In my post “The Arctic-Antarctic seesaw” I explained how natural forces work to produce these phenomena.  In my post “Challenge to the Arizona Daily Star – get the facts” I accused the Arizona Daily Star of content bias because they prominently reported the Arctic minimum, but until now, did not report the Antarctic maximum.

Now, 21 days after the Antarctic maximum, the Arizona Daily Star has reprinted an AP article which attempts to spin observations to fit AGW global warming theory: “Experts: Global warming means more Antarctic ice.”   The article author is Seth Borenstein, long known for bad reporting on climate change.     With global warming media bias, it’s “heads I win; tails you lose.”

The AP/Star story says, “It sounds counterintuitive, but the Antarctic is part of the warming as well.”  Really? Was this a surprise to some climate scientists and their models? Let’s see what the climate models said according to a study in the Journal of Climate:

“We examine the annual cycle and trends in Antarctic sea ice extent (SIE) for 18 Coupled Model Intercomparison Project 5 models that were run with historical forcing for the 1850s to 2005. Many of the models have an annual SIE cycle that differs markedly from that observed over the last 30 years. The majority of models have too small a SIE at the minimum in February, while several of the models have less than two thirds of the observed SIE at the September maximum.”

A study from Ohio State University titled “Antarctic temperatures disagree with climate model predictions” says “temperatures during the late 20th century did not climb as had been predicted by many global climate models.”  Also, there has been “no increase in precipitation over Antarctica in the last 50 years. Most models predict that both precipitation and temperature will increase over Antarctica with a warming of the planet.”

In other words, the climate models predicted less sea ice in the Antarctic as well as in the Arctic.

The AP/Star story says: “Shifts in wind patterns and the giant ozone hole over the Antarctic this time of year – both related to human activity – are probably behind the increase in ice, experts say.”

The shifting winds affect mainly the West Antarctic peninsula and these winds have the effect of breaking up the ice, not increasing it.

From the Ohio State study:

“The westerlies have intensified over the last four decades or so, increasing in strength by as much as perhaps 10 to 20 percent.  There is a huge amount of ocean north of Antarctica and we’re only now understanding just how important the winds are for things like mixing in the Southern Ocean. The ocean mixing both dissipates heat and absorbs carbon dioxide….The peninsula is the most northern point of Antarctica and it sticks out into the westerlies. If there is an increase in the westerly winds, it will have a warming impact on that part of the continent, thus helping to break up the ice shelves…Farther south, the impact would be modest, or even non-existent.”

That Antarctic sea ice increase is due to global warming is without proof, only desperate speculation.

Even the Arctic sea ice minimum has little to do with global warming.  As I reported in “Arctic sea ice reached record low extent in 2012 – or maybe not” the National Snow & Ice Data Center said Arctic sea ice extent dropped rapidly between August 4 and August 8 during what they called “The Great Arctic Cyclone of 2012.”  That storm caused “mechanical break up of the ice and increased melting by strong winds and wave action during the storm.” So wind tends to melt and dissipate ice, not increase it.

In this era of alleged human-caused global warming, both continental and sea ice are increasing in Antarctica. “Satellite radar altimetry measurements indicate that the East Antarctic ice sheet interior north of 81.6-S increased in mass by 45±7 billion metric tons per year from 1992 to 2003.” (Source) And a new paper says in part: “Antarctic Peninsula ice core records indicate significant accumulation increase since 1855…” (Source). According to NASA’s Earth Observatory, total Antarctic sea ice has increased by about 1% per decade since the start of the satellite record..

It seems that the AP/Star story is mainly science fiction, agenda-driven spin,  and once again the Arizona Daily Star is doing disservice to its readers by not getting the facts.

And there is this other inconvenient fact: there has been no net global warming since 1997 in the lower atmosphere according to UAH satellite data nor any net warming of surface temperatures on land or sea according to the British Met Office.

“Scientists have made a biological discovery in Arctic Ocean waters as dramatic and unexpected as finding a rainforest in the middle of a desert. A NASA-sponsored expedition punched through three-foot thick sea ice to find waters richer in microscopic marine plants, essential to all sea life, than any other ocean region on Earth. The finding reveals a new consequence of the Arctic’s warming climate and provides an important clue to understanding the impacts of a changing climate and environment on the Arctic Ocean and its ecology.”

“If someone had asked me before the expedition whether we would see under-ice blooms, I would have told them it was impossible,” said Kevin Arrigo of Stanford University in Stanford, Calif., leader of the ICESCAPE mission and lead author of the new study. “This discovery was a complete surprise.” (See full article here)

Perhaps these NASA scientists should research the scientific literature more carefully. If they did, they might have discovered that Arctic algal blooms are not “unprecedented” or even unusual.

For instance, we have this paper from 1996 reporting on research in 1993:

“Occurrence of an algal bloom under Arctic pack ice” by R. Gradinger, Marine Ecology Progress Series, Vol. 131.

Abstract:

“Summer melting of sea ice leads to the formation of under-ice melt ponds in Arctic seas. The biological characteristics of such a pond were studied in summer 1993. The chlorophyte Pyramimonas sp. (Prasinophyceae) formed a unialgal bloom with cell densities of 19.1 thousand cell per ml and a pigment concentration of 29.6 mg per cubic meter. A comparison with ice core data revealed differences in algal biomass and community structure. Physical data indicate that under-ice ponds are a common feature in the Arctic Ocean. Thus, communities within under-ice ponds, which have not been included in production estimates, may significantly contribute to the Arctic marine food web.”

I wonder if the Arizona Daily Star will, in a few days, report NASA’s “unprecedented” discovery just as the Star uncritically reported the last NASA “unprecedented” claim: Greenland “melting” and media hype.

H/t WUWT

See also:
The Arctic-Antarctic seesaw
Arctic ice reached record low extent in 2012 – or maybe not

As for the headline “Arctic ice shrinks to all time low….”, it’s an all time low if you start counting in 1979, the modern satellite era. But, as I’ve shown in another post, Ice Follies and Hiding the Decline, a 1990 report from the IPCC records earlier  data which show that in 1974 Arctic sea ice melt was as great or greater than it is this year.

As for the headline “Global warming cited as cause” we see that when the Arctic reaches a minimum sea ice extent, the Antarctic reaches a maximum extent. There is a seesaw effect. That is shown most dramatically this year and in 2007 when the Arctic reached the previous “record” low, and the Antarctic sea ice reached a “record” maximum high extent.

Doug Hoffman discusses this seesaw effect at Resilient Earth. This oscillation seems to be related to natural, solar driven variations.

The basic difference between the Arctic and Antarctic is that the Arctic is mainly ocean surrounded by land, and the Antarctic is land surrounded by ocean. The Arctic is therefore more subject to solar-driven oscillations such as the Arctic Oscillation and Pacific Decadal Oscillation which are responsible for changes in ocean currents that can drive ice south toward warmer water or create warmer currents in the Arctic ocean. That, coupled with storms, have a significant effect on Arctic sea ice. As I reported in the post referenced below: the National Snow & Ice Data Center said of this year’s Arctic melt: “Sea ice extent dropped rapidly between August 4 and August 8. While this drop coincided with an intense storm over the central Arctic Ocean, it is unclear if the storm prompted the rapid ice loss.” NSIDC called the storm “The Great Arctic Cyclone of 2012″ and noted the storm caused “mechanical break up of the ice and increased melting by strong winds and wave action during the storm.” Nothing to do with global warming.

Meanwhile, both continental and sea ice are increasing in Antarctica. “Satellite radar altimetry measurements indicate that the East Antarctic ice sheet interior north of 81.6-S increased in mass by 45±7 billion metric tons per year from 1992 to 2003.” (Source) And a new paper says in part: “Antarctic Peninsula ice core records indicate significant accumulation increase since 1855…” (Source). According to NASA’s Earth Observatory, total Antarctic sea ice has increased by about 1% per decade since the start of the satellite record..

It seems that Arctic and Antarctic sea ice extent can be explained by natural cycles.  Those invoking “global warming” must explain why warming causes Antarctic ice to increase and Arctic ice to decrease.

As for the low sea ice in the Arctic this year, it has happened before:

And before:
Reports from fishermen, seal hunters and explorers, …, all point to a radical change in climatic conditions and hitherto unheard-of temperatures in the Arctic zone. Exploration expeditions report that scarcely any ice has been met with as far north as 81 degrees 29 minutes. Soundings to a depth of 3,100 meters showed the gulf stream still very warm. -Washington Post, November 2, 1922.

And before:
“A considerable change of climate inexplicable at present to us must have taken place in the Circumpolar Regions, by which the severity of the cold that has for centuries past enclosed the seas in the high northern latitudes in an impenetrable barrier of ice has been, during the last two years, greatly abated.”

“2000 square leagues of ice with which the Greenland Seas between the latitudes of 74̊ and 80̊N have been hitherto covered, has in the last two years entirely disappeared.” -Royal Society, London. Nov. 20, 1817. Minutes of Council, Vol. 8. pp.149-153.

Perhaps Mark Twain was right when he said: “If you don’t read the newspaper you are uninformed, if you do read the newspaper you are misinformed.”

UPDATE: NASA now admits that the storm caused most of the melt: “This year, a powerful cyclone formed off the coast of Alaska and moved on Aug. 5 to the center of the Arctic Ocean, where it churned the weakened ice cover for several days. The storm cut off a large section of sea ice north of the Chukchi Sea and pushed it south to warmer waters that made it melt entirely. It also broke vast extensions of ice into smaller pieces more likely to melt.” See statement and video animation here.

See also:
Arctic ice reached record low extent in 2012 – or maybe not

Paul Homewood’s article on Arctic vs Antarctic temperatures

If that is true, then the world has 0.006% less ice this year than in 2007. (Source).

The NSIDC would have us believe that the satellite era began in 1979, but it actually began in 1967. Below is a graph from Steve Goddard with data from IPCC 1990 report showing that sea ice was much lower prior to 1979 which happened to be the year of largest sea ice extent since 1967. We should also note that extent of Arctic sea ice is cyclic. Setting records depends on where you start counting.

In an earlier announcement, NSIDC said “Sea ice extent dropped rapidly between August 4 and August 8. While this drop coincided with an intense storm over the central Arctic Ocean, it is unclear if the storm prompted the rapid ice loss.” NSIDC called the storm “The Great Arctic Cyclone of 2012″ and noted the storm caused “mechanical break up of the ice and increased melting by strong winds and wave action during the storm.” Nothing to do with global warming. A similar event happened in 2007 to cause the lower sea ice extent reported then.

Curiously, the NSIDC announcement failed to mention their earlier post and earlier satellites when touting the new “low record.” And it may in fact not be a new record even starting at 1979.

Anthony Watts at WUWT reports that “another NSIDC product, the new and improved “multi-sensor” MASIE product, shows no record low” with sea ice extent at ~ 4.7 million square kilometers which is more than in 2007. “Another product, NOAA’s National Ice Center Interactive Multisensor Snow and Ice Mapping System (IMS) plot, also shows no reason for claiming a record at all. Their number is (for 8/22) ~ 5.1 million square kilometers.” And on NOAA’s National Ice Center, “The numbers they give for 80% and marginal ice add up to an extent of 6,149, 305 square kilometers,” far above the hyped low announced. (The National Ice Center (NIC) is a multi-agency operational center operated by the United States Navy, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and the United States Coast Guard.)

To put things in perspective, we have this AP story from the Washington Post:

The Arctic ocean is warming up, icebergs are growing scarcer and in some places the seals are finding the water too hot, according to a report to the Commerce Department yesterday from Consul Ifft, at Bergen, Norway.

Reports from fishermen, seal hunters and explorers, he declared, all point to a radical change in climate conditions and hitherto unheard-of temperatures in the Arctic zone. Exploration expeditions report that scarcely any ice has been met with as far north as 81 degrees 29 minutes. Soundings to a depth of 3,100 meters showed the gulf stream still very warm.

Great masses of ice have been replaced by moraines of earth and stones, the report continued, while at many points well known glaciers have entirely disappeared. Very few seals and no white fish are found in the eastern Arctic, while vast shoals of herring and smelts, which have never before ventured so far north, are being encountered in the old seal fishing grounds.

That story was written in November 2, 1922 (see the more detailed original here).

For some additional perspective, a paper published last year found that 8,000 years ago Arctic sea ice extent was just half of the “record” low of 2007.

To recap, the “record” lows of 2007 and perhaps 2012 were aided by ice transport out of the Arctic by storms. It has nothing to do with alleged anthropogenic global warming.

Another thing rarely mentioned: when the Arctic ice reached a low in 2007, Antarctic sea ice reached the greatest extent ever measured. In 2012, Antarctic sea ice remains above the 1979-2008 mean value.

See also:

Ice Follies and Hiding the Decline

Greenland “melting” and media hype

Polar Bears

The Inuit population of Canada’s Nunavut Territory say that “Scientists do a quick study one to two weeks in a helicopter, and don’t see all the polar bears. We’re getting totally different stories about the bear numbers on a daily basis from hunters and harvesters on the ground.” The Inuit say that polar bear populations within their territory is stable and on the rise. During the last ten years, the growing population has become a real problem according to the Inuits, “families enjoying outdoor activities must be on the look-out for bears. Many locals invite along other hunters for protection.” (Source).

Doomsayers assume that polar bears cannot adapt to changing conditions, but the bears have been around for a long time, perhaps as much as 600,000 years. That means they have survived several periods warmer than now. For instance, fossils evidence shows that polar bears survived the Eemian period 125,000 years ago when it was warm enough that hippos lived where London is now. (Alaska Science Forum). Within the last 11,000 years, polar bears survived the twin peaks of the Holocene Climatic Optimum which peaked at about 10,000 years ago near Alaska and between 8,500 to 5,000 years ago near Greenland. Proxy evidence shows that global temperatures were about 2.5 C warmer than now in most places and up to 7 C warmer in northern Russia.

Polar bear declines in the recent past was due in large part to over hunting which has now been controlled. The history of polar bears shows that they are highly adaptable to changing natural conditions, even conditions of very low sea ice. By the way, current Arctic sea ice extend is higher than it has been in the last five years and slightly higher than the 1979-2006 average for this time of years, see red line in graph below.

Penguins

“A new study using satellite mapping technology reveals there are twice as many emperor penguins in Antarctica than previously thought.” (ScienceDaily). “An international team of scientists describe how they used Very High Resolution satellite images to estimate the number of penguins at each colony around the coastline of Antarctica.” The survey counted 595,000 birds.

In the Falkland Islands, Gentoo penguin numbers are also increasing. “The Gentoo population now estimated to be 132,321 breeding pairs, the largest number reported since the first estimate was generated in 1933.” Also in the Falklands, Rockhopper penguins have fared less well but are recovering. The Rockhopper population which was estimated at 1.5 million in the 1930s, had been decimated in 1986 due to starvation and by an algal bloom in 2002. Now, “Rockhopper penguins, which the Falklands is estimated to be home to some 36% of the global population … now estimated to be 319,163 (18,503 breeding pairs) seemed to have recovered to the 2000 estimate…”

See also:

Sea ice gone; walruses come ashore, not unusual

IPCC predictions

The story states: “The U.N.’s network of climate scientists – the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change – has long predicted that rising global temperatures would produce more frequent and intense heat waves, and more intense rainfalls.” But the U.N. IPCC has never made any predictions. They just propose scenarios or projections. The IPCC itself says “The climate system is a coupled non-linear chaotic system, and therefore the long-term prediction of future climate states is not possible.” (If you check this reference see third bulleted point from the bottom.)

IPCC senior scientist Kevin Trenberth noted in Nature magazine: “In fact there are no predictions by IPCC at all. And there never have been. The IPCC instead proffers ‘what if’ projections of future climate that correspond to certain emissions scenarios. There are a number of assumptions that go into these emissions scenarios. They are intended to cover a range of possible self consistent ‘story lines’ that then provide decision makers with information about which paths might be more desirable. But they do not consider many things like the recovery of the ozone layer, for instance, or observed trends in forcing agents. There is no estimate, even probabilistically, as to the likelihood of any emissions scenario and no best guess.”

Russian temperatures and Pakistani floods

The story states: “It’s been the hottest summer ever recorded in Russia…Russia’s drought has sparked hundreds of wildfires in forests and dried peat bogs, blanketing Moscow with a toxic smog…” There are two issues here: are the warm temperatures due to “predicted” global warming and has drought dried out the peat bogs.

The bogs: according to the New York times, “As early as 1918 Soviet engineers drained swamps to supply peat for electrical power stations. That approach was abandoned in the late 1950s, after natural gas was discovered in Siberia, but the bogs were never reflooded, though the authorities are currently weighing the idea.”

The temperature: Russian scientist, Michail Kabanov, member of the Academy of Sciences and advisor of the Institute For Climate And Environmental Monitoring says the regional heat wave taking place in Russia is not a sign of catastrophic climate change and that the permafrost has been thawing since the last glacial epoch 10,000 years ago, and its rate of thawing is also not catastrophic. “Deviations in one direction or the other, in this region or the other, are explained completely by the instability of the climate system. It meanders constantly and reaches various anomalies as a result, and does include extremes. The weather conditions of this year are precisely a result of this.”

The high temperatures in Russia and the heavy rain in Pakistan have a common cause unrelated to global warming according the an article in New Scientist. “According to meteorologists monitoring the atmosphere above the northern hemisphere, unusual holding patterns in the jet stream are to blame. As a result, weather systems sat still. Temperatures rocketed and rainfall reached extremes.” “Stationary patterns in the jet stream are called “blocking events”. They are the consequence of strong Rossby waves, which push westward against the flow of the jet stream. They are normally overpowered by the jet stream’s eastward flow, but they can match it if they get strong enough. When this happens, the jet stream’s meanders hold steady creating the perfect conditions for extreme weather.”

The Arctic

The story states: “Researchers last week spotted a 100-square-mile chunk of ice calved off from the great Petermann Glacier in Greenland’s far northwest. It was the most massive ice island to break away in the Arctic in a half-century of observation.” That statement is almost true, but it lies by omission. Such ice calving is not unusual. In 1962, a 230-square-mile chunk of ice broke off the Ward Hunt Ice Shelf. The Petermann glacier, itself, spawned smaller ice islands in 2001 (34 square miles) and 2008 (10 square miles). In 2005, the Ayles Ice Shelf disintegrated and became an ice island (34 square miles) about 60 miles to the west of Petermann Fjord.

The story states: “In the Arctic Ocean itself, the summer melt of the vast icecap has reached unprecedented proportions in recent years.” Technically true but misleading. Arctic summer sea ice melt has been relatively consistent and sea ice extent returns to normal in the winter. The article failed to mention that Antarctic sea ice reached the maximum extent ever recorded in 2007, and is currently more extensive than normal. For many graphics of Arctic and Antarctic sea ice, see Anthony Watts’ Sea Ice Page, a compilation of data from several sources.

Sea level

The story states: “The melting of land ice into the oceans is causing about 60 percent of the accelerating rise in sea levels worldwide, with thermal expansion from warming waters causing the rest. The WMO’S World Climate Research Program says seas are rising by 1.34 inches per decade, about twice the 20th century’s average.” The pretended “acceleration” is the result of cherry-picking starting and ending points. The rate of sea level rise is cyclic, but the overall trend is downward. For a detailed analysis of sea level rise, and to see why the WMO statement is dissembling, see my article, Sea Level Rising? Also, a new paper in the Journal of Geophysical Research, says “The global mean sea level for the period January 1900 to December 2006 is estimated to rise at a rate of 1.56 ± 0.25 mm/yr which is reasonably consistent with earlier estimates, but we do not find significant acceleration.”

Overall temperatures

The story states: “Worldwide temperature readings show that this January-June was the hottest first half of a year since record keeping began in the mid-19th century.” This implies that we are experiencing something unprecedented. Isn’t it strange that 60% of the U.S. had cooler than normal temperatures during this period. The article statement is untrue and due partially to NOAA computer programs actually manufacturing temperature readings where none exist.

It didn’t take me too long to do some fact checking of this AP story. I wonder why AP or the Arizona Daily Star didn’t bother checking the facts. Could there be some political agenda in running such stories?

P.S. For your amusement, see the Warm List, a compilation of everything the press claims is caused by global warming.

Here is some real data, from NOAA High Plains Regional Climate Center, of temperature departure from normal for January 1, 2010 through July 31, 2010. It shows that the northeast U.S. has been warmer than normal, but about 60% of the U.S. has had temperatures below normal.

Source: http://www.hprcc.unl.edu/products/maps/acis/YearTDeptUS.png

In the Arctic, spring sea ice melting got a late start, then melted faster than normal, and now has returned to a normal rate (see red line in graph below).

Source: http://www.ijis.iarc.uaf.edu/en/home/seaice_extent.htm

From Dr. Roy Spencer at UAH: “Sea Surface Temperatures (SSTs) measured by the AMSR-E instrument on NASA’s Aqua satellite continue the fall which began several months ago. The following plot, updated through July 29, 2010 shows that the cooling in the Nino34 region in the tropical east Pacific continue to be well ahead of the cooling in the global average SST, something we did not see during the 2007-08 La Nina event.

Spencer’s graph of atmospheric temperatures, based on satellite readings, show that 2010, an El Nino year, is warmer than the 1979-2001 average, but still cooler than 1998, also an El Nino year:

Abundant research shows that the Medieval Warm Period, ca. 1100 to 1300 A.D. was about 6 degrees F warmer than now (see one example here.)

Meanwhile, in the southern hemisphere:

Peru declared state of emergency amid plunging temperatures. Hundreds die from extreme cold in remote mountain villages also struggling with severe poverty. Source UK.Guardian. Brazil, Argentina, and Uruguay experience extreme cold. In Bolivia, tropical areas temperatures plummeted to zero causing “millions of dead fish” in rivers that normally flow in an environment of 20 Celsius.

Antarctic sea ice extent is greater than normal (Data from National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colorado.)

When put into perspective, 2010 is not so hot. Last winter when much of the U.S. experienced very cold weather, climate alarmists dismissed that saying short term weather is not climate. In that they were right. But now since we’ve had a hot June, those same people are using a short-term weather phenomenon to claim that the climate is heating up. The climate has cycles of many different periods from years to centuries to millennia to hundreds of millions of years. Where we are now in these cycles seems to depend on who is doing the measuring and data compilation. Lost in the prognostications and press releases is evidence of causation. In the case of those who say we are experiencing unprecedented warming is the implication that humans are the main cause, but those same people are unable to present any compelling physical evidence to support that contention. Personally, I find the physical geological evidence of natural climate cycles both compelling and sufficient to explain the trends. The contention that this year or this decade is warmer or cooler than some time in the past proves nothing.

Dr. Ross McKitrick has just published “A Critical Review of Global Surface Temperature Data Products,” which goes into great detail about problems with our temperature data sets (73 pages). That paper documents a major reduction in world-wide weather stations since 1970. The remaining stations are skewed toward airport sites, lower latitudes, and lower elevations; each of which produces a warming bias in the data. McKitrick concludes, “The overall conclusion of this report is that there are serious quality problems in the surface temperature data sets that call into question whether the global temperature history, especially over land, can be considered both continuous and precise. Users should be aware of these limitations, especially in policy-sensitive applications.”

For some further perspective see a recent report of a drilling project in Greenland. This project drilled more than 1.5 miles into the ice to investigate “the Eemian interglacial period from about 115,000 to 130,000 years ago, a time when temperatures were 3.6 to 5.4 degrees Fahrenheit above today’s temperatures.” “Ice cores from previous drilling efforts revealed temperature spikes of more than 20 degrees Fahrenheit in just 50 years in the Northern Hemisphere.” So what if the last decade was the warmest since whenever?

From time to time I will summarize new science research from recently published, or about-to-be published papers. Usually, notice of the research comes in the form of press releases from universities that are made available to the media. Here are some reports that the Arizona Daily Star apparently missed.

Antarctic Ice Shelf Collapse Possibly Triggered by Ocean Waves

Scripps Institution of Oceanography

Background: In the summer of 2007, Arctic sea ice melted more than it had previously. The media made much of that, but failed to mention that the same year, Antarctic sea ice reached the greatest extent ever recorded. You may also remember that in 2008, several large chunks of Antarctic sea ice broke off to become very large icebergs. The general media trumpeted this as evidence of global warming. Scripps has an alternative theory.

The research findings:

Storm-driven waves in the North Pacific break along the coastlines of North and South America where “they are transformed into very long-period ocean waves called ‘infragravity waves’ that travel vast distances to Antarctica.” The authors “propose that the southbound traveling infragravity waves may be a key mechanical agent that contributes to the production and/or expansion of the pre-existing crevasse fields on ice shelves, and that the infragravity waves also may provide the trigger necessary to initiate the collapse process.” “The study found that each of the Wilkins Ice Shelf breakup events in 2008 coincided with the estimated arrival of infragravity waves. The authors note that such waves could affect ice shelf stability by opening crevasses, reducing ice integrity through fracturing and initiating a collapse.”

Press release and photo:

http://tinyurl.com/yhw5zwg

Does Global Warming Threaten Alpine Ecosystems?

Research shows that the combination of genetic diversity within and among alpine species and the high diversity of micro-habitats in alpine terrain precludes any profound effects of warming on alpine species survival. See analysis from CO2Science.org here:

http://www.co2science.org/articles/V13/N7/B3.php

The mammoths’ swan song revised

University of Copenhagen

The researchers claim that by using DNA in soil samples they found that mammoths existed back to between 10,500 and 7,500 years ago, and are therefore remained between 2,600 and 5,600 years after their supposed extinction from mainland Alaska. “Our findings show that the mammoth and the horse existed side by side with the first human immigrants in America for certainly 3,500 years and were therefore not wiped out by human beings or natural disasters within a few hundred years, as common theories otherwise argue.” The research does not address the ultimate cause of their disappearance.

Press release: http://tinyurl.com/yh55e2p

Team finds subtropical waters flushing through Greenland fjord

Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution

“Waters from warmer latitudes — or subtropical waters — are reaching Greenland’s glaciers, driving melting and likely triggering an acceleration of ice loss…”

Press release: http://tinyurl.com/yleb84a

The authors claim: “Our reconstruction shows that the last half-century was the warmest of the last 2,000 years. Not only was it the warmest, but it reversed the long-term, millennial-scale trend toward cooler temperatures. The cooling coincided with the slow and well-known cycle in Earth’s orbit around the sun, and it should have continued through the 20th century.” “The evidence was found by generating a 2,000-year-long reconstruction of Arctic summer temperature using natural archives of climate change from tree rings, glacier ice and mostly from lake sediments from across the Arctic, a region that responds sensitively to global changes.”

Why did they use proxy data for the last 100 years when they could have just looked at thermometer records? Oh, but thermometry shows that is was warmer in the 1930s and 1940s.

The new study presents a curve which is reminiscent of the thoroughly debunked “Hockey Stick” of Michael Mann. The new proxy reconstruction fails to show the well-documented Medieval Warm period of 1,200 yeas ago when temperatures were higher than now. It appears that authors of the new study are using the same statistical malfeasance and cherry-picking of data that were used for the old hockey stick.

Steve McIntyre of Climate Audit discusses the new study. “The problem with these sorts of studies is that no class of proxy (tree ring, ice core isotopes) is unambiguously correlated to temperature and, over and over again, authors pick proxies that confirm their bias and discard proxies that do not.”

Records from the Danish Meteorological Institute show no warming since 1958 and that the 2009 temperature variation is almost identical to 1958. DMI says that the Arctic was warmer in the 1940s than now.

A Duke University-led analysis of available records shows that while the North Atlantic Ocean’s surface waters warmed in the 50 years between 1950 and 2000, the sub-polar regions cooled at the same time that subtropical and tropical waters warmed. This pattern can be explained largely by the influence of a natural and cyclical wind circulation pattern called the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO)

A 2008 study by Håkan Grudd of Stockholm University’s Department of Physical Geography and Quaternary Geology, found that “The late-twentieth century is not exceptionally warm in the new Torneträsk record: On decadal-to-century timescales, periods around AD 750, 1000, 1400, and 1750 were all equally warm, or warmer. The warmest summers in this new reconstruction occur in a 200-year period centred on AD 1000. A ‘Medieval Warm Period’ is supported by other paleoclimate evidence from northern Fennoscandia.”

Besides the controversy over temperatures, there is also media attention given to Arctic sea ice extent. For instance, news media made much of the fact that during the summer of 2007, Northern Hemisphere sea ice area was at a historic minimum (2.92 million sq. km). What was little reported, however, was that in 2007, Southern Hemisphere sea ice extent broke the previous maximum record of 16.03 million sq. km and reached 16.26 million sq. km. (August, 2007). [Source: The Cryosphere Today, a publication of The Polar Research Group, University of Illinois]

To put things in further perspective, consider these reports:

“A considerable change of climate inexplicable at present to us must have taken place in the Circumpolar Regions, by which the severity of the cold that has for centuries past enclosed the seas in the high northern latitudes in an impenetrable barrier of ice has been, during the last two years, greatly abated.”

“2000 square leagues [approximately 14,000 square miles] of ice with which the Greenland Seas between the latitudes of 74 and 80 N have been hitherto covered, has in the last two years entirely disappeared.”

These paragraphs, however, are not the latest scare story from the greenhouse industry, but extracts from a letter by the President of the Royal Society addressed to the British Admiralty, written in 1817 (Royal Society, London. Nov. 20, 1817. Minutes of Council, Vol. 8. pp.149-153).

 When this report was written, 192 years ago, the planet was in the midst of the Little Ice Age. How could the ice disappear in a Little Ice Age?

There is also the following story:

Could it be that carbon dioxide and global warming have nothing to do with it? Well, yes.

A study conducted by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, says unusual winds caused the 2007 Arctic minimum. Their press release says:

“Unusual atmospheric conditions set up wind patterns that compressed the sea ice, loaded it into the Transpolar Drift Stream and then sped its flow out of the Arctic. When that sea ice reached lower latitudes, it rapidly melted in the warmer waters.”

“The winds causing this trend in ice reduction were set up by an unusual pattern of atmospheric pressure that began at the beginning of this century.”

The fact that a 192-year-old report on Arctic ice is very similar to one today lends credence to the contention that changes in ice cover are natural cyclic phenomena and not due to the increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide.  AccuWeather says the changes in wind may be due to changes in the Arctic Oscillation (AO) and the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) which are large atmospheric circulations that have major impacts on the weather in certain parts of the world.

Perhaps reporters should do some investigation so they can report all of the news and put things in perspective. Ah, but only sensational headlines sell papers.