Antarctic sea ice is expanding: study

Antarctic sea ice is expanding: study

www.heraldsun.com.au

GLOBAL warming has led to more ice in the sea around Antarctica and could help insulate the southern hemisphere from atmospheric warming.

A Dutch study says that unlike in the Arctic region, sea ice around Antarctica has expanded at a significant rate since 1985

(visit the link for the full news article)

The planet works in wierd ways doesnt it? Whilst the Artic region is diminishing in sea ice, we have the southern equivalent actually building in ice.

What I find oddly facinating is that contrast between the north and south pole and the weather between the northern hemisphere and southern hemisphere.

i.e. In Australia our weather/summers seem to be getting warmer but down south we are building more ice in Antarctica.

Northern hemisphere winters seem to be getting colder yet the northern sea ice is melting.

In my opinion I beleive that this is more to do with the amount of "soot" that our planet is producing settling on the northern sea ice and absorbing more of the suns heat, thus melting the ice even thou the tempritures are colder.

With the majority of the planets population in the northern hemisphere, the majority of the soot would be there aswell.

Make sense?

They say the expanding sea ice may constitute a "feedback" that has the potential to oppose southern hemisphere atmospheric warming and amplify increases in global sea level.

Changes in sea ice can significantly modulate climate change because of its high reflective and strong insulating nature, the paper says.

Does this mean that as Antarctic sea is grows, the more it reflect heat back to space, thus further cooling the southern hemisphere?

I wonder how this will further affect ocean currents/weather in the region.

www.heraldsun.com.au
(visit the link for the full news article)

Heres more info to prove the global climate contrast from North to South.

Artic Greening seen in global warming

LAND within the Arctic circle is likely to experience explosive "greening" in the next few decades as grass, shrubs and trees thrive in soil stripped of ice and permafrost by global warming, a study says.

Wooded areas in the Arctic could increase by as much as 52 per cent by the 2050s as the so-called tree line - the maximum latitude at which trees can grow - shifts hundreds of kilometres north, according to computer simulations published in the journal, Nature Climate Change.

reply to post by Melbourne_Militia


You've got to love Mother Earth. More ice in the south and more vegetation in the north. The balance will be made.

SNF

It's funny how global warming, or "climate change" theories constantly evolve to account for all the pseudo-scientific principles upon which it is based.

What did Al say?

Here in Antarctica, it’s easy to feel isolated from the rest of the world. But as I look at this exquisite continent buried deep under the ice, it’s troubling to think about what will happen as this ice melts ever more rapidly.
– Al Gore, originally posted at the Climate Reality Project.

Source

What about the migration of the magnetic North Pole? It's happening.

What about the axial tilt of the planet? It has changed. Often mentioned as a main cause of the Arctic/Antarctic situation, yet lost in the minutia of climate change drivel.

And what about the North Atlantic Oscillation? If it turns positive as predicted, the ice will re-freeze. If it stays negative, ice mass will be lost.

As Thatcher (not my favorite at all) once stated: "There is nothing more obstinate than a fashionable consensus." Pollution and man-made damage to the planet are a considerable issue to be addressed. That being said, the nonsense of "climate change" conspiracy theories need to be dropped for a more objective view of what is actually happening to our planet. Especially when considering past historical cycles.

I thought there was always a difference in growth and shrinkage between north and south poles.

Capt. Cook discovered that didn't he?

reply to post by Wide-Eyes


As soon as she gets rid of the pesky humans...

Oh no! Global cooling will kill us all! Save us carbon credits, you're our only hope!

Is this a long term ice layer like the ice masses on Greenland and other "old" ice, or is this just sea ice, similar to glacier ice, which displaces its own mass in the water.

An issue with Arctic warming is that it can contribute to a positive warming feedback loop so "old" ice will melt, like ice in Siberia or Greenland which has methane hydrate gases in them, increasing warming much more than co2.

Point being, the Arctic warming has a much more potential impact on humanity because the ice melting is not all sea ice. These ice reserves can cause ocean levels to rise along with global warming and who really knows what after that possibility imo.

reply to post by Philippines


It's probably a combination of things. One the Antarctic land ice is collapsing on the edges and falling into the sea then floating away the other is that the sea ice is melting from the bottom and when the antarctic winds blow it refreezes the surface but gives it a greater area. Think shorter and wider lol.

Originally posted by Kali74
reply to post by Philippines

 

It's probably a combination of things. One the Antarctic land ice is collapsing on the edges and falling into the sea then floating away the other is that the sea ice is melting from the bottom and when the antarctic winds blow it refreezes the surface but gives it a greater area. Think shorter and wider lol.

Perhaps, but this still does not offset the warming/ice melt going on in the Arctic in my opinion. The ice albedo seems to have changed for very old ice, and the methane hydrates to cause concern for runaway global warming in a positive feedback loop.

Let's also take into consideration that this could probably be a natural thing as Winter officially begins on June 21 in the Southern hemisphere. This is probably a natural occurrence to see the ice freezing again. The thing to look at is the ice volume. The Arctic has been noticing consecutive drops in the ice volume in recent years. Do you know if the ice volume is tracked in Antarctica and how it compares in volume to the Arctic?

Oh wow, some people seem to be a bit confused on this one.
Maybe this link will help you guys out.
Antarctic Sea Ice

reply to post by Philippines

Perhaps, but this still does not offset the warming/ice melt going on in the Arctic in my opinion.

Unfortunately, I agree.

The ice albedo seems to have changed for very old ice, and the methane hydrates to cause concern for runaway global warming in a positive feedback loop.

Is the lag for methane the same as it is for Co2 or does lag encompass all GHG's and how many more summers do you think we have before that old ice is melting in significant volumes?

The Arctic has been noticing consecutive drops in the ice volume in recent years. Do you know if the ice volume is tracked in Antarctica and how it compares in volume to the Arctic?

I know that the land ice in Antarctica is losing volume and is tracked but I'm not sure that sea ice volume has been monitored since the 80's, if not it probably will be soon. I know models run scenarios and according to those models sea ice is losing volume but it would be good to get confirmation, if possible. In searching for an answer I saw that antarctic sea ice volume was measured by passive microwave in the 80's but that doesn't sound too legit to me lol.

Hopefully someone will come along with a better answer.

Originally posted by Kali74
reply to post by Philippines

 

The ice albedo seems to have changed for very old ice, and the methane hydrates to cause concern for runaway global warming in a positive feedback loop.

Is the lag for methane the same as it is for Co2 or does lag encompass all GHG's and how many more summers do you think we have before that old ice is melting in significant volumes?

The Arctic has been noticing consecutive drops in the ice volume in recent years. Do you know if the ice volume is tracked in Antarctica and how it compares in volume to the Arctic?

I know that the land ice in Antarctica is losing volume and is tracked but I'm not sure that sea ice volume has been monitored since the 80's, if not it probably will be soon. I know models run scenarios and according to those models sea ice is losing volume but it would be good to get confirmation, if possible. In searching for an answer I saw that antarctic sea ice volume was measured by passive microwave in the 80's but that doesn't sound too legit to me lol.

Hopefully someone will come along with a better answer.

Yeah, the Arctic warming recently is really alarming. That has a direct impact on the human species everywhere on Earth. Not much else going on has the potential for disaster (that we can prepare for / try to mitigate) than "global warming". That term has been so tainted in countless ways lol.

To my knowledge on methane as a greenhouse gas, it is much more potent in the short term than the long term. In the past, these methane hydrates were released slowly, but now it is an an extremely accelerated rate.

Methane supposedly has an atmospheric half life of 7 years. The global warming potential of methane is "62 over 20 years and 21 over 100 years" - Methane Clathrate - Wikipedia - So if a lot is released very fast, then it could accelerate quickly into runaway global warming.

Sea ice volumes are seasonal and not as much of a concern as old permafrost land based ice, which its volume is not already being displaced in the ocean. Those old ice deposits melting could potentially mean sea levels rising.

The latest CrysoSat info (operating of course on hindsight rolling data) is showing that arctic sea ice volumes are continuing to decline in averages over time.

ESA.INT - CryoSat reveals major loss of Arctic sea ice

Also check out one of my faves:

Arctic.io - Observations

reply to post by Philippines


Thanks for those links and for answering my questions.

I don't think we have to worry about global warming here in the U.P. We may still have snow in June at the rate it is going. Maybe a glacier is trying to grow here.