Antarctic ice is growing, not melting away

[Gaf The Horse With Tears]

Antarctic ice is growing, not melting away

ICE is expanding in much of Antarctica, contrary to the widespread public belief that global warming is melting the continental ice cap.

The results of ice-core drilling and sea ice monitoring indicate there is no large-scale melting of ice over most of Antarctica, although experts are concerned at ice losses on the continent's western coast.

Antarctica has 90 per cent of the Earth's ice and 80 per cent of its fresh water, The Australian reports. Extensive melting of Antarctic ice sheets would be required to raise sea levels substantially, and ice is melting in parts of west Antarctica. The destabilisation of the Wilkins ice shelf generated international headlines this month.

However, the picture is very different in east Antarctica, which includes the territory claimed by Australia.

East Antarctica is four times the size of west Antarctica and parts of it are cooling. The Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research report prepared for last week's meeting of Antarctic Treaty nations in Washington noted the South Pole had shown "significant cooling in recent decades".

Australian Antarctic Division glaciology program head Ian Allison said sea ice losses in west Antarctica over the past 30 years had been more than offset by increases in the Ross Sea region, just one sector of east Antarctica.

"Sea ice conditions have remained stable in Antarctica generally," Dr Allison said.

The melting of sea ice - fast ice and pack ice - does not cause sea levels to rise because the ice is in the water. Sea levels may rise with losses from freshwater ice sheets on the polar caps. In Antarctica, these losses are in the form of icebergs calved from ice shelves formed by glacial movements on the mainland.

Last week, federal Environment Minister Peter Garrett said experts predicted sea level rises of up to 6m from Antarctic melting by 2100, but the worst case scenario foreshadowed by the SCAR report was a 1.25m rise.

Mr Garrett insisted global warming was causing ice losses throughout Antarctica. "I don't think there's any doubt it is contributing to what we've seen both on the Wilkins shelf and more generally in Antarctica," he said.

Dr Allison said there was not any evidence of significant change in the mass of ice shelves in east Antarctica nor any indication that its ice cap was melting. "The only significant calvings in Antarctica have been in the west," he said. And he cautioned that calvings of the magnitude seen recently in west Antarctica might not be unusual.

"Ice shelves in general have episodic carvings and there can be large icebergs breaking off - I'm talking 100km or 200km long - every 10 or 20 or 50 years."

Ice core drilling in the fast ice off Australia's Davis Station in East Antarctica by the Antarctic Climate and Ecosystems Co-Operative Research Centre shows that last year, the ice had a maximum thickness of 1.89m, its densest in 10 years. The average thickness of the ice at Davis since the 1950s is 1.67m.

A paper to be published soon by the British Antarctic Survey in the journal Geophysical Research Letters is expected to confirm that over the past 30 years, the area of sea ice around the continent has expanded.

[taysteewonderbunny]

Um. Wow. [/sarcasm] The ice caps are melting. Whether or not they will disappear, cause a catastrophic rise in sea level, cause the extinction of species, etc, is speculation. Each year, ice caps continue to go through a cycle wherein they gain some, recede some. In some years, they may gain more than they recede, but overall, they have been melting more than their total gain. It is generally agreed that this is because we are in a period of global warming--that is to say, we are coming out of an ice age. The degree to which human activity might exacerbate the climate change is a matter of debate, but that the climate IS changing should not be. It is.

[peelingchrome]

Um. Wow. [/sarcasm] The ice caps are melting. Whether or not they will disappear, cause a catastrophic rise in sea level, cause the extinction of species, etc, is speculation. Each year, ice caps continue to go through a cycle wherein they gain some, recede some. In some years, they may gain more than they recede, but overall, they have been melting more than their total gain. It is generally agreed that this is because we are in a period of global warming--that is to say, we are coming out of an ice age. The degree to which human activity might exacerbate the climate change is a matter of debate, but that the climate IS changing should not be. It is.

I recently started a thread that, I think relates to this... it's about cycles of solar minimums and maximums. From what I've read and heard, we're RIGHT on target for global temperature estimates from a solar cycle point of view. I'll see if I can find that other article... (wish me luck!)

[Gaf The Horse With Tears]

Um. Wow. [/sarcasm] The ice caps are melting. Whether or not they will disappear, cause a catastrophic rise in sea level, cause the extinction of species, etc, is speculation. Each year, ice caps continue to go through a cycle wherein they gain some, recede some. In some years, they may gain more than they recede, but overall, they have been melting more than their total gain. It is generally agreed that this is because we are in a period of global warming--that is to say, we are coming out of an ice age. The degree to which human activity might exacerbate the climate change is a matter of debate, but that the climate IS changing should not be. It is.

right.. except for the "they have been melting more than their total gain" There is far to much empirical evidence to the contrary. and this part "we are coming out of an ice age" where the empirical evidence say we are going into one.

but really, the only thing any of the scientists (not pundits) can agree on is that we don't have enough information to say either way with any certainty whats really going on.

[Rev.Reverence]

right.. except for the "they have been melting more than their total gain" There is far to much empirical evidence to the contrary. and this part "we are coming out of an ice age" where the empirical evidence say we are going into one.

but really, the only thing any of the scientists (not pundits) can agree on is that we don't have enough information to say either way with any certainty whats really going on.

[prick]

right.. except for the "they have been melting more than their total gain" There is far to much empirical evidence to the contrary. and this part "we are coming out of an ice age" where the empirical evidence say we are going into one.

but really, the only thing any of the scientists (not pundits) can agree on is that we don't have enough information to say either way with any certainty whats really going on.

I agree that there is not enough information yet but I do think we should tell the Polar bears something.

[Gaf The Horse With Tears]

Ya, to stop fucking so much. Thier numbers are off the charts and growing every year.

Thre are some population areas where the numbers are going down... but the over data is a growing population.

People need to stop listening to pundits and check facts.

[ttogreh]

Start checkingfacts, huh? All right.

Fact: Petroleum, Natural gas, and coal are finite resources. When they are consumed, they are gone. We can create some liquid fuels and natural gas artificially, but that takes energy. Coal is mostly carbon and hydrogen, and we will never run out of carbon or hydrogen, but we will run out of natural coal. Whether it takes 50 years or five hundred does not make my statement any less true, or less relevant.

Fact: The earth is a tiny blue ball in a vacuum next to an ever expanding nuclear holocaust. The climate is changing. We are experiencing climate change. We need to accept this, and prepare for it. Which way to plan for the next 50 years, hotter or colder, depends on where a person is on the planet. The climate is changing. Deal with it, or die.

Fact: when we burn something, toxic fumes come from it. When we burn a lot of coal, mercury is released. Mercury is a poison. When we burn gasoline in older engines or in poorly engineered engines, ozone is released, as well as oxides of nitrogen. Ozone and oxides of nitrogen are poisons. We have a fuck-ton of poorly engineered, older engines burning a fuck-ton of gasoline right along with a fuck-ton of coal plants burning a fuck-ton of coal. We... are... poisoning ourselves.

Fact: we can do something about all of these things, and harping on the sea ice of antartica totally misses the point. The future is low emissions vehicles, renewable energy, and recognizing that we can't expect to live on barrier islands and continue to get our houses insured.

That's all there is to it.

[taysteewonderbunny]

Start checkingfacts, huh? All right.

Fact: Petroleum, Natural gas, and coal are finite resources. When they are consumed, they are gone. We can create some liquid fuels and natural gas artificially, but that takes energy. Coal is mostly carbon and hydrogen, and we will never run out of carbon or hydrogen, but we will run out of natural coal. Whether it takes 50 years or five hundred does not make my statement any less true, or less relevant.

Fact: The earth is a tiny blue ball in a vacuum next to an ever expanding nuclear holocaust. The climate is changing. We are experiencing climate change. We need to accept this, and prepare for it. Which way to plan for the next 50 years, hotter or colder, depends on where a person is on the planet. The climate is changing. Deal with it, or die.

Fact: when we burn something, toxic fumes come from it. When we burn a lot of coal, mercury is released. Mercury is a poison. When we burn gasoline in older engines or in poorly engineered engines, ozone is released, as well as oxides of nitrogen. Ozone and oxides of nitrogen are poisons. We have a fuck-ton of poorly engineered, older engines burning a fuck-ton of gasoline right along with a fuck-ton of coal plants burning a fuck-ton of coal. We... are... poisoning ourselves.

Fact: we can do something about all of these things, and harping on the sea ice of Antartica totally misses the point. The future is low emissions vehicles, renewable energy, and recognizing that we can't expect to live on barrier islands and continue to get our houses insured.

That's all there is to it.

I will not dispute that. It just seems to make sense to me that whatever the predicted consequences are on the long term, we should examine our behaviors and their immediate impact and try to minimize the negative effects of that impact for the sake of our long term comfort and survival. To that effect, denying that ANY of our behaviors have negative consequences, doubting the inevitability of climate change (human induced or not), or crying "DOOM!", all are ineffective, divisive, and ineffectual strategies.

[candyman]

The future is low emissions vehicles? That was the future a while back there man...the worst cars today are LEV...the better ones go past that. Here, take a 5-gas and go around testing vehicles produced from around 1996 and on...the exhaust is clean or is at least at the point where it can be cleaned a bit more.

The internal combustion engine still has a long future ahead of it and just because it burns gasoline doesn't mean that it is killing the atmosphere. The problem does not lie in the engine design, the problem is the users. If a vehicle is properly maintained it will be just fine...but we live in a time where people buy cars and treat them like shit until they can buy a new one. Right now we have enignes that are easy as shit to keep working properly...let us try that with the fuel cells and electronic hybrids...if anyone can even afford to maintain their hybrid or electric car, meaning parts, I would love to meet the small handful of technicians that have the ability to work on them...I would also love to see what they charge per hour. The fact is that I already know the cost of these vehicles and the sad part is that for all their hype and glory they really total up to jack shit. A little advancement in IC engines would yeild a far superior product, granted there would be no flux-capacitor, and would do it for a very small fraction of the price and an assurance that there are many people that can take care of it should it break for a reasonable fee.

If fuel companies would be force to keep their fuels up to regulation them maybe the CC's on most cars would not fail. But no, they keep putting in additives which destroy the positive effects of the CC. Maybe if the government would fund the right programs...but no that is too much to ask...they have to go with extreme "solutions" that bring them money and cost us money.

Do you know how we would be able to keep using coal burning powerplants, reduce their emissions to absolutely zero, and have a much greater power output than before without spending tons of money? No...probably not...considering most of the ways to reduce our pollution and become "green" are only green because of the money spent on them, see ethanol, and nobody pays attention to the cost effective solutions that can be easily implemented without affecting out wallets much and without really changing what we do, just how we do it.

If anyone wants to talk "green" or about pollution go ahead...but we can neither stay the way we are and we cannot completely change either. IC powered vehicles will stay, coal burning powerplants will stay, everything else will stay...but idiots must be shown what the real meaning of a "tweak" is and how is it much better then tossing your wallet at something that may or may not work.

Oh interesting fact: Hybrid vehicles produce just as much pollution as conventional IC powered vehicles...just at different times and in different ways.

[candyman]

I would just like to add something else here.

With all that we know, all that information that we have, the fact remains that we still know jack shit about this world that we live on. We know nothing or out oceans yet people make claims about them relating to "global warming". We know really nothing of our atmosphere yet we claim to know how it acts based on certain parameters.

For all we know out impact on this planet may be nothing. Even if we lived like cavemen and lived basic lives this planet could destroy us at any moment. Take the example of Katrina: What did we really do? Hurricanes are beasts that cannot be calculated in an effective manner. Why oh why are we confused when a hurricane, a natural occurance in that area, wipes out a city that was built below sea level in an unstable area? The city interrupted a natural cycle that went along with the Mississippi and sealed its own fate. It was only a matter of time before something happened to that city.

I want to ask those that believe in evolution something too. Survival of the fittest...how does that apply here? We survived up to this point, what did we do wrong? If we are doing something wrong doesn't that mean that the THEORY of evolution is wrong?

[torn asunder]

all i really have to say about global warming is this...

there is no possible way that you can predict, with any certainty, a trend for cycles that span thousands of years, with only a couple hundred years' worth of data at most. in no way do we have enough info to predict a damn thing.

i could pick a data set from the stock market during a time when everything was climbing, and predict that in 20 years, the dow would close at 215,235, but it would be stupid to do so, based on such a small data set.

that being said, i still think it's a worthy thing to address.

[candyman]

all i really have to say about global warming is this...

there is no possible way that you can predict, with any certainty, a trend for cycles that span thousands of years, with only a couple hundred years' worth of data at most. in no way do we have enough info to predict a damn thing.

i could pick a data set from the stock market during a time when everything was climbing, and predict that in 20 years, the dow would close at 215,235, but it would be stupid to do so, based on such a small data set.

that being said, i still think it's a worthy thing to address.

+1

there is no doubt that we should always check on whatever we do...but it should not be done with the idea that it is wrong

[ttogreh]

The future is low emissions vehicles? That was the future a while back there man...the worst cars today are LEV...the better ones go past that. Here, take a 5-gas and go around testing vehicles produced from around 1996 and on...the exhaust is clean or is at least at the point where it can be cleaned a bit more.

I was inarticulate. I did not mean "low emissions vehicles" in the legal or engineering sense. I meant vehicles that produce low emissions. As in, nearly no emissions.

The internal combustion engine still has a long future ahead of it and just because it burns gasoline doesn't mean that it is killing the atmosphere. The problem does not lie in the engine design, the problem is the users. If a vehicle is properly maintained it will be just fine...but we live in a time where people buy cars and treat them like shit until they can buy a new one. Right now we have enignes that are easy as shit to keep working properly...let us try that with the fuel cells and electronic hybrids...if anyone can even afford to maintain their hybrid or electric car, meaning parts, I would love to meet the small handful of technicians that have the ability to work on them...I would also love to see what they charge per hour. The fact is that I already know the cost of these vehicles and the sad part is that for all their hype and glory they really total up to jack shit. A little advancement in IC engines would yeild a far superior product, granted there would be no flux-capacitor, and would do it for a very small fraction of the price and an assurance that there are many people that can take care of it should it break for a reasonable fee.

Indeed, you can over-engineer anything. However, extended range battery electric vehicles, such as the upcoming Chevy Volt and the vehicles of several start-up companies have fewer parts, not more. Granted, they are all ran by a small computer that is a single point of failure, but if you build that to be durable AND easily swapped out, then you also only have a battery, four electric motors, an internal combustion engine tied to an electric generator, and the wiring between those elements. That's nine things that can go wrong. The most complex of those things being the wiring.

People can learn how to fix those things.

If fuel companies would be force to keep their fuels up to regulation them maybe the CC's on most cars would not fail. But no, they keep putting in additives which destroy the positive effects of the CC. Maybe if the government would fund the right programs...but no that is too much to ask...they have to go with extreme "solutions" that bring them money and cost us money.

The fuel problem will solve itself, I think. See, when extended range battery electric vehicles do come on to the market, we will only need one gear for the engine, and that is optimal revolution. Turbine engines are the most fuel efficient and fuel versatile combustion engines humans have ever made. Once we don't need a drive-train, the need for an engine that can be efficient at idle AND optimal revolution is gone. Fuel companies will pay attention when start-ups selling anything liquid that can burn start eating into their profits.

Do you know how we would be able to keep using coal burning powerplants, reduce their emissions to absolutely zero, and have a much greater power output than before without spending tons of money? No...probably not...considering most of the ways to reduce our pollution and become "green" are only green because of the money spent on them, see ethanol, and nobody pays attention to the cost effective solutions that can be easily implemented without affecting out wallets much and without really changing what we do, just how we do it.

This problem will also solve itself. Coal is king because it is so cheap. However, we only have about sixty years of domestic coal at current consumption levels. Wind is infinite, as is solar, hydroelectric dams, biomass, and wave energy, not to mention geothermal. We have ten thousand years of uranium dissolved in the seas at current consumption levels. The writing is on the wall. If electric utilities want to be in business past 2070, they need to diversify and move towards renewable or alternative fossil fuels.

There are ten thousand years worth of natural gas deposits under the sea, but we need to see what will be the cheapest and lowest impact way forward.

If anyone wants to talk "green" or about pollution go ahead...but we can neither stay the way we are and we cannot completely change either. IC powered vehicles will stay, coal burning powerplants will stay, everything else will stay...but idiots must be shown what the real meaning of a "tweak" is and how is it much better then tossing your wallet at something that may or may not work.

Coal plants will stay for as long as coal is cheap. Internal combustion engines are never going away, that's for sure.

Oh interesting fact: Hybrid vehicles produce just as much pollution as conventional IC powered vehicles...just at different times and in different ways.

Indeed, we do need to look at the factory-to-tailpipe emissions of our vehicles, but the technology hurdle and pollution parity gap is getting smaller. The old way of doing things is simply unsustainable.

[candyman]

I was inarticulate. I did not mean "low emissions vehicles" in the legal or engineering sense. I meant vehicles that produce low emissions. As in, nearly no emissions.

Indeed, you can over-engineer anything. However, extended range battery electric vehicles, such as the upcoming Chevy Volt and the vehicles of several start-up companies have fewer parts, not more. Granted, they are all ran by a small computer that is a single point of failure, but if you build that to be durable AND easily swapped out, then you also only have a battery, four electric motors, an internal combustion engine tied to an electric generator, and the wiring between those elements. That's nine things that can go wrong. The most complex of those things being the wiring.

People can learn how to fix those things.

The fuel problem will solve itself, I think. See, when extended range battery electric vehicles do come on to the market, we will only need one gear for the engine, and that is optimal revolution. Turbine engines are the most fuel efficient and fuel versatile combustion engines humans have ever made. Once we don't need a drive-train, the need for an engine that can be efficient at idle AND optimal revolution is gone. Fuel companies will pay attention when start-ups selling anything liquid that can burn start eating into their profits.

This problem will also solve itself. Coal is king because it is so cheap. However, we only have about sixty years of domestic coal at current consumption levels. Wind is infinite, as is solar, hydroelectric dams, biomass, and wave energy, not to mention geothermal. We have ten thousand years of uranium dissolved in the seas at current consumption levels. The writing is on the wall. If electric utilities want to be in business past 2070, they need to diversify and move towards renewable or alternative fossil fuels.

There are ten thousand years worth of natural gas deposits under the sea, but we need to see what will be the cheapest and lowest impact way forward.

Coal plants will stay for as long as coal is cheap. Internal combustion engines are never going away, that's for sure.

Indeed, we do need to look at the factory-to-tailpipe emissions of our vehicles, but the technology hurdle and pollution parity gap is getting smaller. The old way of doing things is simply unsustainable.

There are a few problems with the Chevy Volt though. First, it is basically a brick going down the road, wind tunnel tests have shown that it does not really flow air. That can be fixed though. Also, it runs off of more than one computer and will probably use the CAN/BUS system...either that or fiber optic. People could learn to fix them, but their complexity is insane and the danger risk is even worse, not as bad a hybrids though. The expense for these vehicles goes all the way to changing the tires and I know of one person that can afford to buy one of these things AND fix it. They have really made no effort to make anything in these vehicles easy to swap out at all. I would rather swap the entire drivetrain on a Dodge minivan than do the tires and a battery on a Prius...I know because I have done both and guess which one can be done in only a few hours...the Prius took three days because of all the parts that needed to be changed and ordered.

My big beef with all this "green" stuff is that it requires everyone to change everything...that will not work or help at all. Cars can remain the way they are with certain improvements. However, most of the fuel problems can be solved by FLEETS changing to hybrid technologies. The common person will never use a hybrid to its fullest potential causing them to spend too much and help nothing at all. Fleet vehicles and their drivers are a different story, they have far more options avaliable to them already that have been proven to work. It would cost little for them to implement these systems and they would certainly use them to their fullest potential. Think about it, how many fleet trucks do you see in one day? Those trucks don't even come close to sipping fuel and if they could be made to it would solve a few problems. I am just sick of people holding these non-conventional cars up as solutions when they are nothing more than supplements at most...they are really just ideas for the future that should be worked on alot more before they are released.

With the burning of fossil fuels, we don't really need to stop we just need to adjust a few things. Coal burning power plants have to work very hard...VERY hard to keep up with demand. Any process that has to keep up with demand like that will not work efficiently...that is not the problem of the process it is a problem with how it is being used. Now, people keep calling for an elimination of a power plants that burn matter in favor of those that burn nothing. That will not work as it will trade, well, shit for shit. However, test groups in Milwaukee have proven that if you take very small solar panels, a few wind generators, some waste burners, a few algae growers, and homes switch to better lighting you allow the coal burning powerplants to run at optimum levels where they produce little in the way of emissions...and those emissions will be cleaned up by the algae growers...and that algae will be used to make alternative fuels.

Wind is infinite, as is solar, hydroelectric dams, biomass, and wave energy, not to mention geothermal. All those technologies combined with our fossil fuel plants can allow them all to run at safe levels while producing plenty of energy...it will also strech out our reserves allowing us to either use them longer, or sell them.

The old way of doing things will never really be gone, just a little different. Emissions testing is good right now and even though improvements can be made they need to be made in the people first. I mean think about it, if the common people of today cannot take care of their vehicles, money not being the issue, then how the hell can we trust them with these new, expensive, and complicated vehicles? It will be hell on earth...the Toyota dealership in Madison has to keep expanding their Prius area...not for sales but major repairs...they also have a "rescue squad" that picks up the Prius and the owner after they ran out of gas.

I just feel that we are rushing into things WAY too quickly without a though about what it will do...we just hear the it is "new" and "alternative" and then eveyone freaks out and thinks that it is god...

[torn asunder]

a bit off-topic, but not - i read an article the other day that said someone was looking at creating artificial "trees" that would absorb carbon dioxide (which is said to be the largest greehouse gas contributor) from the air.

wtf!? plant some goddamned trees, you idiots! trees (and other vegetation) are basically earth's "air scrubbers", and here we are cutting them down in droves, but talking about *manufacturing* artificial trees?

someone's off their fucking rocker...