By admitting the models don't work doesn't that mean they admit they don't understand the mechanisms at work? And if they can't get it right within a couple of years, what makes them think they're more accurate in the future?

Just thoughts...

Gee, It seems there is a thin spot in earths crust under Greenland, contributing to the melting of the icesheet. Hmmmm, another nail in the AGW coffin ??? Interestingly "what caused the hotspot to suddenly form is another mystery."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/livescience/20071213/sc_livescience/magmamaybemeltinggreenlandice;_ylt=ApZ655aHtp4hZZFsvFaeMwQDW7oF

What say you now, Mark, Bloom, BT ?

This almost certainly happened during the very warm (and very long) Holocene Maximum, and during the even warmer Eemian interglacial. It was so warm that boreal forests advanced almost to the edge of the Arctic Ocean.

And since the Svalbard jawbone indicates that polar bears have been around for maybe over 130,000 years, the species obviously got through these warmings, and knows how to survive the disappearance of ice, even for very long periods.

Nice to see climate scientists making verifiable predictions within their own lifetime for a change.

There was no trend in Arctic ice minima from 1999-2006. The 15 minutes of fame seems to be based on a one year trend.
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/current.area.jpg

But at least they are providing good fodder for one camp or the other next summer! We will soon see if they are right.

It's refreshing to find a climate change study with an outcome timeframe within the probable lifespan of an interested reader.

notice they say "summer" sea ice,hmm.

""and indicate that the northern polar waters could be ice-free during the summers by 2013""

The eco cruise ships are going to make a fortune.

I have a silly question.

Everyone on this planet should know that the climate changes
Why do they get so freaked out when it does

Did anyone really expect it to stay the same forever?

OFF TOPIC

I have returned from Maine, sorry about everyone's luck. Decent trip, ate too many Christmas cookies.

Thanks to BT, Brett et al who gave me advice on the trip. Roads were dry, glad we got out prior to today's and this weekend's storms, though I must say BT, apparently speed limits in Mass. must be just a suggestion rather than the rule as apparently, being consistently 10 mph over made us "number 1" in the eyes of many on the roads there. Or maybe they just could tell that an AGW skeptic was in their midst. LOL.

I am glad to have been reminded on the trip of just how vast our country is and how much area is heavily forested and unpopulated. I also swung by ACCUWEATHER world headquarters on the way. Nice Building. Apologize for not looking to see if you were there at that time Brett, but Henry Margusity was kind enough to give us a quick tour as we ran into him in the parking lot and we were on kinda a schedule at the time.

A completely unscientific study of the car's temperature gauge did in fact reveal a 2 degree uptick as we approached near NYC. No other metro areas really changed the numbers in a short distance. I have noticed that Columbus is consistently warmer so maybe you need a city of more than 850,000 people or so to register.

OK ON TOPIC

I am sure PH and Andrew will comment here. But if the ice is gone in the summers in 6 years, does that mean NYC will be wet as the Goreacle predicts?

Gotta love these predictions of the future based on miniscule data sets using questionable methods.

Thanks again to all.

All you morons who think this "global warming" is caused by mankind need to get a grip. PROVE it is man who is responsible...you can't. Weather is cylical......no more than that!!

Crisis to crisis, is how you live!!

Judd Wymer

Not only will the Arctic be ice free in 2013 but there will be vast flocks of flying pigs soaring on the winds of GLO-BULL warming!!
This stuff is unbelievable ... especially when you consider there is a university somewhere paying these bozos to come up with ever more ludicrous climate claims.
Keep your sticks on the ice folks.

Wasn't a good part of the melt this summer caused by warm pacific waters entering the arctic ocean? And isn't that stopped now due to cooler pacific waters?

About 30 years ago another bunch of pinheads proclaimed that the world was going to freeze over and many millions of people would die.

Now those pinheads' proteges have pre-empted their tutors and decided that instead of freezing we are going to die as a result of global warming.

Fast forward to the year 2045: a group of scientists will predict that the oceans are freezing more rapidly than originally thought and that in the next decade several BILLION people will die.

Fast forward to the year 2075... well, you get the idea don't you?

These people who live on government grants and subsidies will keep inventing calamatous weather events so they can keep getting those taxpayer dollars and keep working.

They are a cyclical joke.

Isn't it ironic, to have this post juxtaposed to the one about hurricanes not being very influenced by global warming after all?

Does anybody remember those dire post-Katrina predictions?

What shall we forecast then, a 2009 article saying that arctic ice minima are not influenced by global warming? How often do we have to repeat the same mistake?

Hi Guys,

Nice link describes the reason the ice is thinning. Hmm, no mention of AGW. BT look I linked this one too. LOL Look these are natural forces and it happens, you know what.

"Sea-ice circulation in the Arctic is dominated by the clockwise Beaufort Gyre extending over much of the western and west-central Arctic (with mean ice age on the order of three to five years), and the Transpolar Drift, transporting ice from the Siberian shelves across the Pole into the Greenland Sea (with mean age of less than three years)."

"This thinning is attributed mostly to changes in atmospheric circulation and radiative forcing (Francis et al., 2005; Rothrock and Zhang, 2005)."

"This renders separation of inherent decadal- and centennial-scale variability from any trends due to anthropogenic warming, which is predicted to be greatest in the Arctic (Holland and Bitz, 2003; ACIA, 2005), difficult."

http://books.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=11753&page=67

Darren, when all the artic ice melts in the next 5-6 years, sea levels should drop. Ice is less dense than water so NYC should be fine.

Wouldn't the melting ice cool the warmer water down? Then with that, wouldn't the ice caps either reform, or rebuild?

Somewhat Off Topic but still relevant.

So today during the Northeast storm freezing my bunny slippers off, hearing about the Record snow in Boston, I was scanning various Socialist web sites with the keyword "climate change", and apparently there appears to be a constant viewpoint on all sites related to climate change and capitalism. I know sometimes on this blog, politics enters the discussion arena...

Anyway, the common thread on these sites basically addresses using climate change as a vehicle presented to the masses to elimnate capitalism and introduce socialism, because socialism is the ONLY system that can stop climate change. LOL.

The following from the Socialism and Liberation Party website sums it up nicely.

"There is today no organized body on the planet that has the power to force the capitalists to adopt the measures that will forestall the worst catastrophes of global warming. That we lack such a body is one of the central problems facing the movement of workers and oppressed people on the planet.

Climate change affects everyone, but it will disproportionately affect working-class people and poor countries. This is why the planet needs socialism.

The U.N. panel can issue reports on the dangers of climate change, but the U.N. itself has no authority to impose binding carbon reduction schemes on industrialized nations. Instead, there is a hodgepodge of treaties and plans.

The United States, the country most responsible for carbon emissions, has completely refused to participate in the Kyoto Protocol. The U.S. government continues to act like a spoiled brat, refusing to endorse any mandatory programs, while blaming developing nations like China and India.

There are more workers than capitalists. The only difference is that most of the workers are not organized and do not realize our own power. If we unite, we can overturn this irrational capitalist system and begin to build socialism�a rational system based on economic planning.

Under socialism, the workers� state can impose mandatory emissions controls and implement emissions reduction technology in a coordinated fashion. The worst case scenario of global warming can be averted.

In a socialist society, like Cuba, the government run for and by the people can impose mandatory emissions controls and implement emissions reduction technology in a coordinated fashion.

Capitalism cannot save the planet. In fact, if it continues it will likely destroy it.

Socialism is an alternative that is real and necessary�for working people and the world we live in."

Yowza...

We Skeptics Must Continue to Resist!!

I'm with Oiznop!

Chris,

The way that AGW proponents talk about La Nina, you would think that it is an evil alien force which has nothing to do with earth's climate - but periodically invades to confuse the stupid public and keep them from understanding that they are headed to "oblivion."

But they love El Nino - apparently they just don't like girl children.

Rick may be interested to know that Maslowski is the U.S. Navy's sea ice modeler. If there's one institution Rick has even less respect for than science, it has to be the U.S. Navy.

Never learned to interpret graphs, PH? That's very sad. Interestingly the sharp increase in the rate of sea ice reduction began in about 1999. This graph shows it a bit more clearly.

Evan Andersen

It took me a while to believe that our earth is getting warmer. I had been reading blogs, science journals, magazines and it was only in my head did I think no one had it right.

Then, I took a flight for myself over the Artic. I have no more words but that our civilization is in danger. Whether people need more votes or it serves as just good breakfast conversation. Evan Andersen think that it is time to just put up and shut up. Use electric cars, use wind power and lets move forward. There is only one way for that.

Evan Andersen

Guys,

Like Patrick Henry said, this prediction is fairly short-term. The proof will be in the pudding, as they say. That's why I'm so interested in the seas ice's rebound this winter.

Anyway, on an alarmist note, isn't 2013 the year that the Mayan calendar supposedly predicted the end of the world? Dum Dum Dum!!!

Reply: I believe it is 2012.

I find it amazing that so much of this is happening so quickly, geologically speaking. In fact, it seems to be happening too quickly for me to believe that carbon dioxide is the main culprit here. If CO2 is the cause, then it is a much more powerful greenhouse molecule than I ever imagined. We hear so much about the current observations of sea ice levels and climatology, but rarely hear a reason to what is causing the melt. Is it warm air? Is is warm water? Is it vulcanology? Is it cloud cover? I don't know what to believe.

Earlier this year, NASA published that a change in prevailing winds caused the dramatic sea ice decrease. OK, then what caused the change in the winds?

Somebody please explain to me the weather pattern or how it has changed) that is forcing warm air/water northward to cause this melt.

so even when wee see a short horizon, significant impact related to global warming do the skeptics and deniers insist that it's a fiction/there's something else going on/here look at this link to prove my point that this is wrong, etc.....

a good scientist by nature is careful and conservative by nature...i think we can call agree that our ecosystems and global atmospheric conditions and climatology are incredibly complex and evolving...but it's childish to throw your hands up and in the air and say we can never understand, or try, to understand the world around us because of that complexity

climate models are certainly not perfect...i also allow for things like natural cycles and variability. but the most significant causal variable in relation to climate change in recent history is human driven C02 emissions. really (and i mean really), there isn't much disagreement in the legitimate scientific community on this topic, despite what you see on this blog and elsewhere in the "fringe denier" community

"UN climate conference taking the World in entirely the wrong direction"

As presented in other threads here, the Open Letter to the Secretary-General of the United Nations
http://www.nationalpost.com/most_popular/story.html?id=164002
appears to have been ignored by the general media. My impression is that this document is ground breaking when we consider the impressive list of scientific signatories of this document.

Brett: Maybe a distinct thread would be warranted for this? Of all the many "anecdotal" stories that have crossed this forum, I submit that this one should be considered seriously.
How can we seriously discuss cause/effects/results of global warming without presenting ALL the SCIENTIFIC perspectives?
Enough of the political/biased/self-serving views!

Chris,
I think you hit THE biggest question concerning the recent melting of artic ice. What is very interesting is that both the Pacific and Atlantic have cooled in recent years. This cooling has coincided with the warming of both the Bering Straits and the North Atlantic.

I don't think anyone has conclusively proven that AGW has caused the northern high latitude oceans to warm, and the equatorial waters to cool. There has been much speculation that the artic oceans have been virtually ice free before (in a 1921 Op Ed, the Washington Post complained that the artic melt was destroying the local enviorment, most notably the seals habitat).

It could be there is a hidden long range oscillation in the NH SSTs that has been discovered.

By 1940, the artic waters again began to cool, as did the Pacific Ocean.

I took a flight for myself over the Artic. I have no more words but that our civilization is in danger.

Evan Anderson,

From a single data point of one flight over the Arctic you have established that our civilization is in danger?

I fly over the Arctic all the time and have for decades. It is a beautiful place but I have never seen anything which appears in the least alarming, other than the thought of the plane going down and having to deal with the extreme cold.

Steve Bloom,

Your last remark about the graph gives me some significant insight into your technical competence and objectivity.

According to the climate models, there should be a similar warming in the Antarctic. Given that the Antarctic is moving in the opposite direction, it seems obvious that the models are wrong and the mechanism is not understood - at least not by the IPCC.