When will the Arctic Ocean (CAB) go Ice Free in Winter?

[Dharma Rupa]

Excluding any water that is close to the coast or tightly surrounded, like the Hudson or the CAA, when will the Arctic Ocean be ice-free all year, and will that be significantly different from ice-free at the end of Summer?

[be cause]

I'll just go and check gfs before I answer ...

[Wherestheice]

I think it will happen sometime between 2050-2100. The Earth is changing rapidly. Paul Beckwith says it will happen by 2030 but I have trouble seeing it happen that soon.

[sark]

Here's some very interesting comments by James G. Anderson



In order to speak meaningfully about the climate in the arctic beyond ~2035, I believe it is necessary to address fundamental structural changes in the circulation patterns of the northern hemisphere.



PIOMAS Volume in September has a variety of trends which hit zero in the 2020-2025 timeframe.  It seems a standard expectation is that the ice will retreat to an essentially ice free arctic basin in September, and then refreeze in the winter, and gradually the arctic will open up earlier and freeze up later than before, eventually becoming ice free year-round at some far flung date in the future like 2100.

(we used to talk about a blue ocean event happening in 2100, back in 2006)

However, I don't think we can expect the arctic to behave in a linear fashion to loss of sea ice cover.  We already see the weakening, meandering, and chaotic path finding of the jet stream with merely 1 degree Celsius of warming.  What will a warm arctic ocean surrounded by cold continents bring to the Hadley, Ferrel, and Polar cell distribution pattern of the northern hemisphere?

Are we seeing a decades long process of the three cell system entering chaos as it transforms into an equable climate distribution?

https://www.seas.harvard.edu/climate/eli/research/equable/climate.html

Click to animate, ERA-I temperature anomaly of 2007-2017 vs 1979-2000.  To my eyes, many similar reanalyses taking 2007-2017 or 2012-2016 or any such recent period in comparison to earlier periods show a warm arctic with cold anomalies over NH land mass during the winter.  This could be caused, for example, by the inability of the arctic to throw massive warm anomalies in the summer time as the heat is being used to melt ice... and the increasingly meandering jet stream delivering polar air over the continents.  So, in a sense, of course you will have a warm arctic- cold continent signal while there is ice to melt.

[Tor Bejnar]

moved post: I removed this from the ice-free Arctic thread, now seeing this new thread...

My understanding from reading this forum over the years is that there is plenty of heat in the deep parts of the Arctic Ocean to keep the surface ice-free through the winter if the surface 100 meters were thoroughly mixed, and as long as the surface waters remain mixed, under current atmospheric conditions (greenhouse gasses, etc.).  (Have I misunderstood the science?)

I therefore expect a seriously major storm (some day) will mix a large enough section of the central Arctic to effectively destroy the halocline and allow at least months of warm salty water that will refresh itself at the surface (as cooled water, having released heat to the colder air, will sink below warmer water of the same salinity).  Wherever there is sea ice to melt or rivers to flow or massive snows to fall, there will be a natural 'attempt' to reinstall a halocline with cold fresher water at the surface.  Which wins out after the first or second 'seriously major storm', I don't have a clue (the physics is above my abilities), but I rather expect a 'black ocean surface' through winter in the central Arctic within the next twenty years or so.  (I write "black" because it will be Arctic night, and the water won't reflect any blue.)

Over a broken/destroyed/nonexistent halocline region in the winter, the heat exchange will be intense and the air will be very humid.  Whether the resulting fog will keep the 2 meter temperature warm (above -10C) or whether it will calm the seas allowing the halocline to reestablish are beyond me (ahh, atmospheric physics!)

[Dharma Rupa]

moved post: I removed this from the ice-free Arctic thread, now seeing this new thread...

My understanding from reading this forum over the years is that there is plenty of heat in the deep parts of the Arctic Ocean to keep the surface ice-free through the winter if the surface 100 meters were thoroughly mixed, and as long as the surface waters remain mixed, under current atmospheric conditions (greenhouse gasses, etc.).  (Have I misunderstood the science?)

I therefore expect a seriously major storm (some day) will mix a large enough section of the central Arctic to effectively destroy the halocline and allow at least months of warm salty water that will refresh itself at the surface (as cooled water, having released heat to the colder air, will sink below warmer water of the same salinity).  Wherever there is sea ice to melt or rivers to flow or massive snows to fall, there will be a natural 'attempt' to reinstall a halocline with cold fresher water at the surface.  Which wins out after the first or second 'seriously major storm', I don't have a clue (the physics is above my abilities), but I rather expect a 'black ocean surface' through winter in the central Arctic within the next twenty years or so.  (I write "black" because it will be Arctic night, and the water won't reflect any blue.)

Over a broken/destroyed/nonexistent halocline region in the winter, the heat exchange will be intense and the air will be very humid.  Whether the resulting fog will keep the 2 meter temperature warm (above -10C) or whether it will calm the seas allowing the halocline to reestablish are beyond me (ahh, atmospheric physics!)

I don't know if it will be a big storm or simply not enough Winter ice making the freshwater cap, but that is more or less what I expect -- though I have no idea of the timeline.  When it happens I think the fog rolls in and the central Arctic stays mixed and warm.

[Shared Humanity]

I am not sure when the CAB will go ice free in the winter but it will not happen until temperatures north of 80 during the long polar night are significantly warmer than they are currently. The Arctic winters have been warming in an alarming manner. They are still cold enough to cause the CAB to freeze over completely.

[Dharma Rupa]

I am not sure when the CAB will go ice free in the winter but it will not happen until temperatures north of 80 during the long polar night are significantly warmer than they are currently. The Arctic winters have been warming in an alarming manner. They are still cold enough to cause the CAB to freeze over completely.

So far anyway.  I will be watching DMI 80N in winter very closely for the next few years -- though I think the most interesting time at first will be what happens at about day 250.  If the long tail of warm continues to grow then I will become pretty confident about my guess on what will happen.  If the temps revert to the norm in the Fall then I might have to rethink my expectations.

[Shared Humanity]

So far anyway.  I will be watching DMI 80N in winter very closely for the next few years -- though I think the most interesting time at first will be what happens at about day 250.  If the long tail of warm continues to grow then I will become pretty confident about my guess on what will happen.  If the temps revert to the norm in the Fall then I might have to rethink my expectations.

The temps will not revert to normal in the fall. In fact, the fall is when we will continue to see anomalously warm temps due to the vast stretches of open water giving up their heat and commencing to freeze. Freezing Degree Days matter and until this drops to the point that freezing does not happen, we will see ice form.

[GoSouthYoungins]

(we used to talk about a blue ocean event happening in 2100, back in 2006)

By far the most salient quote I've read here in the last few years.

Something I find fascinating is the consistent reversion to the mean mentality people hang onto despite being show in the recent past the drastic incorrectness of these projections. In other words, even the most well informed are not able to adjust their forecast away from the conventional wisdom regardless of REAL WORLD observations proving change FASTER THAN FORECAST by conventional wisdom.

I'd like to make an analogy based from the most different field imaginable: shooting.

External ballistics is a very complicated science. Shooting at far away things is complex and it is difficult to properly integrate all the variables to accurately forecast where a bullet will strike.  After the first shot visibly "splashes" it is possible to figure out how far off you were. However, this doesn't inform you as to the variable(s) which you got wrong.  So you can do new math, and make some new guesses and shoot again (example: maybe it is windier between you and the target than you guess). But if your first bullet splashed 10 feet left, and after your new math, your 2nd bullet splashed 9 feet left, the best thing to do for your 3rd shot is to simply aim 9 feet to the right. It's known as Kentucky Windage.

What I witness on these forms is people land their rounds to the left of the target every time, and simply insist that their math is good and their sights are good, and this next shot will clearly hit the target.  (this is the "we won't lose all the ice until 2200 crowd")

(FYI: in my example adjusting the sights would be akin to coming up with new physics which is not really an option, so I pretended like the sights were fixed.)

[sark]

(we used to talk about a blue ocean event happening in 2100, back in 2006)

...

Something I find fascinating is the consistent reversion to the mean mentality people hang onto despite being show in the recent past the drastic incorrectness of these projections. In other words, even the most well informed are not able to adjust their forecast away from the conventional wisdom regardless of REAL WORLD observations proving change FASTER THAN FORECAST by conventional wisdom.

...

Was looking for the examples I recall and came across an excellent website: http://climatechangepredictions.org/categories/arctic_sea_ice

The arctic sea ice disappearance by 2100 quote if I recall came from IPCC's 4th assessment report published in 2007:

"contraction of snow cover area, increases in thaw depth
over most permafrost regions and decrease in sea ice extent;
in some projections using SRES scenarios, Arctic
late-summer sea ice disappears almost entirely by the latter
part of the 21st century"

Here were some of the typically alarmist click-bait titles of the day

Arctic clear for summer sailing by 2040 - Published online 11 December 2006
https://www.nature.com/news/2006/061211/full/news061211-1.html

Arctic Ice Field Could Melt By 2080 - Berlin (AFP) Dec 05, 2006)
http://www.terradaily.com/reports/Arctic_Ice_Field_Could_Melt_By_2080_999.html

And of course, after 2007 and 2012 there were exponential trend curves on the PIOMAS September Volume time series that hit 0 at 2016 or 2017, and nobody really believed that.  If anyone really thought you wouldn't have a retracement after 2012 I don't know who they are.  Yet, I'm sure there were click bait articles suggesting such an early melt out back in 2013.  This is seized upon by deniers who can lol at the folly of knowledge with such cherry picked examples of failed forecasts.

It's a real problem, and I think it has led to a lot of scientists working toward improving their communications, but the fact is that the IPCC and individual scientists working on their research are forced to make the whole thing more palatable so that fossil fuel and large corporate interests will tolerate their research and they won't end up hacked, attacked, and defunded.

Personally I think it's not up to scientists to communicate this message.  It is up to people like me, a high school dropout, who has had it with the inability for government to respond.  People like me are free to be political and dismissive and populist and activist, scientists are confined to higher principles that aren't effective in this confused and distracted commercial-industrial empire.

They sell, we buy.  It is a conspiracy of all of us.

But, getting back to the topic of thread of arctic sea ice disappearance in winter, I don't think it is wise to apply the same filter of "faster than expected" to published estimates.  We can now reasonably expect an open water arctic ocean in September - October near 2025.

I'm expecting the entire northern hemisphere to enter atmospheric chaos as jet streams work out path finding around Greenland and Siberia and the CAA in winter, and muddy completely in summer, leading to a more unicellular northern hemisphere in the timeframe of 2035-2045.

The jet stream wind patterns of the northern hemisphere already look like a bucket of mixed paint in the summer.

That, I believe, is the structural changes to climate that will lead to the arctic ocean being ice free year-round and I can see it happening with an accumulated global warming of +2 or +3 degrees Celcius, which I further guess will be seen by 2050.  so I'd put an ice free arctic during WINTER at the year 2050.

[El Cid]

Paul Beckwith says it will happen by 2030 but I have trouble seeing it happen that soon.

Judging by his videos, Mr.Beckwith is pretty much nuts.

Truth is, our climate models can not even model a Green Sahara which happened just a couple of thousand years ago, and they are also not very good at modelling paleoclimate either (without some very articial tweaks). So, nobody knows when the Arctic goes icefree during winter. Noone has a clue

[bbr2314]

Paul Beckwith says it will happen by 2030 but I have trouble seeing it happen that soon.

Judging by his videos, Mr.Beckwith is pretty much nuts.

Truth is, our climate models can not even model a Green Sahara which happened just a couple of thousand years ago, and they are also not very good at modelling paleoclimate either (without some very articial tweaks). So, nobody knows when the Arctic goes icefree during winter. Noone has a clue

I can explain Green Sahara!

The bulge of warm SSTAs that enters the NATL during periods of warming shunts Greenland airmasses into Quebec instead of allowing more general movement. This results in the reglaciation of Quebec, and a severely intensified NW NATL cold pool, inklings of both of which we have seen develop this year.

Subsequently the Greenland-Quebec modified airmasses drift across the NATL before encountering the warm pool NW of Europe,whereby they fall into Iberia and Northwest Africa, resulting in much more humid and substantially cooler conditions, both of which we have also seen evolve this year. This also yields increased heat transport northward across the Eastern Sahara, at least for the moment, resulting in increasingly scorching temperatures for much of Europe and Eastern Africa, until reglaciation accelerates in Quebec to the point where the NE NATL warm bubble is resolved and glaciation commences in Europe as well.

I suspect increased seasonal snowfall across the Atlas Mountains due to ^^^ is also to blame on a local level, as this allows additional airmass modification / humidity / cooling across adjacent and downstream regions of the Sahara.

[sark]

Paul Beckwith says it will happen by 2030 but I have trouble seeing it happen that soon.

Judging by his videos, Mr.Beckwith is pretty much nuts.

I like Paul Beckwith, but I think the problem is that he makes a lot of proclamations and explanations without couching all of it deeply in uncertainty.  The truth is, we have only a foggy idea of what's going on and what will be.  When Beckwith is describing his ideas about abrupt climate changes, he's not really supporting his comments with peer-reviewed geophysical research.

I don't mind that so much,  because I find him a wealth of information about rapid climate transitions, and it takes courage to leave your comments unconfined to that supported by literature.

it is a little annoying to be beat over the head with hypotheses that may or may not have merit, but that's how humans think.  we're a simulacrum of consciousness.  in order to assimilate information, we need to put it into a story, and that gives us a mental picture.

Personally with CO2 levels accelerating through 410ppm and a host of other greenhouse gasses in an otherwise dimmed, smoky sky, I can't really see the growth of glaciers anywhere on this planet, but that's just my own personal mental picture of the future... a future we're only able to predict in the broadest strokes.

[GoSouthYoungins]

Agree with sark in too many ways to quote.

It is a huge problem when the sources of pessimistic predictions are click-bait-esque, and the optimistic predictions are the more scientifically rigorous articles. I understand the restraints on serious science to make bold predictions, but I believe the scientists should go out of their way to stress in their personal public communications the real possibilities of drastic near term consequences which are very real yet effectively unpublishable due to the inherent complexities and uncertainties.

[sark]

I would also like to see researchers and publishers less constrained by fear of repercussions to tell us how they really feel about the pace of global warming and what sort of world will emerge by 2050.  I think scientists would have a much easier time telling us what they really think if you had a large movement of people talking about this in popular culture.

More and more people are talking about this thing, and we're only at +1C.  It's unfortunate that it has to been seen and experienced before anyone will do anything about it, but, here we are... we're seeing it and experiencing it.

It isn't just up to the scientists to communicate this, and government isn't going to do anything about it.  I'm done waiting for a managerial solution to the problem.  It's time for individual action to mitigate the emissions of greenhouse gasses.

There could be a critical mass of people who drop their personal greenhouse gas emissions from 20 or 10 tonnes, down to 2 tonnes per annum.  Doing that is very difficult, today.  If many people start doing it, a market for low and no carbon trade will emerge, legal frameworks will be established, local food networks will expand... and then it wouldn't be so difficult for someone who has a family to take this path.

I'm heading into the forest for a few days of off the grid.  Before I leave, I will criticize Paul Beckwith for sitting down with at least one promulgator of pseudoscience, who is a fraud and a clown and I hope never to read his name on this forum.  Paul Beckwith is much, much better than that, and I'm sad he sat down and did an interview with this guy.

I'll leave whoever is reading this with a video that I really like, Kevin Anderson, Delivering on 2C

[bbr2314]

I would also like to see researchers and publishers less constrained by fear of repercussions to tell us how they really feel about the pace of global warming and what sort of world will emerge by 2050.  I think scientists would have a much easier time telling us what they really think if you had a large movement of people talking about this in popular culture.

More and more people are talking about this thing, and we're only at +1C.  It's unfortunate that it has to been seen and experienced before anyone will do anything about it, but, here we are... we're seeing it and experiencing it.

It isn't just up to the scientists to communicate this, and government isn't going to do anything about it.  I'm done waiting for a managerial solution to the problem.  It's time for individual action to mitigate the emissions of greenhouse gasses.

There could be a critical mass of people who drop their personal greenhouse gas emissions from 20 or 10 tonnes, down to 2 tonnes per annum.  Doing that is very difficult, today.  If many people start doing it, a market for low and no carbon trade will emerge, legal frameworks will be established, local food networks will expand... and then it wouldn't be so difficult for someone who has a family to take this path.

I'm heading into the forest for a few days of off the grid.  Before I leave, I will criticize Paul Beckwith for sitting down with at least one promulgator of pseudoscience, who is a fraud and a clown and I hope never to read his name on this forum.  Paul Beckwith is much, much better than that, and I'm sad he sat down and did an interview with this guy.

I'll leave whoever is reading this with a video that I really like, Kevin Anderson, Delivering on 2C

There will be no critical mass and if there is it will only bring about cataclysm sooner than later due to the reduction in aerosols and resultant boost to AGW of +.5C-+1.5C. We are screwed and there is no hope. Sorry!

[sark]

There will be no critical mass and if there is it will only bring about cataclysm sooner than later due to the reduction in aerosols and resultant boost to AGW of +.5C-+1.5C. We are screwed and there is no hope. Sorry!

I detest what you write, but I would give my life to make it possible for you to continue to write.

[El Cid]

Paul Beckwith says it will happen by 2030 but I have trouble seeing it happen that soon.

Judging by his videos, Mr.Beckwith is pretty much nuts.

Truth is, our climate models can not even model a Green Sahara which happened just a couple of thousand years ago, and they are also not very good at modelling paleoclimate either (without some very articial tweaks). So, nobody knows when the Arctic goes icefree during winter. Noone has a clue

I can explain Green Sahara!

bbr!

That is nice, but as far as we know that is not how it happened. During the Holocene Climate Optimum Europe was pretty warm AND we had a green sahara, so no glaciation there...

I have seen two good papers modelling the Green sahara during the HCO but they really had to tweak/push the models to get the "desired" results, ie. enough precipitation in N.Africa. Same goes for modelling the Pliocene...

So I have serious doubts about our current models. I also have doubts about your Quebec glaciation hypothesis, although I like it for being interesting.

As the Chinese curse goes: "May you live in interesting times!" 

 

[bbr2314]

Paul Beckwith says it will happen by 2030 but I have trouble seeing it happen that soon.

Judging by his videos, Mr.Beckwith is pretty much nuts.

Truth is, our climate models can not even model a Green Sahara which happened just a couple of thousand years ago, and they are also not very good at modelling paleoclimate either (without some very articial tweaks). So, nobody knows when the Arctic goes icefree during winter. Noone has a clue

I can explain Green Sahara!

bbr!

That is nice, but as far as we know that is not how it happened. During the Holocene Climate Optimum Europe was pretty warm AND we had a green sahara, so no glaciation there...

I have seen two good papers modelling the Green sahara during the HCO but they really had to tweak/push the models to get the "desired" results, ie. enough precipitation in N.Africa. Same goes for modelling the Pliocene...

So I have serious doubts about our current models. I also have doubts about your Quebec glaciation hypothesis, although I like it for being interesting.

As the Chinese curse goes: "May you live in interesting times!" 

Thank you! But I think I may have phrased it wrong -- I think Green Sahara occurs simultaneously as Europe reaches peak warmth (except for the Iberian peninsula).

As the Sahara re-greens and glaciation progresses, Europe eventually ices over, but initially, both Sahara Greening and "warm Europe" (or most of Europe) would occur simultaneously, with both happening due to the build-up of very warm ocean water in the NE NATL (simultaneously heating Europe, while forcing Greenland/Quebec airmasses S, into N Africa). Of course, it ends with Europe freezing over as the warm bubble is resolved, leaving the Sahara the only area of "optimized" climate.

Hopefully this makes a bit more sense.

[Sebastian Jones]

I can explain Green Sahara!


The bulge of warm SSTAs that enters the NATL during periods of warming shunts Greenland airmasses into Quebec instead of allowing more general movement. This results in the reglaciation of Quebec, and a severely intensified NW NATL cold pool, inklings of both of which we have seen develop this year.

Subsequently the Greenland-Quebec modified airmasses drift across the NATL before encountering the warm pool NW of Europe,whereby they fall into Iberia and Northwest Africa, resulting in much more humid and substantially cooler conditions, both of which we have also seen evolve this year. This also yields increased heat transport northward across the Eastern Sahara, at least for the moment, resulting in increasingly scorching temperatures for much of Europe and Eastern Africa, until reglaciation accelerates in Quebec to the point where the NE NATL warm bubble is resolved and glaciation commences in Europe as well.

.....

As the Sahara re-greens and glaciation progresses, Europe eventually ices over, but initially, both Sahara Greening and "warm Europe" (or most of Europe) would occur simultaneously, with both happening due to the build-up of very warm ocean water in the NE NATL (simultaneously heating Europe, while forcing Greenland/Quebec airmasses S, into N Africa). Of course, it ends with Europe freezing over as the warm bubble is resolved, leaving the Sahara the only area of "optimized" climate.

Hopefully this makes a bit more sense.

Perfect sense except for the awkward fact that both western North Africa and Iberia experienced record heat this summer.....

[bbr2314]

I can explain Green Sahara!


The bulge of warm SSTAs that enters the NATL during periods of warming shunts Greenland airmasses into Quebec instead of allowing more general movement. This results in the reglaciation of Quebec, and a severely intensified NW NATL cold pool, inklings of both of which we have seen develop this year.

Subsequently the Greenland-Quebec modified airmasses drift across the NATL before encountering the warm pool NW of Europe,whereby they fall into Iberia and Northwest Africa, resulting in much more humid and substantially cooler conditions, both of which we have also seen evolve this year. This also yields increased heat transport northward across the Eastern Sahara, at least for the moment, resulting in increasingly scorching temperatures for much of Europe and Eastern Africa, until reglaciation accelerates in Quebec to the point where the NE NATL warm bubble is resolved and glaciation commences in Europe as well.

.....

As the Sahara re-greens and glaciation progresses, Europe eventually ices over, but initially, both Sahara Greening and "warm Europe" (or most of Europe) would occur simultaneously, with both happening due to the build-up of very warm ocean water in the NE NATL (simultaneously heating Europe, while forcing Greenland/Quebec airmasses S, into N Africa). Of course, it ends with Europe freezing over as the warm bubble is resolved, leaving the Sahara the only area of "optimized" climate.

Hopefully this makes a bit more sense.

Perfect sense except for the awkward fact that both western North Africa and Iberia experienced record heat this summer.....

They may have experienced brief record heat but it has generally been much cooler than normal.

[miki]

They may have experienced brief record heat but it has generally been much cooler than normal.

It is obvious you're not of these parts.

[magnamentis]

I can explain Green Sahara!


The bulge of warm SSTAs that enters the NATL during periods of warming shunts Greenland airmasses into Quebec instead of allowing more general movement. This results in the reglaciation of Quebec, and a severely intensified NW NATL cold pool, inklings of both of which we have seen develop this year.

Subsequently the Greenland-Quebec modified airmasses drift across the NATL before encountering the warm pool NW of Europe,whereby they fall into Iberia and Northwest Africa, resulting in much more humid and substantially cooler conditions, both of which we have also seen evolve this year. This also yields increased heat transport northward across the Eastern Sahara, at least for the moment, resulting in increasingly scorching temperatures for much of Europe and Eastern Africa, until reglaciation accelerates in Quebec to the point where the NE NATL warm bubble is resolved and glaciation commences in Europe as well.

.....

As the Sahara re-greens and glaciation progresses, Europe eventually ices over, but initially, both Sahara Greening and "warm Europe" (or most of Europe) would occur simultaneously, with both happening due to the build-up of very warm ocean water in the NE NATL (simultaneously heating Europe, while forcing Greenland/Quebec airmasses S, into N Africa). Of course, it ends with Europe freezing over as the warm bubble is resolved, leaving the Sahara the only area of "optimized" climate.

Hopefully this makes a bit more sense.

Perfect sense except for the awkward fact that both western North Africa and Iberia experienced record heat this summer.....

but i'am and my dad is and my grandma was and measuring temps is a daily thing on each side of the house and i drive mostly by motorbike and visit the ocean each day so many times i have to listen to my gut feeling while this time i know and no-one can convince me of something i can feel and measure myself every day.

everyone of my neighbours and friends agree that we have second very pleasant summersi in a row, until now whithout one single day with 33-36C night temps which before we had almost each year

further we had a lot of rain in southern spain and the entire spring was cool, it's mostly even cooler here than in germany and other middle european countries.

don't fall for headlines and madrid is not spain and lisbon is not portugal etc.

each years some are calling me that they heard it's snowing in spain while the news mentioned asome snow that remained a few minutes or hours in madrid and then in the mountains it snows each year.

i write this because it's the second time someone makes that claim taken from mainstream media and i can tell you that i have 6 inside and 3 outside thermometers (in the shadow of course) even with highest and lowest temp feature stored for up to two years and it's very pleasantly cool below 40 a t all times with one single exception this year.

of course i can speak only for my area but i know that others have even cooler temps, up to 5C less in marbella that's about 60km from here.

as to temps they're often presented very misleading, by country, by max without mentioning wheter that max was reached for a few minutes or 8 hours etc. etc.

only thing i know we have sufficient water, not many wildfires and no superhot days or nights yet and to the east and to the west it's even more so.

the hottest spots here are cordoba and sevilla and even they reach 43 while 45 is very common each year, both is super hot of corse but not extraordinary hot for those places.

further i can tell you that we go 3 times per week for sports at the beach and all members of our group agree that is was extraordinarily cool, windy and humid this spring as well.

i read a lot of such things but rarely can proof something while in this case i've spent each day here which is an exception and checked the measurement tools each day several times to decide when to open and close which windows and whethter it's too hot (or cold in winter) to get up for sports.

i'm not a weather pro but they're more often off than not if conditions are not stable and then at least i had to learn weather to get and keep my pilots and watercraft license and once upon a time as a 4 days a week windsurfer it was key to learn something about the weather.

[bbr2314]

They may have experienced brief record heat but it has generally been much cooler than normal.

It is obvious you're not of these parts.

Do you not see the maps? I was in Barcelona last week and I am still in Europe. It is hot. But Iberia is not all of Europe and Morocco is not all of Africa.

Also, as the NATL anomalies are resolved due to lack of snowmelt / Greenland melt, the cold pool is dissipating and the entirety of Europe will scorch. Cold Iberia / Africa is dependent on a sustained NATL cool pool.

[bbr2314]

I can explain Green Sahara!


The bulge of warm SSTAs that enters the NATL during periods of warming shunts Greenland airmasses into Quebec instead of allowing more general movement. This results in the reglaciation of Quebec, and a severely intensified NW NATL cold pool, inklings of both of which we have seen develop this year.

Subsequently the Greenland-Quebec modified airmasses drift across the NATL before encountering the warm pool NW of Europe,whereby they fall into Iberia and Northwest Africa, resulting in much more humid and substantially cooler conditions, both of which we have also seen evolve this year. This also yields increased heat transport northward across the Eastern Sahara, at least for the moment, resulting in increasingly scorching temperatures for much of Europe and Eastern Africa, until reglaciation accelerates in Quebec to the point where the NE NATL warm bubble is resolved and glaciation commences in Europe as well.

.....

As the Sahara re-greens and glaciation progresses, Europe eventually ices over, but initially, both Sahara Greening and "warm Europe" (or most of Europe) would occur simultaneously, with both happening due to the build-up of very warm ocean water in the NE NATL (simultaneously heating Europe, while forcing Greenland/Quebec airmasses S, into N Africa). Of course, it ends with Europe freezing over as the warm bubble is resolved, leaving the Sahara the only area of "optimized" climate.

Hopefully this makes a bit more sense.

Perfect sense except for the awkward fact that both western North Africa and Iberia experienced record heat this summer.....

but i'am and my dad is and my grandma was and measuring temps is a daily thing on each side of the house and i drive mostly by motorbike and visit the ocean each day so many times i have to listen to my gut feeling while this time i know and no-one can convince me of something i can feel and measure myself every day.

everyone of my neighbours and friends agree that we have second very pleasant summersi in a row, until now whithout one single day with 33-36C night temps which before we had almost each year

further we had a lot of rain in southern spain and the entire spring was cool, it's mostly even cooler here than in germany and other middle european countries.

don't fall for headlines and madrid is not spain and lisbon is not portugal etc.

each years some are calling me that they heard it's snowing in spain while the news mentioned asome snow that remained a few minutes or hours in madrid and then in the mountains it snows each year.

i write this because it's the second time someone makes that claim taken from mainstream media and i can tell you that i have 6 inside and 3 outside thermometers (in the shadow of course) even with highest and lowest temp feature stored for up to two years and it's very pleasantly cool below 40 a t all times with one single exception this year.

of course i can speak only for my area but i know that others have even cooler temps, up to 5C less in marbella that's about 60km from here.

as to temps they're often presented very misleading, by country, by max without mentioning wheter that max was reached for a few minutes or 8 hours etc. etc.

only thing i know we have sufficient water, not many wildfires and no superhot days or nights yet and to the east and to the west it's even more so.

the hottest spots here are cordoba and sevilla and even they reach 43 while 45 is very common each year, both is super hot of corse but not extraordinary hot for those places.

further i can tell you that we go 3 times per week for sports at the beach and all members of our group agree that is was extraordinarily cool, windy and humid this spring as well.

i read a lot of such things but rarely can proof something while in this case i've spent each day here which is an exception and checked the measurement tools each day several times to decide when to open and close which windows and whethter it's too hot (or cold in winter) to get up for sports.

They ignore my maps of actual data, they will ignore your first-hand account of actualities as well, but ignorance is bliss so who can blame them?

[colchonero]

I can explain Green Sahara!


The bulge of warm SSTAs that enters the NATL during periods of warming shunts Greenland airmasses into Quebec instead of allowing more general movement. This results in the reglaciation of Quebec, and a severely intensified NW NATL cold pool, inklings of both of which we have seen develop this year.

Subsequently the Greenland-Quebec modified airmasses drift across the NATL before encountering the warm pool NW of Europe,whereby they fall into Iberia and Northwest Africa, resulting in much more humid and substantially cooler conditions, both of which we have also seen evolve this year. This also yields increased heat transport northward across the Eastern Sahara, at least for the moment, resulting in increasingly scorching temperatures for much of Europe and Eastern Africa, until reglaciation accelerates in Quebec to the point where the NE NATL warm bubble is resolved and glaciation commences in Europe as well.

.....

As the Sahara re-greens and glaciation progresses, Europe eventually ices over, but initially, both Sahara Greening and "warm Europe" (or most of Europe) would occur simultaneously, with both happening due to the build-up of very warm ocean water in the NE NATL (simultaneously heating Europe, while forcing Greenland/Quebec airmasses S, into N Africa). Of course, it ends with Europe freezing over as the warm bubble is resolved, leaving the Sahara the only area of "optimized" climate.

Hopefully this makes a bit more sense.

Perfect sense except for the awkward fact that both western North Africa and Iberia experienced record heat this summer.....

but i'am and my dad is and my grandma was and measuring temps is a daily thing on each side of the house and i drive mostly by motorbike and visit the ocean each day so many times i have to listen to my gut feeling while this time i know and no-one can convince me of something i can feel and measure myself every day.

everyone of my neighbours and friends agree that we have second very pleasant summersi in a row, until now whithout one single day with 33-36C night temps which before we had almost each year

further we had a lot of rain in southern spain and the entire spring was cool, it's mostly even cooler here than in germany and other middle european countries.

don't fall for headlines and madrid is not spain and lisbon is not portugal etc.

each years some are calling me that they heard it's snowing in spain while the news mentioned asome snow that remained a few minutes or hours in madrid and then in the mountains it snows each year.

i write this because it's the second time someone makes that claim taken from mainstream media and i can tell you that i have 6 inside and 3 outside thermometers (in the shadow of course) even with highest and lowest temp feature stored for up to two years and it's very pleasantly cool below 40 a t all times with one single exception this year.

of course i can speak only for my area but i know that others have even cooler temps, up to 5C less in marbella that's about 60km from here.

as to temps they're often presented very misleading, by country, by max without mentioning wheter that max was reached for a few minutes or 8 hours etc. etc.

only thing i know we have sufficient water, not many wildfires and no superhot days or nights yet and to the east and to the west it's even more so.

the hottest spots here are cordoba and sevilla and even they reach 43 while 45 is very common each year, both is super hot of corse but not extraordinary hot for those places.

further i can tell you that we go 3 times per week for sports at the beach and all members of our group agree that is was extraordinarily cool, windy and humid this spring as well.

i read a lot of such things but rarely can proof something while in this case i've spent each day here which is an exception and checked the measurement tools each day several times to decide when to open and close which windows and whethter it's too hot (or cold in winter) to get up for sports.

i'm not a weather pro but they're more often off than not if conditions are not stable and then at least i had to learn weather to get and keep my pilots and watercraft license and once upon a time as a 4 days a week windsurfer it was key to learn something about the weather.

I don't have time to analyze now, I agree with most of the things, as I myself am from Madrid (Spanish-American), not there in the last 15 days though, I am on vacation, so I haven't experienced this heatwave. The thing I want to say real quick (the only thing that I don't agree) is when you said that we've had two normal and pleasant Summers. I mean it's not even a disagreement, maybe just different locations as you have mentioned above, Madrid is not that close to Marbella.

So, last year we've had (in Madrid) 3 or 4 similar heatwaves to this current one, when temp reached 40C (which is really high when you consider that Madrid is at 700m above sea level) and Montoro measured a national record with 47,3C. So it was exceptional. This summer when you look at aemet es. (Spanish meteo center) you'll find that it was pretty normal. But the statistics don't show that personal gut feeling that you wrote about. There were so many cloudy days through June and part of July, and I can't recall such a rainy spring as this one. So everyone here thinks this was one of the coldest spring/beginning of the summer in the last XY years (because 20C is not the same on a sunny/rainy day). Last year we've had the total opposite, the summer was dominated by high pressure, I couldn't find a "single cloud" (paraphrasing) for days, there were heatwaves especially in the first part, and then the drought came and held until the Winter. Experts say it was the worst drought in the last 20+ years.  Manzanares river contrast between the 2 years(a small river in Madrid, I don't know if that should even qualify for being called a river  ) was so huge. Last year it was almost gone, and this spring I thought, I was looking at Guadalquivir   (a big river in southern Spain)

[GoSouthYoungins]

not sure the above could be more off topic

[Michael Hauber]

Ice free in winter is not going to happen in the next few centuries.

[Sam]

Predicting on extent or area is misleading. They are 2D measures and exclude the vital third dimension - thickness. The thickness is failing far faster than the areal measures.

Extent in particular is most misleading. It counts any area with 15% ice as all ice. As the ice cap breaks apart from thinning and losing integrity, it is shattering and spreading out. This is especially apparent over the last decade. This falsely makes the extent appear far larger than it really is.

Based on the thinning (volume), the Arctic will be ice free in September in about 2022-2023 plus or minus about two years. And yes, if we have an El Niño next year or the year after it could be that soon.

Based on those same trends, without any additional feedback from the blackwater event of a warming ice free ocean, naively projecting the ice volume declines forward, the Arctic will be ice free about 2053, plus or minus a couple of years. With even a small nudge of positive feedback that is 2050.

But let's not be naive shall we? The black water event (ice free periods, expanding each year) will have profound impacts on the energy storage in the ocean and the delay in succeeding years refreeze. That may pull forward the first ice free Arctic winter to circa 2035.

But then too, as the ocean over the Arctic plain warms, more methane clathrate will undoubtedly 'break' releasing yet more methane. Already we have massive streams of methane being released. When those are rapid enough. The decline in ocean density in the region above the clathrate will fall due to the increasing gas content in the water. At some point, that crosses a threshold. The decreased pressure on the sea floor then leads to a runaway methane release over some region of unknown size that then completely releases its clathrates as gas in a giant 'boil'.

We have seen this happen in the Gulf of Mexico from oil drilling, and from subsea slides. The areal extent of these is limited there. They may not be so limited on the Arctic plain. Gigatons of methane may release all at once over a very short period.

In the gulf, these 'boiling' events are quite likely the cause of ships sinking, planes lost, ... colloquially called the Bermuda Triangle.

Whatever the case, even without added methane releases, the black water event will pull forward the first ice free Arctic winter date by perhaps 5-10 years (my guess, and only a guess). That would mean circa 2043-2048. It takes very little added positive feedback to pull that forward further to 2035.

And with the added winter heat, tundra fires in Siberia, rotting of the tundra, collapse of tundra, methane belching from the Yamal peninsula, or a dozen others each of which easily cause that, 2035 is not unreasonable.

What is very certain is that it will occur far before 2,100 and under no possible circumstance in centuries.

We are very close.... very close indeed.

It is very likely that all of us on ASIF will live to see the first ice free Arctic September. And it is even likely that most of us on ASIF will live long enough to see a fully ice free Arctic - barring of course that we do not get killed by the various wars, plagues, famines, droughts, deluges, fires, civil strife, and other calamities that come with such enormous changes in the operation of our biosphere.

[binntho]

I can explain Green Sahara!

The bulge of warm SSTAs that enters the NATL during periods of warming shunts Greenland airmasses into Quebec instead of allowing more general movement.

A major claim  - any evidence?

This results in the reglaciation of Quebec, and a severely intensified NW NATL cold pool, inklings of both of which we have seen develop this year.

If the cold air above Greenland were to be "shunted" eastwards it would warm up considerably, and besides it would be bone-dry. So I don't really see any glaciation being caused by this. The cold pool south of Greenland is indeed colder, but there are no "inklings" of reglaciation of Quebec!

Subsequently the Greenland-Quebec modified airmasses drift across the NATL before encountering the warm pool NW of Europe,whereby they fall into Iberia and Northwest Africa, resulting in much more humid and substantially cooler conditions, both of which we have also seen evolve this year.

Well, there have been unusually warm conditions in Iberia and NW Africa this year, with Algiers reaching an all-time temperature maximum for Africa, and Iberia being literally baked these last weeks. So I'm not seeing any "substantially cooler conditions" evolving this year. It did rain a bit in July, but the draught indicator for August shows rainfall well under par.

This also yields increased heat transport northward across the Eastern Sahara, at least for the moment, resulting in increasingly scorching temperatures for much of Europe and Eastern Africa, until reglaciation accelerates in Quebec to the point where the NE NATL warm bubble is resolved and glaciation commences in Europe as well.

Well, having read this far, I suddenly realize that you are only joking! Or maybe not ...

I suspect increased seasonal snowfall across the Atlas Mountains due to ^^^ is also to blame on a local level, as this allows additional airmass modification / humidity / cooling across adjacent and downstream regions of the Sahara.

So all this has already started? But all your previous indicators do not really hold up, and even though the Atlas mountains did get unusual amounts of snow this last winter there is no reason to think that your line of reasoning is valid.

[Wherestheice]

yeah I agree Sam, looking at Extent alone is kinda like saying looking at the ground and saying the earth is flat. There's a lot more to it than just extent. Extent is a good factor though for yearly observations.

https://14adebb0-a-62cb3a1a-s-sites.googlegroups.com/site/arctischepinguin/home/piomas/grf/piomas-trnd2.png?attachauth=ANoY7coDmauRMMTrzNKUcDjZuMylbUy7ygjESNJyflpVbNdLCf1g_BFKhkT5A5uiRKxordyi460gD-Y3z42NAwjCpTLfaggyejemZuD4sxTt3eS5rRd5dgzERekBU3VPQabV0H8kcPgZQICPYuiRW075ZFQ0NIm-yf-1I9BgFJtiFkTTtDFOMRN0e2Xzz5Ii-0bPhPSq9TSodxlmUKn7EhwQsowDWKSPqAsLXmd7mYPOmOAmjM5mzqy5NvfN78WF58cN4O7bEtDc&attredirects=1

[binntho]

BBR, saw your maps of temperatures in Iberia and NW Africa for June and July. Well, the temperatures there vary quite a lot from month to month as can be seen here.

Haven't you heard about the difference between climate and weather?

[GoSouthYoungins]

Ice free in winter is not going to happen in the next few centuries.

Ice free in winter already began happening in 1900.

My statement is probably going to end up being closer to reality than Michael's.

[Stephan]

Ice free in winter is not going to happen in the next few centuries.

If you extrapolate the data from 1979-2018 (which is, of course, quite speculative) to a zero extent and volume you will see the extent going to zero much later than the volume, independent whether you do a linear or a log evaluation. The latter almost always delivers you earlier dates which shows that the decay of ASI is not really linear. In this evaluation there is only one value after 2100 (April volume, linearly extrapolated)!
See attached table.

[GoSouthYoungins]

Maybe there will be negative volume, yet still quite a bit of extent. I hadn't considered it previously, but I'm warming to the idea.

[sark]

...
But then too, as the ocean over the Arctic plain warms, more methane clathrate will undoubtedly 'break' releasing yet more methane. Already we have massive streams of methane being released. When those are rapid enough. The decline in ocean density in the region above the clathrate will fall due to the increasing gas content in the water. At some point, that crosses a threshold. The decreased pressure on the sea floor then leads to a runaway methane release over some region of unknown size that then completely releases its clathrates as gas in a giant 'boil'.
...

Are you able to add a little support a risk of methane clathrate destablization in the near term?  I'll note that in your comment you note that even without destabilization of clathrates, the topic of ice free arctic during winter is still a looming impact this century.  I agree.

However, I think the ice free arctic will emerge from a breakdown in the atmospheric circulation setup of a 3 cell system, setting up a more and more equable climate distribution, long before heat in the deep ocean will destabilize methane clathrates.

Because of that depth and burial of methane clathrates, and because since the clathrate gun hypothesis a number of investigators have talked down the risk (Richard Alley comes to mind), it seems to diminish some of the risk of methane releases from clathrates in this century.  There's a hell of a lot of heating required to melt permafrost, and there's a hell of a lot of time required to deliver heat to the deep ocean.

Any research or background you can point me toward on these subjects would be very constructive.

[Dharma Rupa]

However, I think the ice free arctic will emerge from a breakdown in the atmospheric circulation setup of a 3 cell system, setting up a more and more equable climate distribution, long before heat in the deep ocean will destabilize methane clathrates.

The cause-effect relationship between the collapse of the polar cell and the encroachment of the Atlantic on the Arctic is complex and hard to figure out, but I'm inclined to think that they cause each other.

[gerontocrat]

Are you able to add a little support a risk of methane clathrate destablization in the near term?  I'll note that in your comment you note that even without destabilization of clathrates, the topic of ice free arctic during winter is still a looming impact this century.  I agree.

Because of that depth and burial of methane clathrates, and because since the clathrate gun hypothesis a number of investigators have talked down the risk (Richard Alley comes to mind), it seems to diminish some of the risk of methane releases from clathrates in this century.  There's a hell of a lot of heating required to melt permafrost, and there's a hell of a lot of time required to deliver heat to the deep ocean.

Any research or background you can point me toward on these subjects would be very constructive.

Suggest you go to the methane thread in the permafrost topic. Lots of links to papers.

 the deep ocean  The Eastern Siberian Arctic Shelf is huge and large parts at an average depth of less than 10 metres, with vast methane deposits in the clathrates and under that frozen lid vast amounts of highly organic soil and free methane under pressure.

Use the search facility in this forum "The Eastern Siberian Arctic Shelf " or simply search for "ESAS".

(And loads and loads more CO2 / methane trapped in the tundra. )

Bathymetry map attached (click to see full size)

[Michael Hauber]

Ice free in winter is not going to happen in the next few centuries.

Ice free in winter already began happening in 1900.

My statement is probably going to end up being closer to reality than Michael's.

Based on what evidence?  Even the models that overestimate current ice loss do not get below 10m sq km of ice in winter by the end of this century.  I'd trust models over extrapolating a trend.  And extrapolating extent over extrapolating volume.  It is not how thick the ice is that determines ice free winter - it is the extent of ocean that is cold enough in the coldest part of winter to support the formation of ice.  Even extrapolating volume gives us another century until ice free winter.

[sark]

Ice free in winter is not going to happen in the next few centuries.

Ice free in winter already began happening in 1900.

My statement is probably going to end up being closer to reality than Michael's.

Based on what evidence?  Even the models that overestimate current ice loss do not get below 10m sq km of ice in winter by the end of this century.  I'd trust models over extrapolating a trend.  And extrapolating extent over extrapolating volume.  It is not how thick the ice is that determines ice free winter - it is the extent of ocean that is cold enough in the coldest part of winter to support the formation of ice.  Even extrapolating volume gives us another century until ice free winter.

How does the model maintain the cold halocline layer despite the lack of sea ice cover?

You're talking about a model of arctic sea ice decline, not a model of a blue ocean event.  We have no clue what that looks like, but the hypotheses floating around suggest papers in the next couple of years that begin to test the subject.  Models of arctic sea ice disappearance may be able to be sourced in such discussions right about the time it's happening right in front of our eyes.

[GoSouthYoungins]

Ice free in winter is not going to happen in the next few centuries.

Ice free in winter already began happening in 1900.

My statement is probably going to end up being closer to reality than Michael's.

Based on what evidence?  Even the models that overestimate current ice loss do not get below 10m sq km of ice in winter by the end of this century.  I'd trust models over extrapolating a trend.  And extrapolating extent over extrapolating volume.  It is not how thick the ice is that determines ice free winter - it is the extent of ocean that is cold enough in the coldest part of winter to support the formation of ice.  Even extrapolating volume gives us another century until ice free winter.

Even volume? Even volume? You are aware the world does occur in 3D, right? How could you prefer extent more than volume? There is a place for it, but the top indicator has to be volume...cuz it is, like,  the actual amount. Takes a certain amount of energy to melt a certain volume of ice. You simply can't say that about extent. Extent could be historically normal and we could be a week away from no ice (cuz it could all be an few inches thick). If volume was historically normal, there isn't a problem.

Linearly extrapolating "winter" (April) maximum volume would have the trend line hitting zero in about 2100. September trend would hit zero about 2035. It's not a huge mental leap to figure that once there is no ice to melt, that warming would go into the ocean and start subtracting from the winter maximum. So that would bring winter BOE to about 2070.

But all of that is if there is no lag in the climate system. Which is madness. And it also assumes that the GHGs wont continue to increase. Which is madness.

Speaking of madness...saying "well this is what is going to happen cuz a  few models say so..." is effectively like pontificating about what would happen in a zombie outbreak cuz thats what happened in Fortnite or Call of Duty waves. How good do you believe the models are? Can any models tell me what the weather will be like in a month?

[Michael Hauber]

How does the model maintain the cold halocline layer despite the lack of sea ice cover?

You're talking about a model of arctic sea ice decline, not a model of a blue ocean event.  We have no clue what that looks like, but the hypotheses floating around suggest papers in the next couple of years that begin to test the subject.  Models of arctic sea ice disappearance may be able to be sourced in such discussions right about the time it's happening right in front of our eyes.

I'm sure the model programmed by Arctic experts does a better job of predicting the influence of the cold halocline on sea ice than the guesses of members of this forum.

[Michael Hauber]

Even volume? Even volume? You are aware the world does occur in 3D, right? How could you prefer extent more than volume?

I think I explained it just fine in my last post.  Is there some part of it you didn't understand.

There is a place for it, but the top indicator has to be volume...cuz it is, like,  the actual amount. Takes a certain amount of energy to melt a certain volume of ice.

Winter maximum isn't about melting ice, it is about conditions being cold enough for sea water to freeeze.

Speaking of madness...saying "well this is what is going to happen cuz a  few models say so..." is effectively like pontificating about what would happen in a zombie outbreak cuz thats what happened in Fortnite or Call of Duty waves. How good do you believe the models are? Can any models tell me what the weather will be like in a month?

Climate deniers don't like what the models say so run exactly the same argument.  Seems you don't like what the models are saying and so are running exactly the same argument.  This is a science based forum and not Watts Up with That.  The models are certainly imperfect, but whats a better method for predicting the future? 

[gerontocrat]

The models are certainly imperfect, but whats a better method for predicting the future?

All models have parameters buried inside them. I should know, I've made a few fairly complex ones in my time.

I used to display the important parameters (and the assumed values) - the "drivers" - in the front of the model together with the changes in results caused by changing the parameters. This helped me to find out the sensitivity of the output from changes in the parameters, and so my audience could see what parameters mattered.

Scientists tend to bury all this inside a mass of code. So when I look at what the IPCC and conventional wisdom is saying, I try to figure out what parameters and assumptions they are using to drive their models.

An example is PIOMAS trends from The Polar Science Center. They use a linear regression to find the average yearly volume loss (280 km3).  The decadal averages say volume loss is on an accelerating trend.

Should I, as a professional analyst, base my opinion as to the future  on the linear trend?

Another example is methane emissions. On the methane thread a few months ago there was a long discussion on whether a massive increase in methane emissions is possible or even likely from places such as the EAAS and the tundra. This included access to papers by climate scientists suggesting that this is happening to some extent now (and from elsewhere such as gas wells and pipelines).

But the NOAA data for their Greenhouse Gas Index has methane and other non CO2 gases emissions as almost flat over many years, and the CO2e monitoring stations they have are few and far between.

I could go on and on - the change in boreal and Tropical forests from carbon sinks to carbon emitters.

This is not being picked up sufficiently by the established system of the IPCC, which due to its stately progress is always behind the curve.

It seems to me that, as you say, this is a science based forum, healthy scepticism (as in the proper meaning of the word) is a necessary part of these discussions. Mind you, hyperbole based on an absence of fact and reason, should also be discarded.

So I repeat. Should I, as a professional analyst, base my opinion as to the future on the models or should I take them as the base and do some pluses and minuses from the data flooding in from all sides ?

[Dharma Rupa]

Climate deniers don't like what the models say so run exactly the same argument.  Seems you don't like what the models are saying and so are running exactly the same argument.  This is a science based forum and not Watts Up with That.  The models are certainly imperfect, but whats a better method for predicting the future?

Paleontology.

[P-maker]

Gerontocrat
I really like your message. It is spot om.

Palaeontology is not the answer.

[Sam]

Paleocivisicide would be more useful (though wholly inadequate) - the study of how and why ancient civilizations died. 

[RoxTheGeologist]

Michael does make a good point.

The halocline is formed during the melt/freeze cycle, and by freshwater input from the Arctic Rivers.

We can do a very simply thought experiment. Lets assume that we have a simply thermodynamic model. That the heat is building up in the earth constantly. That energy is distributed evenly, and that the additional heat energy to melt the ice reflected in PIOMASS volume reductions continues to build up in the Arctic and prevents ice formation. Lets assume that trend is linear.

PIOMASS winter volume is around 20000 cubic Km. It's reducing at 3100 cubic Km per decade. That gives us about 70 years before the Arctic is ice free in winter.

[jdallen]

Gerontocrat
I really like your message. It is spot om.

Palaeontology is not the answer.

Paleontology and the models reinforce one another. Both together in context are more skillful than either alone.