Tuesday, September 10, 2013

"It really is a wolf," said Peter.


Arctic summers ice-free 'by 2013'
Scientists in the US have presented one of the most dramatic forecasts yet for the disappearance of Arctic sea ice. Their latest modelling studies indicate northern polar waters could be ice-free in summers within just 5-6 years.


And now it's global COOLING! Record return of Arctic ice cap as it grows by 60% in a year
·         Almost a million more square miles of ocean covered with ice than in 2012
·         BBC reported in 2007 global warming would leave Arctic ice-free in summer by 2013
·         Publication of UN climate change report suggesting global warming caused by humans pushed back to later this month

Of course, lest we forget, our planet has two poles and Antarctic ice is increasing. But, putting things in real perspective:


You have to chuckle ... or maybe scream a bit.

Update:
Something everyone really needs to realise when reading 'science' reports and studying graphs. How much of a tilt there is on any line on the graph - how severe it looks - is utterly dependent on the numbers used and their spacing up the sides or along the bottom or top.

12 comments:

Northern Fop said...

Here's something else to cheer you up. Germany's rush to renewables, and their hasty closure of nice clean nuclear plants is costing the consumer dear. Ironically, it also means they are forced to keep several filthy, ancient and inefficient coal-burning plants running.

You'd need a heart of stone, etc, etc.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/high-costs-and-errors-of-german-transition-to-renewable-energy-a-920288.html

[article is in English]

Unknown said...

When ever you read a science article in a newspaper, you really ought to check their sources. Reporters aren't scientists, and frequently get things wrong.

How wrong? Well, in this case, let's look at the
US's National Snow and Ice Data Center, nsidc.org, which tracks data on -- surprise! snow and ice around the planet. Sure enough, they report ice levels well above last year's. Of course, last year was a record low. And the trend since 1979 is steadily decreasing, even though year-on-year variability is quite high.

How high? Well, the high mark was about 8.5M km^2, in 1983. It got back quite close to that in 1996. But this year's high mark was lower than the record lows in every year prior to 2005.

So. Check the source data, because the news sources are generally incompetent when they aren't actually lying.

Neal Asher said...

Ah Jason, you miss the point that articles like the BBC one are taken seriously on the CAGW side, while ones like the Daily Mail one are dismissed as 'generally incompetent or lying'. The truth of the matter lies somewhere between 'we're all going to fry' and 'the ice-age is coming'. And really, this hasn't been about science for decades.

Neal Asher said...

Heh:

"The main story is this: for well over two decades now, a dishonest, highly politicised scientific establishment, in bed with scaremongering green NGOs, shyster politicians, rent-seeking corporations and ignorant, irresponsible media outfits has been warning the world of a terrible environmental threat variously called "global warming" or "climate change" which only exists in the form of computer projections. As time has progressed, so the doomy prognostications of these computer models (GCMs) have begun looking less and less plausible, leaving that dwindling body of experts who still believe in their accuracy looking more and more foolish."

http://tinyurl.com/oqly655

David Britten said...

Neal, denying climate change is like denying the evolution. It doesn't matter what you want to believe the facts say otherwise. Taking one single season of data over the longer term trend is just stupid.

Neal Asher said...

David, no one is denying climate change. In fact those called deniers generally agree that the planet has warmed. The disagreement is on cause, effects and what to do about it, if anything. And, when you're talking about the climate of the planet, how long is a trend? 15 years? Apparently that was enough before but now because it's flat lined it is apparently just a blip, and the goalposts have been shifted again.

Neal Asher said...

NOAA:

“Near-zero and even negative trends are common for intervals of a decade or less in the simulations, due to the model’s internal climate variability. The simulations rule out (at the 95% level) zero trends for intervals of 15 yr or more, suggesting that an observed absence of warming of this duration is needed to create a discrepancy with the expected present-day warming rate.”

Neal Asher said...

More here: http://tinyurl.com/99osz7m

David Britten said...

Neal, you realise there is a difference between modelling climate and the actual records. The models to predict the climate aren't right. We know that but it doesn't mean it isn't happening and we aren't the cause. It just means we haven't got the model perfect.
Putting that aside, all of the measures that climate scientist recommend are good planetaty husbandry measures anyway. Even if the planet doesn't warm. Cutting back on polutants, developing renewable, working on fusion, population control and reforestation schemes are things that will improve and diversify life on this planet. So we should all get behind it even if the planet isn't warming.

Neal Asher said...

Rubbish, CO2 is not a pollutant and cutting down rain forests to grow palm oil is not reforestation. And the models, which are WRONG are the only justification for the vast amounts of time and wealth that have been pissed away.

David Britten said...

Strawman arguments Neal? Shameful. I never said CO2 was a pollutant but it is a greenhouse gas. I never said reforest to produce palm oil either.

CO2 is a greenhouse gas that will trap more energy into the biosphere. What happens when you add more energy into a weather system? Unpredictable weather. Weather that destroys infrastructure, crops, homes and industry. CO2 isn't going to poison us, it's going to provide the energy source for the planet's weather to pound our civilization to collapse.

The catastrophic release of pollution is another entirely different and dangerous nightmare scenario we have to face at the same time.

Neal Asher said...

No David, in your last paragraph you were conflating the two, so it is not a straw man argument. You are not the only person to do this. Yes, CO2 is a weak greenhouse gas - one that would be no problem at all without water vapour as a positive feedback. This positive feedback only exists in models that have been consistently wrong for nigh on a quarter of a century.

Please also do some proper research on this extreme weather meme - the one gradually displacing 'climate change' and which in its turn displaced 'global warming'. Our weather has not become more extreme. It is only the reporting of it that has. Even the IPCC is aware of that.

Also check out 'the greening of the Earth' and 'CO2 famine' or, alternatively, keep going with the confirmation bias and 'believing' what you want to believe.