Summer Arctic sea ice is going extinct 50% faster than predicted

[marmar]

from Grist:




Summer Arctic sea ice is going extinct 50% faster than predicted
By Philip Bump


In 2010, the European Union launched a satellite called CryoSat-2, with data analysis to be done by scientists at University College London (UCL). It had one task: determine the extent and thickness of sea ice. Previous satellites either couldn’t gauge ice thickness or had trouble penetrating cloud cover. CryoSat-2 can do both.

“Before CryoSat, we could see summer ice coverage was dropping markedly in the Arctic,” said (UCL professor Chris) Rapley. “But we only had glimpses of what was happening to ice thickness. Obviously if it was dropping as well, the loss of summer ice was even more significant. We needed to know what was happening — and now CryoSat has given us the answer.”

It just got in under the wire.


[font size="1"]Ponds on the surface of Arctic ice. (Photo by NASA.)[/font]

Combining data from a predecessor to CryoSat (named, lamely, ICESat) with on-the-ground measurements, scientists calculated the amount of Arctic sea ice in winter 2004 at 17,000 cubic kilometers, and in summer, at 14,000. .....................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://grist.org/news/summer-arctic-sea-ice-is-going-extinct-50-percent-faster-than-predicted/

[longship]

1. And nobody is paying attention to this shit.

At least nobody in power. Too bad for everybody on the planet.

R&K

[redqueen]

2. I keep hoping they'll find a negative feedback loop.

All they ever seem to find is positive ones.

I don't want to think we're toast, but...

[Uncle Joe]

4. Once we reach certain tipping points the only built in negative feedback loop that I see

is when society/humanity becomes so devastated by increasingly traumatic global warming climate change events and becomes mostly if not totally wiped out, the burning of fossilized carbon will cease.

I would like to be an optimist but I don't see any other negative feedback loop after we cross the Rubicon.

[redqueen]

5. Moderate sized meteorite hit?

Significant, sustained volcanic activity?

It would be nice if people with the money to blow through resources at will would stop doing so.

[Uncle Joe]

7. I thought of that as well, those events could happen but I

view them as being more outside of the current equation.

Having said that the melting of all the glaciers may alter plate tectonics enough to increase volcanic activity.

[redqueen]

8. Yeah, long shots.

What else have we got?

Obviously world leaders couldn't give a rip... and individuals intent on consuming as much as possible in their all-important (and tragically misguided) pursuit of happiness are too busy think of anything but themselves.

[Uncle Joe]

9. Your question reminds me of a song by Jackson Browne.

Now we got country and western on the bus
R and B, we got disco in eight tracks and cassettes in stereo
We've got rural scenes & magazines
We've got truckers on the CB
We've got Richard Pryor on the video
We got time to think of the ones we love
While the miles roll away
But the only time that seems too short
Is the time that we get to play
People you've got the power over what we do
You can sit there and wait
Or you can pull us through

http://www.lyricsfreak.com/j/jackson+browne/the+load+out_20068514.html

[Uncle Joe]

3. Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread, marmar.

[FarCenter]

6. There is a large detached area of ice in the East Siberian Sea that will melt by September

http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/