Tag: sea level

“The Arctic ice is back to normal.” Yeah, right.


This New Scientist video includes some rather spectacular images of a rapidly draining meltwater lake on the surface of the Greenland ice sheet. The three kilometre wide lake drained down through 1 km of ice in an hour and a half, at a rate similar to that of the water flowing over the Niagara Falls. Full story here, and more detail from NASA here. Meanwhile, RealClimate covers the factors driving the acceleration of Greenland’s outlet glaciers, the principle mechanism for getting large volumes of ice into the ocean. There’s some interesting stuff in the comments, too, particularly from a scientist (Tad Pfeiffer) working on establishing an upper limit to the contribution to global sea level rise likely from Greenland’s glaciers. Nature also has a very nice overview article on the state of research on the GIS, but unfortunately it’s hidden away behind a paywall.

Offshore in the high Canadian Arctic, Canadian Rangers have discovered large cracks are appearing in the Ward Hunt ice shelf, a large chunk of very old and thick ice on the northern coast of Ellesmere Island. The Arctic sea ice has now begun its spring melt back, and the National Snow & Ice Data Centre has posted a page to monitor this summer’s events. The time series graph of ice extent (here) compares current ice to last year’s record and the 79-2000 average. You can monitor ice area (a slightly different metric) at Cryosphere Today (here).

Down South, more results from the Andrill Project were presented at last week’s European Geophysical Union conference. Researchers now have a climate history for the continent stretching back 17 million years, and there are plans to drill a new core (starting in 2012) to take that back to 40 million years, when the continent started iceing up. Grab the Nature article before it disappears behind a paywall.

Tasman.jpgThis is the Tasman Glacier, near Mt Cook, from the lookout on the lateral moraine a couple of months ago (click for a larger version: pic ©GR). New fieldwork shows that the lake is now 7 km long, 2 km wide and – amazingly – 245 m deep. The results confirm that the presence of the lake effectively dooms the glacier to disappear – within 20 years, according to the research team from Massey University. Herald story here.

I’ll drown in my own tears

homer.jpg But tears of laughter or tears of frustration? I honestly don’t know whether to laugh or cry (but I’ve certainly got the blues) about a “Viewpoints” feature in this week’s Listener – here’s the intro that runs above two single page articles:

The latest UN climate change conference canvassed many opinions. The Listener asked people from opposite sides of the debate to share their views.

On the crank side we have Bryan Leyland and Chris de Freitas. The “balancing” view comes from Professor Dave Kelly, an ecologist from the University of Canterbury (previews only – full text available after April 19). As I’ve said before, framing the discussion about climate change as a “debate” and with only two sides (it’s real/it isn’t) is highly misleading because it misrepresents the balance of evidence – and I’ll be returning to that in more depth in a future post. But what really brought tears to my eyes were the outright lies from the cranks. CdF repeats some of the untruths in his last outing in the Herald, and BL adds a few more of his own. Here we go again…

Continue reading “I’ll drown in my own tears”

Winter wonderland

205188main_2007ice_anomaly.jpg Climate cranks are keen to paint the last northern hemisphere (boreal) winter as unusually cold – a clear sign, they say, that “global warming is over”, and that global cooling has begun. Every crank’s at it: Bob Carter at Muriel’s place, Gerrit van der Lingen in an article in a Christchurch magazine and Vincent Gray in a submission to the select committee looking into the Emissions Trading Bill. It’s nonsense. The winter was cooler than many recent ones – but still 16th warmest, according to NOAA. A strong La Niña is cooling the tropical Pacific, and dragging the global average down, the precise converse of the strong El Niño that made 1998 so hot. In other words it’s weather noise, not long term change, as Stu Ostro explains at the Weather Channel. However, the cranks are right about one thing: last winter was unusual, but not for the reasons they think. In this post, I want to explore some of the reasons why this winter was out of the ordinary, and why I think it may demonstrate that rapid climate change is happening now. It’s an expanded version of how I began my last two talks…

Continue reading “Winter wonderland”

Black is the new white

homer.jpg Once again the sceptic-friendly opinion pages of the Herald provide noted NZ denier Chris de Freitas with a platform to spout the most astonishing tripe. It seems CdF reacted badly to a Reuters report about Tuvalu’s concerns about sea level rise. So he rushes to assure the Pacific island nation that their problem has nothing to do with climate change:

There is some inundation evident on islands in Tuvalu, but global warming is not the cause. It is the result of erosion, sand mining and construction projects causing an inflow of sea water.

That’s a relief. An associate professor in the geography department at Auckland University knows better than the world’s climate scientists and the government of Tuvalu. I hope the people of Tuvalu are suitably relieved.

Unfortunately, Chris undermines his good deed by continuing to talk utter nonsense. And “utter” is a mild description.

Continue reading “Black is the new white”

The midweek omnibus: #37 (Putney to Peckham)

There’s been some good news, and not too much bad news. Let’s start with some good NZ news.

  • The Hillary Institute of International Leadership, launched in Antarctica a year ago with Sir Ed in attendance, has announced that “Leadership in….Climate Change Solutions will be the topic for the Institute’s first four year work-cycle, 2008-2012.” The Institute will appoint annual Hillary Laureates who will give public lectures in the US and NZ (the first in Christchurch in June), and a major award, to be called the Hillary Step, in 2012. There will be substantial cash awards – they’re aiming for $1 million by 2012. Good interview on Radio Nz National earlier this week (scroll to 18:46) with an Institute spokesman. Meanwhile Helen Clark won an United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) Champions of the Earth award, which recognises individuals from each region of the world who have shown “extraordinary” leadership on environmental issues. The cynic in me comments that if wishes (and good words) were horses, she’d be riding a virtual Melbourne Cup winner. Unfortunately, in the real world she’s stuck on My Little Pony.
  • Christchurch Airport has achieved carbon neutrality through Landcare Research’s CarbonZero programme, making it the second in the world to do so (behind one in Sweden). Good marketing, at the very least, though it would be better if the international tourists arriving were as well offset.
  • Mass market electric vehicles take a step closer with announcement of a deal between Project Better Place, Renault-Nissan and the Israeli government. “The Israeli government would provide tax incentives to customers, Renault would supply the electric vehicles, and Project Better Place would construct and operate an Electric Recharge Grid across the entire country. Electric vehicles will be available for customers in 2011.” According to the launch press release, the scheme will use an “innovative business model” where drivers will not have own a battery, but will subscribe to the service on the basis of kilometers driven. This (and the tax incentives) will presumably keep the cost of the cars down. Over to Meridian… (Hat-tip: Joe Romm at Climate Progress). Meanwhile, Tesla are promising to (finally) deliver the first of their electric sportscars in March.
  • The EU has announced its climate plan, designed to reduce European emissions by 20% by 2020 [Economist, New Scientist, Guardian], and there will undoubtedly be a lot of fighting over how individual countries targets have been allocated. Meanwhile, the US has warned the EU not to use climate policy as a trade barrier, and the EU has warned the US that if it has no climate policy its products will face tariffs.
  • Technology Review has more on the Australian hybrid battery being successfully tested, and the BBC had a reporter on the Beluga as it began its transatlantic voyage to test the SkySail kite system.
  • Gar Lipow has made the full text of his book No Hair Shirt Solutions to Global Warming available as a free download [PDF]. I’m looking forward to reading it.
  • The BBC has done a couple of good pieces on king tides in Tuvalu and sea level rise, and The Economist finds encouraging signs of the success of eco-labelling (especially of sustainably harvested fish).
  • More wind farms on the way: Meridian has announced it intends to proceed with a 31 turbine installation in Wellington’s Ohariu valley – the $420 million Makara development. Meanwhile the Herald prints poet Brian Turner’s thoughts on the impact of wind farms on the NZ landscape. I don’t necessarily agree with his take on wind energy, but it’s hard to disagree with his conclusion: “Our oft-warbled claims to be ahead of the game and clean and green are no more than self-congratulatory chitter. Sort out what you think our legacy ought to be, people, and stand up for it before it’s too late.”
  • Finally, Weather Channel senior meteorologist Stu Ostro continues his analysis of weather developments in the northern hemisphere, and how they could be (or already are) are sign of the impact of rapid climate change. Well worth a read if you are in the slightest weather literate, and worrying for those who are. And lest we relax, scientists at the University of Colorado at Boulder report that the ice cap on Baffin Island in the far north of Canada has reduced in size by at least half over the last 50 years.