The cooling down in the Antarctic has led to the largest ice sheet in many years for this day. Check the chart: In only four years out of the last 43 has there been more ice.
So, how are the northern polar region shaping up?
The ice in the Arctic will stay
In Greenland it snowed every day
New white snow, what a sight!
Reflects back all the light
No climate change here, this i say.
Back in 2012 the Greenland ice sheet had an unprecedented melt, and the prediction was that all the Arctic ice would be melted in September of 2015, having reached the Climate tipping point from which there is no return to a normal climate unless we reorganized the whole planet into a new totalitarian global governance society.
Well, the tipping point didn’t happen, so hopefully global governance will not happen either, even though many are trying.
These are the latest charts for arctic temperatures, ice and snow for August 26:
While still below average, it is the most ice for this day in the last ten years.
The ice-pack on Greenland has been melting much less than normal during the melting season
And yesterday’s snowfall over Greenland
Remember, H2O is a condensing gas, when cooled off it condenses into clouds. Clouds sometimes gives rain, and without rain life on land will cease to exist. In the Arctic, instead of rain it snows all times of the year, especially in Greenland. It rains for a month on the coast, but over 2000 feet it is all snow all the time when there is precipitation.
Clouds cool by day and warm by night, a one percent difference in cloud cover means more than the increase in CO2.
The only place where cloud cooling doesn’t work is in deserts. There is an Arab proverb: “All sunshine makes a desert.” The climate change danger is not more CO2, but making more deserts. The American South-west is in danger of being “desertified” unless we restore the fragile water balance in the region. To solve the problem I am proposing a Transcontinental Aqueduct, from the Mississippi river to the Colorado river, using a lot of power, but also producing a lot of peak power and hydro-power storage facilities on the way, and i so doing tripling tht hydro-power ccapacity of the whole nation.
Climate change is now officially the new secular religion. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) said Sunday, March 14 on ABC’s “This Week” “My most recent trip to the northern triangle, that would be Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador. You saw the impact of climate change. These people were leaving because of the drought. They couldn’t farm, and they were seeking other ways to survive. There are many reasons to go into this, but the fact we have to deal with it at the border, and some of the people coming there are seeking asylum.
The iconic Metronome digital clock sprawled across a 14th Street building in New York City facing Union Square normally counts time to and from midnight down to the fractions of a second, like a never-ending hour glass.
But in September 2020, the public installation was transformed into a “Climate Clock” that broadcasts the time remaining to avert an all-out climate catastrophe, or more specific, how much time we have left before the earth has warmed up 1.5 degree Celsius, the tipping point after which life as we know it would seize to exist.
Climate apocalypse alarmists also provide you with a climate clock to download which at the time of writing this blog looked like this:
The climate clock ticks down with remarkable precision, and the part of the total energy generated that is renewable is increased is displayed with ten digit precision.
So far, so good. But is it true? Let us take a look at the total ecosystem, including the clouds, rain and snow.
As CO2 warms up the poles
burned oil, gas and coal play their roles.
CO2 is still good;
makes plants green, grows more food,
and clouds are the climate controls.
We live in interesting times, the CO2 concentration has increased 50% since the beginning of industrialization. In the last 30 years the level has risen 17%, from about 350 ppm to nearly 410 ppm. This is what scares people. Is is time to panic and stop carbon emissions altogether as teenage Climate activist Greta Thunberg and N.Y. congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez have suggested? As if on cue the climate models have been adjusted, and they suddenly show a much higher rate of temperature increase, in this case what is supposed to happen to global temperatures for a doubling of CO2 from pre-industrial times, from 270ppm to 540ppm.
There are two ways to approach this problem. The models make certain assumptions about the behavior of the changing atmosphere and model future temperature changes. This is the approach taken by IPCC for the last 32 years. These models are all failing miserably when compared to actual temperature changes.
The other way i to observe what is actually happening to our temperature over time as the CO2 increases. We have 50 years of excellent global temperature data, so with these we can see where, when and by how much the earth has warmed.
The most drastic temperature rise on earth has been in the Arctic above the 80th latitude. In the winter of 2018 it was 8C above the 50 year average. See charts from the Danish Meteorological Institute:
Note, there is no increase at all in the summer temperatures!
The fall temperature saw an increase of 4C and the spring temperature saw an increase of about 2.5C.
The 2020 winter recorded an about 4c increase Source: DMI.
Notice: In this chart the there is no recorded summer temperature increase at all!
The 5 thru 8C winter rise of temperature is significant, most would even say alarming, and my response is, why is that?
To get the answer we must study molecular absorption spectroscopy and explain a couple of facts for the 97% of all scientists who have not studied molecular spectroscopy. IPCC and most scientists claim that the greenhouse effect is dependent on the gases that are in the atmosphere, and their combined effect is additive according to a logarithmic formula. This is true up to a certain point, but it is not possible to absorb more than 100% of all the energy available in a certain frequency band! For example: If water vapor absorbs 90% of all incoming energy in a certain band, and CO2 absorbs another 50% of the energy in the same band, the result is that 95% is absorbed, (90% + 50% * (100% – 90%)), not 140%, (90% + 50%).
The following chart shows both CO2 and H2O are absorbing greenhouse gases, with H20 being the stronger greenhouse gas, absorbing over a much wider spectrum, and they overlap for the most part. But it also matters in what frequency range s they absorb.
For this we will have to look at the frequency ranges of the incoming solar radiation and the outgoing black body radiation of the earth. It is the latter that causes the greenhouse effect. Take a look at this chart:
The red area represents the observed amount of solar radiation that reaches the earth’s surface, the white area under the red line represents radiation absorbed in the atmosphere. Likewise, the blue area represents the outgoing black body radiation that is re-emitted. The remaining white area under the magenta, blue or black line represents the retained absorbed energy that causes the greenhouse effect.
Let us now take a look at the Carbon Dioxide bands of absorption, at 2.7, 4.3 and 15 microns. Of them the 2.7 and 4.3 micron bands absorb where there is little black body radiation, the only band that is of interest is at 15 microns, and that is in a band where the black body radiation has its maximum. However it is also in a band where water vapor also absorb, not as much as CO2,only about 20% to 70% as much. Water vapor or absolute humidity is highly dependent on the temperature of the air, so at 30C there may be 50 times as much water vapor, at 0C there may be ten times as much water vapor, and at -25C there may be more CO2 than water vapor. At those low temperatures the gases are mostly additive. In the tropics with fifty times more water vapor than CO2, increased CO2 has no influence on the temperature whatsoever. Temperature charts confirm this assertion:
Here the temperature in the tropics displays no trend whatsoever. It follows the temperature of the oceans, goes up in an El Niño and down in a La Niña. The temperature in the southern hemisphere shows no trend. In the northern temperate region there is a slight increase, but the great increase is occurring in the Arctic. There is no increase in the Antarctic yet even though the increase in CO2 is greater in the Antarctic and the winter temperature in the Antarctic is even lower than in the Arctic. So CO2 increase cannot be the sole answer to the winter temperature increase in the Arctic.
There is an obvious answer. When temperatures increase the air can contain more moisture and will transport more moisture from the tropics all the way to the arctic, where it falls as snow. Is the snow increasing in the Arctic?
Let us see what the snow statistics show. These are from the Rutgers’ snow lab.
The fall snow extent is increasing, and has increased by more than 2 percent per year.
The winter snowfall has also increased but only by 0.04 percent per year. The snow covers all of Russia, Northern China, Mongolia, Tibet, Kashmir and northern Pakistan, Northern Afghanistan, Northern Iran, Turkey, Part of Eastern Europe, Scandinavia, Canada, Alaska, Greenland and part of Western and Northern United States.
In the spring on the other hand the snow pack is melting faster, about 1.6 percent less snow per year. One of the major reasons for an earlier snow-melt is that the air is getting dirtier, especially over China, and to some extent Russia. The soot from burning coal and mining and manufacturing changes the albedo of the snow. The soot is visible on old snow all the way up to the North Pole. The other reason is that the poles are getting warmer. In the fall and winter it is mostly due to increased snowfall, but in the spring, as soon as the temperature rises over the freezing point, melting occurs.
So the warming of the poles, far from being an impending end of mankind as we know it, may even be beneficial. Warmer poles in the winter means less temperature gradient between the poles and the tropics, leading to less severe storms. They will still be there, but less severe.
There is one great benefit of increased CO2, the greening of the earth.
Thanks to this greening, accomplished with only the fertilizing effect of CO2, the earth can now keep another 2 billion people from starvation, not to mention what it does to plants and wildlife. The people in El Salvador are, even with the drought, better off now with the air containing more CO2 than before. One extra benefit is that photosynthesis uses less water as CO2 increases.
Having said that, I am still a conservationist. Coal, oil and gas will run out at some time, and I for one would like to save some for my great grandchildren. In addition I would like to minimize the need for mining, which is quite destructive. As the great conservationist Sarah Palin so succinctly put it: “For when it’s gone, it’s gone.“
The best solution is to switch most electricity generation to Thorium molten salt nuclear power. There are multiple reasons why this should be done as a priority.
On a totally unrelated note Senator Amy Klobuchar announced her presidential bid today in 17F weather and in a snowstorm, without hat, neck-cover and without gloves. You guessed it: She communicated her support for the Green New Deal.
She is from Minnesota. I guess she never was a member of Minnesotans for global warming.
Up to 16 inches of snow has fallen on a town in the Sahara desert after a freak winter storm hit the area on Sunday.
This is the third time in 37 years that the town of Ain Sefra in Algeria has seen snow cover the red sand dunes of the desert.
Snow started falling in the early hours of Sunday morning Jan 7 and it quickly began settling on the sand.
Does this mean global warming is ending and the beginning phases of the next Ice Age has started?
No, not necessary, but it is a consequence of increased water vapor in the atmosphere. You see, in the tropics it is all regulated by the cumulus clouds and thunderstorms and the temperature of the oceans. If the oceans heat up ever so little, they release more water vapor into the atmosphere, and the amount of CO2 is of no consequence. All greenhouse warming is done by the water vapor, since you cannot absorb more than all energy available in the frequency band of absorption of the gas, and since in the tropics water vapor is counted in percent rather than parts per million as is the case of CO2. As the water vapor increases, clouds form and act as a strong negative feedback to keep the temperature stable in the tropics.
Not so at the poles. On Greenland and on the Arctic ice cap it snows more, and the increased water vapor leads to more storms coming up the Pacific and up the Atlantic. Some of them swirls back into Africa leading to these rare snowfalls.
If it were not for the increased CO2, we would already be back into a new little ice age, but thanks to increased generation of CO2 the onset of the next ice age will be delayed by maybe a thousand years.
Another good thing with more snow at the poles. The poles are getting warmer, and this leads to a smaller temperature difference between hot and cold regions, making for weaker storms, fewer tornadoes and hurricanes, less violent rains spreading over larger regions, all good.
The snow comes earlier and earlier, but it also melts earlier. Blame China for that. They already use 47% of the world’s mined coal, and does not do a good job of cleaning up the exhaust gases despite their claims.
For the second year in a row there is a layer of fresh snow in the Northern Sahara desert! Aïn Séfra was sprinkled with some snow in December 2016, which was the first time that snow had fallen there since February 18, 1979, when a half-hour storm disrupted traffic. freak winter storm hit the area on January 20, 2017 dumping snow in the municipality up to three feet thick in some places. This was the largest snowfall in residents’ memories and had caused travel disruptions due to the roads becoming slippery with ice, while the resident children made the most of the situation by sledding on the snow-covered sand dunes and making snowmen.
Here are some spectacular pictures from Jan 5 2018
After a record warm winter in the Arctic last year leading to the lowest ice maximum, the ice melted at the slowest rate recorded, leading to the 8th lowest ice minimum.
On Greenland the situation was quite different. It snowed and snowed, leading to the largest yearly ice gain recorded, which was quite a change from years and years of ice loss.
This year the ice gain started even earlier
Are these changes only temporary, or are they an early harbinger of the ice age to come?
It was very warm in the Arctic above the 80th latitude last winter. Late summer two hurricane strength storms broke up a lot of ice up and transported it south to areas where it was bound to melt. The ice area reached a new low, except for the year 2012, but the ice volume hit a new all time low on Sep 9 2016.
Since then the ice volume has recovered to equal the previous all time winter low around April 20, 2017, but the ice area hit an all time low maximum as early as March 5.
What happened?
The unusually warm temperatures averaging 7 degrees C above normal with a spike as high as 20 degrees C above normal and no days below was not because of increased CO2, but because it snowed. Anyone that has shoveled snow knows that while it snows it is usually not that cold, especially if the winds are calm. Then, when the snowing stops it gets cold indeed. Nowhere is that shown better than what happened on Greenland this winter. It snowed and snowed from one winter storm after another starting in the Philippines, raining and snowing over California, regaining strength from the Mexican Gulf and then racing up the Eastern Seaboard snowing out over Greenland.
Then on May 5 it all changed. From having been warmer than normal the Arctic became colder than normal, in fact there has been no day since then that temperatures has been above normal. Today, Aug 13 it even dipped below freezing for the first time since summer max, five days before normal.
The ice area will still decrease for another month or so since sea ice does not start forming until temperatures are -4 degree C, but the ice volume is near its minimum since snow season in the Arctic has already started, and new snow on ice stays, and fresh snow has a higher albedo than old, tired ice.
How much more ice? As of today the sea ice volume is 500 to 1000 km3 larger than last two years, not much, but enough to make a trend. In addition the ice on Greenland has increased by 150 km3, reversing many years of decline.
The prediction that the Arctic ice would be melted by 2016 was foolish extrapolation, but the chart looked good at the time.
This year’s minimum will be about 6,000 km3.
The moral of this story. Beware of extrapolations. Don’t trust models, go with observations.
And one more thing. In 2016 the sailboat Polar Ocean Challenge managed to sail through both the North East Passage and the North West Passage in the same season. In 2015 it would have been no problem The North East Passage choke point Cape Chelyuskin was ice free late July. In 2016 it was still ice covered Aug 5, but the first summer storm cleared out the ice plug. This year Cape Chelyuskin is still full of ice
This year they could not have made the journey. There is not enough time left until the North West Passage freezes over.
Having a snow day here at State College, and watching the birds feast on theseeds in the feeder, remembering the temperature was in the fifties yesterday my thoughts went back, way back to a time when I was trying to figure out why it was so hard to calibrate a temperature programmed gas chromatograph when analyzing samples from -40C to 275C. During the cryogenic phase water vapor froze on the inside of the oven, and when the oven temperature then rose through the melting point of water, temperature rise took a pause until all the ice was evaporated. As a result, calibration could vary widely dependent on the humidity and how long the oven was in the cryogenic state.
The weather has been unusual this year. After a long drought the Pacific coast has been hit with a seemingly unbroken string of storms, carrying moisture all the way from the Philippines, resulting in record rain and snow. Likewise, in the Atlantic there have been a string of strong storms going from the Gulf of Mexico all the way up to Greenland or Norway, and the storms are still roaring. From time to time the temperature has been reported to be up to 30 degrees warmer than normal, and it has been raining as far north as Svalbard.
A few years ago there was a prediction (was is Al Gore?) that Arctic Sea ice would be totally gone by the year 2015 and the following charts were produced as proof:
The charts seem to indicate that by September 2015 Arctic ice would be totally gone and all Arctic snow by summer 2014.
Yogi Berra said: “It is hard to predict, especially about the future.” So how are we doing?
Arctic ice started out with the lowest minimum since 2012 and is still at record low levels for this time of the year.
The total sea ice volume is also at a record low for this time of the year: (from DMI, Danish Meteorological Institute)
Couple this with the message that 2016 was reported the warmest year on record, and there seems to be plenty cause for alarm. But then it was reported by whistle blowers that the temperature data is homogenized to better align with climate models, in other words, falsified, so we may have to look for something that does not change over time, like temperature. Snow and ice have the characteristic of freezing and melting at the same temperature, al long as there is no change in what else is in the snow or ice, like soot or salinity.
With all this ice melting, what is happening to the snow? Checking Rutgers’ University Global Snow Lab ice charts it is clear that the fall snow cover is increasing, signifying an about 8% increase in the last 50 years, and surprisingly, a significant rise in the last 8 years.
This seems to hint it is getting colder.
Not so fast: what happens to the winter snow cover?
Again we see a slight upward movement, about 2% in the last 50 years.
The January 2017 result are in, and the snow cover was the 5th highest on record for January, so the upward trend continues, indicating the climate is getting colder.
But what happens in spring?
The story is quite different with the snow cover decreasing about 10% in the last 50 years.
That must mean the climate is warming.
Let us look at one more piece of statistics: The Greenland ice cover.
This fall has seen a lot of snow falling over Greenland, about double of normal, much like the rain falling in California, the result of a string of storms starting in the Philippines, raining and snowing i California, snowing out in the Western states, recharging themselves with moisture from the Gulf of Mexico, and finally snowing out over Greenland or Norway.
When the storms hit Greenland the temperature spikes, sometimes reaching 30F above normal, but it is still snowing!
This year the snow fallen over Greenland is larger than ever recorded. This means that al this new-fallen snow will not melt during the melting season, which means the snow albedo is higher this year and will cause less snow melt than in years when the albedo is lower
The albedo was constantly getting lower until 2012, and then it again snowed more than normal and the albedo recovered in 2013, from then continuing a downward trend. This year it will probably recover some more, leading to a year of ice gain over Greenland.
Why is the albedo decreasing? Blame China. The last few years they have been building one dirty coal plant every week, spewing out soot and sulphur compounds in spite of their claim to have the best scrubbers. This is the reason for the earlier spring snow melt.
The conclusion?
The effects of increasing CO2 is mush less than the effects from clouds and what the clouds reflect back into the sky and what they carry in the form of water vapor. We are now seeing the result of the end of the el nino, the raining out of the excess humidity, which happens when the earth again is cooling.
It is the first time since February 1979 it has snowed in Ain Sefra, located on the edge of the Sahara Desert. That snow lasted for about an hour, and it was mid-winter. This time the snow lasted for a whole day, and it was on the last day of fall!
I guess this is why the alarmists changed from calling it Global Warming to Climate change. Snow that lies doesn’t lie.
Len Bilén's blog, a blog about faith, politics and the environment. 