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2020 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #34
Posted on 22 August 2020 by John Hartz
Editor's Choice
Expedition shares scary photos from the North Pole
Loose and weak ice with lots of melt ponds, partly open water, and no signs of multiyear ice. The powerful photos from the MOSAiC expedition reaching the North Pole on August 19 show the dramatic impact of climate changes.
The sea ice is surprisingly weak, has lots of melt ponds, and the expedition ship Polarstern was able to easily break through. Photo: Steffen Graupnerice / MOSAiC
Few photos are better proof of the climate crisis than those taken by the members of the MOSAiC expedition over the last few days. The Barents Observer has obtained permission to repost some of them, showing the current ice-cap on the top of the world.
The photos clearly underline how several recent climate studies, predicting ice-free Arctic summers by 2035, is not a theoretical scenario but rather an unavoidable fact.
The expedition ship Polarstern sailed from the northern Fram Strait between Greenland and Svalbard to the North Pole this week.
“I’m very surprised to see how soft and easy to traverse the ice up to 88° North is this year, having thawed to the point of being thin and porous,” said Captain Thomas Wunderlich.
“Even after passing 88° North we mostly maintained a speed of 5-7 knots; I’ve never seen that so far north,” the Polarstern captain said.
He added: “The current situation is historic.”
Expedition shares scary photos from the North Pole by Thomas Nilsen, The Barents Observer, Aug 20, 2020
Articles Linked to on Facebook
Sun, Aug 16, 2020
- Blackballed: will coal bounce back from slump or is it terminal? by Nick O'Mally, Environment, Sydney Moring Herald, Aug 15, 2020
- Greenland's ice sheet has melted to a point of no return, according to new study by Max Claypool & Brandon Miller, CNN, Aug 14, 2020
- La Niña Watch increases one month before peak hurricane season by Allison Chinchar, CNN, Aug 16, 2020
- With better soil, farmers can fight climate change, make agriculture more sustainable, What on Earth, CBC Radio, Aug 16, 2020
Mon, Aug 17, 2020
- Kamala Harris might help ‘night and day’ shift for US on global climate diplomacy by Alister Doyle & Chloé Farand, Climate Home News, Aug 12, 2020
- As California Grid Buckles, It Faces Worst Heat in 70 Years by Brian K Sullivan, Bloomberg News, Aug 15, 2020
- China’s Summer of Floods is a Preview of Climate Disasters to Come by Lili Pike, InsideClimate News, Aug 17, 2020
- What Climate Alarm Has Already Achieved by David Wallace-Wells, Intelligncer, New York Magazine, Aug 14, 2020
- Death Valley, California, may have recorded the hottest temperature in world history by Jeff Masters, Eye on the Storm, Yale Climate Connections, Aug 17, 2020
Tue, Aug 18, 2020
- More than 3 million California homes may lose power in record heat wave due to rolling blackouts by Cheri Mossburg, CNN, Aug 17, 2020
- Climate crisis or ‘hoax’: Where Trump and Biden stand on environmental policy by Anna M Phillips, Politics, Los Angeles Times, Aug 17, 2020
- A simpler, more useful way to tax carbon by David Roberts, Energy & Environment, Vox, Aug 17, 2020
- Amazon's widespread fire damage 'invisible to our eyes' by Martin Kuebler, Environmnet, Deutsche Welle (DW), Aug 18, 2020
Wed, Aug 19, 2020
- Extreme Heat Exposure Could Really Ramp Up in U.S. Cities by Chelsea Harvey, E&E News/Scientific American, Aug 18, 2020
- Big oil need not apply: UK raises the bar for UN climate summit sponsorship by Chloé Farand, Climate Home News, Aug 18, 2020
- After two years of school strikes, the world is still in a state of climate crisis denial, Opinion by Greta Thunberg, Luisa Neubauer, Anuna De Wever & Adélaïde Charlier, Comment is Free, Guardian, Aug 19, 2020
- New York's Heat-Vulnerable Neighborhoods Need to Go Green to Cool Off by Ilana Cohen. InsideClimate News, Aug 18, 2020
Thu, Aug 20, 2020
- Climate Change Lesson From California's Blackouts: Prepare For Extremes by Lauren Sommer, Environment, NPR News, Aug 19, 2020
- We may have just seen the world's highest recorded temperature ever. Has that sunk in? by Bob Henson, Environment, Guardian, Aug 19, 2020
- Destructive Bay Area fires fueled by rare mix of intense dry lightning and extreme heat by Joseph Serna, Rong-Gong Lin II & Leila Miller, California, Los Angeles Times, Aug 20, 2020
- The Grizzly Creek fire is threatening the Colorado River and water for the entire West by Jason Blevins & Jennifer Brown, The Coorado Sun, Aug 19, 2020
Fri, Aug 21, 2020
- Mark Lynas's 'Final warning' on climate: 'It's all on us, here, now,' says reviewer by Spencer Weart, Review, Yale Climate Connections, Aug 19, 2020
- Nuclear Plants Face More Heat Risk Than They’re Prepared to Handle by Leslie Kaufman, Finance, Bloomberg News, Aug 19, 2020
- ‘Is This Real Life?’ A Wall of Fire Robs a Russian River Town of its Nonchalance by Evelyn Nieves, InsideClimate News, Aug 20, 2020
- Wildfires are blazing new records as they burn in 15 Western states by Brandon Miller, CNN, Aug 21, 2020
Sat, Aug 22, 2020
- Recipe for a Busy Hurricane Season: Warmer Water, Cleaner Air by Chelsea Harvey, E&E News/Scientific American, Aug 21, 2020
- Gulf Coast on alert as two tropical systems could threaten at the same time by Nicole Chavez & Allison Chinchar, CNN, Aug 21, 2020
- Expedition shares scary photos from the North Pole by Thomas Nilsen, The Barents Observer, Aug 20, 2020
- 2 Tropical Storms Aren’t Going To Merge Into A Megastorm - Here’s Why by Marshall Shepherd, Science, Forbes, Aug 22, 2020
Worst possible report: open water and melt ponds at the North Pole- the polar ice cap is going to disappear sooner than even the earliest predicted date. We're not going to cook the planet (and our survivability), we are already doing it. We are way past the time for preventative measures, we can only hope to ameliorate the destuctive consequences of global warming.
slcochran @1,
While there have been many statements made about the timing of the first ice-free summer up in the Arctic Ocean, the prediction of 2040 +/-10 years remains (although the IPO has been cited as a reason for it being earlier rather than later within that range).
Dramatic stuff is happening to the sea ice which is in terminal decline but it is worth considering the full set of data before getting carried away and proclaiming it "is going to disappear sooner than even the earliest predicted date." Open water & melt ponds at the North Pole have been observed for some years now (eg here from 10 years ago).
Consider this year's melt season which followed on from a freeze-up which was a little stronger than the previous few years - the 2020 melt season has been pretty dramatic with the Sea Ice Extent showing record breaking values through July yet the low SIE was not matched by such dramatic Sea Ice Area data which has only fleetingly managed record-breaking status. And the PIOMAS models of Sea Ice Volume show nothing record-breaking so far. Latest comparative PIOMAS values (for mid-Auguat) run:-
2012 ... 4.75M cu km
2019 ... 4.88M cu km
2020 ... 5.14M cu km
2017 ... 5.31M cu km
Of course, this is all dramatic stuff (the average 1979-2001 was three-times greater at 15M cu km) but the progress towards an ice-free summer Arctic Ocean is slow and still years away from being delivered. And even if it is now inevitable (as the Barants Observer says it is), that is no reason to slacken our efforts pushing for some rapid & long-overdue AGW mitigation measures. We certainly need something dramatic mitigation-wise to match the dramatic AGW we are already responsible for.