areas for sea-ice-extent growth  will see way above average temps during the current forecast period i'd not expect a significant increase in extent, at least nothing out of the ordinary that would be needed to make up for the current delay in re-freeze. i'm sorry to say that this includes the Sea of Okhotsk where so many put their last hope into.