Irreversible warming tipping point possibly triggered: Arctic mission chief
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
The tipping point for irreversible global warming may have already been triggered, the scientist who led the biggest-ever expedition to the Arctic warned on Tuesday.
"The disappearance of summer sea ice in the Arctic is one of the first landmines in this minefield, one of the tipping points that we set off first when we push warming too far," said Markus Rex.
"And one can essentially ask if we haven't already stepped on this mine and already set off the beginning of the explosion."
Rex led the world's biggest mission to the North Pole, an expedition involving 300 scientists from 20 countries.
The expedition returned to Germany in October after 389 days drifting through the Arctic, bringing home devastating proof of a dying Arctic Ocean and warnings of ice-free summers in just decades.
The 140-million-euro ($165-million) expedition also brought back 150 terabytes of data and more than 1,000 ice samples.
The ice was only half as thick and temperatures measured 10 degrees higher than during the Fram expedition undertaken by explorers and scientists Fridtjof Nansen and Hjalmar Johansen in the 1890s.
Because of the smaller sea ice surface, the ocean was able to absorb more heat in the summer, in turn meaning that ice sheet formation in the autumn was slower than usual
"Only evaluation in the coming years will allow us to determine if we can still save the year-round Arctic sea ice through forceful climate protection or whether we have already passed this important tipping point in the climate system," Rex added, urging rapid action to halt warming.
World leaders had agreed under the Paris agreement in 2015 to take action to limit global warming to well below 2 degrees Celsius, preferably to 1.5 degrees Celsius, compared with pre-industrial levels.
Stefanie Arndt, who specialises in sea ice physics, said it was "painful to know that we are possibly the last generation who can experience an Arctic which still has a sea ice cover in the summer".
"This sea ice cover is gradually shrinking and it is an important living space for polar bears," said Arndt, while recounting observations of seals and other animals in the polar habitat.
The data collected during the expedition included readings on the atmosphere, ocean, sea ice and ecosystems.
Several hundred scientific publications analysing the findings are expected to be published between 2021 and 2023.
During the expedition, scientists had set up four observational sites on the sea ice in a radius of up to 40 kilometres (25 miles) around the mission's "Polarstern" (North Star) ship.
Among data collected were water samples from beneath the ice to study plant plankton and bacteria and better understand how the marine ecosystem functions under extreme conditions.
More than 100 parameters were measured almost continuously throughout the year.
The abundance of information will feed into the development of models to help predict what heatwaves, heavy rains or storms could look like in 20, 50 or 100 years.
Tags
Who is online
95 visitors
Lets see what their data says......
My bet is that it isn't a good idea to be buying that retirement home in Florida any time soon.....
Imma gonna have to agree with you. More and more it looks like our future is like that in Soylant Green.
Stock up on Frank's hot sauce...! Put that Sxxx on everything!
I better schedule a visit to the FL Keys at least once before they disappear.
By the time my house is paid off, I might have beach front property.
Same here
But, didn't anyone tell you climate change is a hoax?
A good bet would be to buy up land in Greenland - Trump may have had a good eye for future-valuable real estate.
I took a tour of the Midway. Is that where you took your avatar pic? Did you serve on her?
Nope.... Did IO cruises on CVN65 Enterprise, and CV64 Constellation. I was a "back-seater" (SENSO) in the S-3A Viking as part of VS-37
On the Midway flight deck there's a mannequin that looks just like your avatar.
I just read an article (I was going to post it) about world landmarks that have disappeared recently.
One of them was, I think I am saying it right, the Solomon Islands.
Another one was either an Artic or Antarctic ice shelf that broke off.
Antarctic. The size of Rhode Island if I am not mistaken.
The Arctic ice nor the Antarctic ice shelf that broke off will add to the ocean rising, both of which were already floating and when melted will actually decrease the ocean depth.
Another one was a glacier that is about gone. A ski resort had to close down.
I need to just post the article. Haha
The rest was about formations though.
I don't think it was free floating by looking at the pic before it broke off.
I need to find it. It just looked like snow with a crack in it.
According to NASA, if the Earth's glaciers and ice sheets melted, ocean levels would rise by 60 meters. Then there's the secondary effects to consider. Less ice means less sunlight is reflected back into space. Therefore, the oceans would absorb more solar heat and become warmer, which would disrupt the oceans currents. That would result in more severe storms and weather pattern changes, not to mention disrupting or destroying ocean ecosystems.
It was floating, that is why it cracked off. Without the foundation of land, a pressure crack started and the thawing/freezing action of water in the crack forced the crack larger until it split the entire shelf off. There was nothing global warming about it.
Yep, and?
Here's a question, what are the signs of the next ice age?
Less ice means less sunlight is reflected back into space. Therefore, the oceans would absorb more solar heat and become warmer, which would disrupt the oceans currents. That would result in more severe storms and weather pattern changes,
IMO this would be the signs of the coming ice age.
So your claim of the Artic & Antarctic ice not having and effect on ocean levels is not quite accurate.
I imagine temperatures would become very cold and remain cold for quite some time. But considering global temperatures are only rising, we're not likely to have an ice age anytime soon.
That would alter the climate. But it's unlikely to cause a total ice age.
Ever see snow piled up? Ever see fissures form in it as it melted away?
So your claim of the Artic & Antarctic ice not having and effect on ocean levels is not quite accurate.
I was agreeing with NASA's assessment, but there is that "if", so an assumption and do you think all the ice will melt?
I imagine temperatures would become very cold and remain cold for quite some time.
To lift that much water into the atmosphere to pile snow and ice up to 1 mile thick and, note, to maintain the glacial thickness into the lower 48 would take heat not cold, in other words there would be more precipitation than what could melt every summer to grow the glaciers of the ice age.
We're talking about an "Ice Shelf" a near solid piece of ice, not piles of snow.
Suggest you take a class in either heat transfer or thermodynamics...... It should help you to correct your thinking
You might also want to bone up upon thermal emissivity and energy absorption.
That is good.
It's not so much an "if" as it is more of a when. The ice is already melting and has been for some time.
Same difference. Snow is ice-frozen water.
Forming and maintaining a glacier requires snow to remain on the ground year round, with snowfall being greater than snow melt. With temperatures rising, forming or maintaining a glacier becomes increasingly problematic, as summer melts can last longer and/or be at higher temperatures during melting.
Before the last ice age, how much land was under water? If it was more than what we have now under water then shouldn't we expect that warming is a sign of the next ice age?
Under normal, natural conditions, a period of warming may precede the onset of a new ice age. As glacial and artic/antarctic ice melts, the warmed water absorbs CO2 more readily, reversing the greenhouse effect. Ergo, cooling results. The difference now is, human activity has greatly increased the concentration of CO2 and other greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere. So even if ice melted and the oceans warmed (disrupting ocean currents), current (and rising) concentrations of CO2 may not drop enough to reverse the greenhouse effect and significantly cool the planet enough to cause another ice age.
The next ice age is predicted to start in 1,500 years.
Anthropogenic global warming/climate change/pollution will likely have made the planet unlivable long before then.
I'll see if I can find the article, but if memory serves me, there are areas in the world where the water has reached it's saturation point with regards to CO2 absorption rates.
Forming and maintaining a glacier requires snow to remain on the ground year round, with snowfall being greater than snow melt.
Well actually the glaciers of the ice age were huge snow/ice fields that developed on flat land, so even in the summers with melting and rains the water could not leave the glacier and was therefore still part of the glacier, so the water didn't leave and was frozen in during the winter, so it was not just winter time building it was year round.
So here is the next question, where did all this precipitation come from to build and maintain the glaciers? The only water source large enough would be the oceans. The earth's poles are, well, polar opposites, the Antarctic is land surrounded by water and the Arctic is water surrounded by land. But each has a high pressure system of cold dry sinking air over them, the Antarctic the cold air spreads out over low energy ice and snow so not much happens, the Arctic, however, the cold air spreads out over higher energy water of the Arctic Ocean picking up the water vapor and spreading it out over the land and that water has to be replaced from the warmer waters (along with more salt) of the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans, which to me would mean that during the Ice Ages the Arctic Ocean is ice free year round or near year round. Now as the oceans start receding because the water is being locked up in the glaciers on land, there comes a point at which the Arctic Ocean now longer receives warmer waters, it freezes over, the system collapses, the precipitation stops or slows, and the glaciers melt away returning to the oceans.
1,500 years, I didn't realize it would be that soon.
Thank you. I would be interested in reading it.
Bam! And just like that bccrane "owns" NASA! /s.
I'm not sure what point you're trying to make? We know how an ice age can start. We also know the natural patterns of warming and cooling. What you seem to overlook is that the natural cycle is being disrupted, with a proclivity towards warmth. The conditions do not favor an ice age.
More fake news, there is no climate change. Opps, now if you ask the Alaskan village that have to be moved because they are being swallowed up by the sea you'll get a much different answer.
World leaders had agreed under the Paris agreement in 2015 to take action to limit global warming to well below 2 degrees Celsius, preferably to 1.5 degrees Celsius, compared with pre-industrial levels.
The seas are still rising very slowly, about a tenth of an inch a year, even though temperatures have leveled off somewhat. That's what happens during an interglacial period, of which there have been several over the last ~2 million years, as the Ice Ages come and go. It would be foolish to waste more billions of dollars trying to mitigate or reverse the so called coming climate catastrophe.
What it would take to combat climate change would be the concentrated and combined efforts and resources of ALL the Earth's nations, not just the United States. We can't afford to pay other nations to not pollute, since we have becoming a bankrupt nation thanks to the left wingers, whose out of control spending seems determined to put us deeper in debt.
Those world leaders don't have a clue as to what to do to prevent climate change. Right now it's all talk and no action.