14 ms·

Antarctic sea-ice at 'mind-blowing' low alarms experts

66 points by mindracer 3y ago

solardev 3y ago
At some point, we should probably stop calling it climate change and just start calling it climate abandonment. We're all so desensitized now that the more stories come out, the less people care... =/
- throw_pm23 3y ago
  There is a slight danger though. Suppose there is a baseline climate change, Earth is getting gradually warmer on average. Then there is some yearly variation, say, this year above average by 3 degrees, 5 years later below average by 3 degrees. If you call the yearly variation climate change, then five years later your opponents will say "you see, it was a hoax". It is a bit like presidents taking credit for the stock market going up. Then when it inevitably goes down, it makes them look bad.
  - defrost 3y ago
    Sure - save for the geophysical fact that we're not seeing just variation .. underlying the usual flux we are seeing a steady increase in heat energy trapped in the near sea | land layer. This is an inevitable physical consequence of human activity steadily increasing the insulating properties of the atmosphere in a demonstrable and measurable way. Sure, right now we're going up faster than our new normal rate of increase due to ENSO flux, and in a few years we'll see our rate of increase drop below the current rate as ENSO swings back (fingers crossed) .. but overall on a ten year rolling average we're seeing steady increases in average global temp. as a direct result of human activity (hence AGW) and it'll stay that way until we reduce the insulation properties of the atmosphere.
  - myshpa 3y ago
    https://skepticalscience.com/global-warming-natural-cycle.htm https://skepticalscience.com/global-warming-natural-cycle.ht... https://skepticalscience.com/internal-variability.htm https://skepticalscience.com/internal-variability.htm
    - throw_pm23 3y ago
      It's hard to argue with someone who responds with links, but none of the content behind those links contradicts what I said. There can be a day-to-day variation of 10+ degrees. If Monday is cold and Tuesday is warm, and I say "this is because of global warming", then if Wednesday is lukewarm then I discredited myself.
      - myshpa 3y ago
        > this year above average by 3 degrees, 5 years later below average by 3 degrees > There can be a day-to-day variation of 10+ degrees You seem to be confusing weather with climate change. Weather refers to short-term atmospheric conditions, such as daily temperature and precipitation variations, while climate change represents long-term shifts in average temperature, precipitation patterns, and other climatic factors over extended periods, often spanning decades (3+) to centuries.
        throw_pm23 3y ago
        No, my point is that many articles on climate change confuse weather with climate change. (The crime that you accuse me of committing.) If someone says "this year is unusually warm with unusually low ice cover", that is not about climatic factors spanning decades to centuries. If someone says "the average ice cover between 2000-2020 is lower than the average cover between 1980-2000" that is about climate.
        myshpa 3y ago
        If I am misunderstanding your original comment then I'm sorry.
- PradeetPatel 3y ago
  That is not true, I think most people care dearly and are doing everything to slow down climate change, this includes participating in recycling and watching our own carbon footprints. Ultimately its up to us to convince the policymakers and senior leadership in corporations to make the correct decision.
  - myshpa 3y ago
    > participating in recycling and watching our own carbon footprints https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/may/31/avoiding-meat-and-dairy-is-single-biggest-way-to-reduce-your-impact-on-earth https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/may/31/avoiding... > Ultimately its up to us to convince the policymakers and senior leadership in corporations to make the correct decision Imagine a nation with the highest consumption of meat, where individual choices and habits have long shaped dietary preferences. In such a scenario, without widespread adoption of plant-based diets and a shift in societal norms driven by individuals, convincing policymakers and senior leadership in corporations to regulate and promote sustainable diets becomes an uphill battle. It's through our own choices and advocacy that we can lay the foundation for systemic change and address the pressing issue of climate change effectively.
  - netsharc 3y ago
    Huh, "most people"? Maybe in your community, but most of the planet probably don't care. And even if they do those things, only to a degree of inconvenience that they tolerate.. separating plastic/metal/etc? Easy. Missing out on European vacations? "But it's been my life dream to see Italy! It'll only be once in my lifetime!". And the little plastic recycling they do has the effect of making them think "I'm helping!", when in reality it moves the needle very little...
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
mg 3y ago
Could we breed trees which capture more CO2? We increased crop yields multifold already: https://ourworldindata.org/crop-yields https://ourworldindata.org/crop-yields So maybe we can do the same to carbon yield? Are trees the plants which capture most CO2 per hectare?
- myshpa 3y ago
  > We increased crop yields multifold already With catastrophic effects. https://www.stockholmresilience.org/research/research-news/2023-09-13-all-planetary-boundaries-mapped-out-for-the-first-time-six-of-nine-crossed.html https://www.stockholmresilience.org/research/research-news/2... All planetary boundaries mapped out for the first time, six of nine crossed https://www.researchgate.net/publication/320356605_Agriculture_production_as_a_major_driver_of_the_Earth_system_exceeding_planetary_boundaries https://www.researchgate.net/publication/320356605_Agricultu... Agriculture production as a major driver of the Earth system exceeding planetary boundaries Most of it is because of animal agriculture - it uses 80% of agriculture land and about half of our crops. https://ourworldindata.org/land-use https://ourworldindata.org/land-use https://ourworldindata.org/drivers-of-deforestation https://ourworldindata.org/drivers-of-deforestation https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26231772/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26231772/ https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/may/31/avoiding-meat-and-dairy-is-single-biggest-way-to-reduce-your-impact-on-earth https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/may/31/avoiding... > Could we breed trees which capture more CO2? We don't have to breed new trees. The ones we have are enough. We have enough space to capture 2+x more CO2 than we've released into the atmosphere since industrial revolution. We could switch to plant-based diets and free an area the size of both Americas. https://ourworldindata.org/uploads/2013/10/World-Map-by-Land-Use-01.png https://ourworldindata.org/uploads/2013/10/World-Map-by-Land... On that land a regular primeval forest, Miyawayki/Amazon/Syntropic style would grow 10x faster than regular monocultures and that would also enable the biodiversity to rebound. We'd get ourselves out of overshoot in no time (given few decades, of course). https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-020-00603-4 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-020-00603-4 https://ourworldindata.org/carbon-opportunity-costs-food https://ourworldindata.org/carbon-opportunity-costs-food The overshoot threatens our civilization with crop failures. The only realistic way out of it is immediate phase-out of fossil fuels and plant-based diets. https://ourworldindata.org/emissions-by-sector https://ourworldindata.org/emissions-by-sector https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/917471 https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/917471
jiofj 3y ago
(They began counting in 1981)
- edhelas 3y ago
  Do I feel some climatoscepticism, or at least climatodenialism in this message ?
  - jiofj 3y ago
    [flagged]
    - netsharc 3y ago
      Funny you mention religion, the deniers also have their own religion, disputing facts with their own "facts" and "truth". So what about 1981? Do you think it means it could've been lower than right now in, say, the 1970s, but the liars conveniently only started counting from the decade after? Given we have temperature data from further back and we know higher temperature = ice melts, the scientific mind would conclude there's a correlation. But oh nooo, jiofj knows better, there could be something else affecting it!
  - jkhdigital 3y ago
    Pathologizing dissent is not going to change anyone’s mind.
    - Fricken 3y ago
      If something was going to change their mind it would be changed by now.
    - timeon 3y ago
      Nothing is going to.
  - pauldenton 3y ago
    Comparing criticisms of data, (testing of data being a key part of science) to denying the Holocaust isn't going to win anyone over. We've heard many inaccurate predictions before, an easy one being "2 Weeks to flatten the curve" or "If you get vaccinated you'll have a 98% protection rate and can no longer catch Covid"
unpopular42 3y ago
Did we also panic in 2014 that was above average by a similar margin? I just can't remember
- timeon 3y ago
  Was it similar? The graph in article is showing that it was not.
- thulle 3y ago
  That little september bump? Compared to what seems to be a 5 month record gap?
  - unpopular42 3y ago
    It was record high the whole year. http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/files/2023/09/asina_S_iqr_timeseries.png http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/files/2023/09/asina_S_iqr_...
    - thulle 3y ago
      In that case the line would've been constantly on top in the article, like the current year is below it, but it isn't. While high it intermingles with the other lines, and is nowhere as much an outlier. Also 2014 seems to've been more ice due to record snowfall, which is easier to freeze than the regular freezing of the sea. Seems to be in line with climate models predicting more erratic weather. Good example of why they weren't worried about that, since it's expected, but worried about this, since it isn't.
      - unpopular42 3y ago
        The article wants to convince you in something and naturally the visuals are adjusted to help that goal. Have a look at the raw data if you like. So far, as much as I can see, the current climate models do not predict absolutely anything in advance, but are used to explain things afterwards to show that anything is caused by co2.
neets 3y ago
What if earth is normally like one of those water planets in sci-fi where the poles are all water?
- solardev 3y ago
  The penguins would be pretty bummed
wallhack 3y ago
Vote out any policy maker who impedes the response to climate change. This is not something we fix as individuals, with feel-good home solutions, recycling, or planting trees. Large industry is destroying our world, on purpose, because of greed. This only gets fixed through policy and regulation. Vote.
- fsloth 3y ago
  Given this is a discussion forum with global reach your suggestion on implementing change to global industrial policy via voting may or may not be viable (not everyone gets to vote, and most of the countries lack global impac. US is really unique along with few other countries being able to influence global industry trends).
  - EForEndeavour 3y ago
    Good point, but I don't think it changes the validity of encouraging participation in democratic process where possible. Perfect is the enemy of good.
- dgan 3y ago
  You are implying there are candidates who do not impede response to climate change: even the Greens are against nuclear, which in my understanding, is totally unproductive. They are also still debating "décroissance", that is "de-growth". I find crazy that no one even mentionned the word "efficiency" as in "we might not need all the resources we consume to produce everything we do today. Let's set a realistic efficiency goals and try to achieve them"
  - thulle 3y ago
    I guess you could see de-growth as efficiency, lower useless production/necessary production for a good life-ratio. If we just reduced the resources needed to produce todays consumption, why wouldn't the savings just go to producing more of the same stuff? Ie. growth?
    - 3y ago
koksik202 3y ago
more area to spread the suburbs to if not covered by ice
Temporary_31337 3y ago
If the ice volume gets too low, even the Futurama style of cooling is going to stop working. https://youtu.be/0SYpUSjSgFg?si=8ovAWC1IGL9Z7JXf https://youtu.be/0SYpUSjSgFg?si=8ovAWC1IGL9Z7JXf
weinzierl 3y ago
If you want to show a trend, give us a diagram that shows a trend. A scatter plot with a trend line would be a start, maybe. One can equally interpret the diagram from the article as showing a fairly constant level - somewhat varying within a limited range - with 2023 being an outlier. All it tells about is the variance and without at least more year labels there is no way to read anything about the trend from it. [I'm not saying the article is wrong or right, just that it does a very bad job supporting its thesis.]
- penteract 3y ago
  From the article: > Until 2016 Antarctica's winter sea-ice had actually been growing in size. >"There is a chance that it's a really freak expression of natural variability," [Dr Mallet] says There isn't an obvious trend. I'm pleased that they aren't trying to hide this and that the article is clear that we don't know everything about Antarctica (I'd imagine it's very hard to get data for annual sea ice maxima before we started measuring them). This isn't supposed to single-handedly convince anyone that climate change is happening, but show a piece of evidence that extreme weather events are becoming more frequent.
- frumiousirc 3y ago
  > trend You can play with the data a bit here: http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/charctic-interactive-sea-ice-graph/ http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/charctic-interactive-sea-i... Be sure to click the Antarctic button. Arctic (the default) shows 2012 as the lowest record. For Antarctica, last year was the previous minimum and was 2-sigma from the mean. Additional iso-sigma curves are not shown but I'd guess this year is at least one more sigma off the mean. I progressively activate past years and do not spot an obvious trend. So, last two years have deviated significantly with this year deviating yet more so. On the other hand, given the number of measurements, we would expect about two measurements to be outside of 2-sigma. If we do not attribute anything to 2022 and 2023 being correlated, then this is just a fluctuation. On the gripping hand, 2022 and 2023 may be the first two points of an explosive trend.
  - weinzierl 3y ago
singularity2001 3y ago
To keep track of the graph (click Antarctic) : http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/charctic-interactive-sea-ice-graph/ http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/charctic-interactive-sea-i...
ChrisArchitect 3y ago
[dupe]
- ChrisArchitect 3y ago
  More discussion over here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37540768 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37540768
lsllc 3y ago
Dupe: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37540768 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37540768
ben30 3y ago
It’s essential to consider the multifaceted effects of our environmental interventions. For instance, the commendable move in 2020 to reduce sulfur dioxide emissions in shipping lanes had an unintended side effect. The decreased emissions meant fewer sulfur dioxide-based clouds in the atmosphere, which previously reflected a significant amount of sunlight and contributed to rain cloud formation. While reducing emissions is a positive change, the absence of these ‘reflective clouds’ might be inadvertently amplifying the heat, especially when combined with the current El Niño. This could partially explain the accelerated ice melt in Antarctica we’re observing just three years after the regulation change. It serves as a reminder that the Earth’s climate system is intricately interconnected, and actions in one area can have cascading effects.

66 points by mindracer 3y ago

At some point, we should probably stop calling it climate change and just start calling it climate abandonment. We're all so desensitized now that the more stories come out, the less people care... =/

throw_pm23 3y ago
There is a slight danger though. Suppose there is a baseline climate change, Earth is getting gradually warmer on average. Then there is some yearly variation, say, this year above average by 3 degrees, 5 years later below average by 3 degrees. If you call the yearly variation climate change, then five years later your opponents will say "you see, it was a hoax". It is a bit like presidents taking credit for the stock market going up. Then when it inevitably goes down, it makes them look bad.
- defrost 3y ago
  Sure - save for the geophysical fact that we're not seeing just variation .. underlying the usual flux we are seeing a steady increase in heat energy trapped in the near sea | land layer. This is an inevitable physical consequence of human activity steadily increasing the insulating properties of the atmosphere in a demonstrable and measurable way. Sure, right now we're going up faster than our new normal rate of increase due to ENSO flux, and in a few years we'll see our rate of increase drop below the current rate as ENSO swings back (fingers crossed) .. but overall on a ten year rolling average we're seeing steady increases in average global temp. as a direct result of human activity (hence AGW) and it'll stay that way until we reduce the insulation properties of the atmosphere.
- myshpa 3y ago
  https://skepticalscience.com/global-warming-natural-cycle.htm https://skepticalscience.com/global-warming-natural-cycle.ht... https://skepticalscience.com/internal-variability.htm https://skepticalscience.com/internal-variability.htm
  - throw_pm23 3y ago
    It's hard to argue with someone who responds with links, but none of the content behind those links contradicts what I said. There can be a day-to-day variation of 10+ degrees. If Monday is cold and Tuesday is warm, and I say "this is because of global warming", then if Wednesday is lukewarm then I discredited myself.
    - myshpa 3y ago
      > this year above average by 3 degrees, 5 years later below average by 3 degrees > There can be a day-to-day variation of 10+ degrees You seem to be confusing weather with climate change. Weather refers to short-term atmospheric conditions, such as daily temperature and precipitation variations, while climate change represents long-term shifts in average temperature, precipitation patterns, and other climatic factors over extended periods, often spanning decades (3+) to centuries.
      - throw_pm23 3y ago
        No, my point is that many articles on climate change confuse weather with climate change. (The crime that you accuse me of committing.) If someone says "this year is unusually warm with unusually low ice cover", that is not about climatic factors spanning decades to centuries. If someone says "the average ice cover between 2000-2020 is lower than the average cover between 1980-2000" that is about climate.
        myshpa 3y ago
        If I am misunderstanding your original comment then I'm sorry.
PradeetPatel 3y ago
That is not true, I think most people care dearly and are doing everything to slow down climate change, this includes participating in recycling and watching our own carbon footprints. Ultimately its up to us to convince the policymakers and senior leadership in corporations to make the correct decision.
- myshpa 3y ago
  > participating in recycling and watching our own carbon footprints https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/may/31/avoiding-meat-and-dairy-is-single-biggest-way-to-reduce-your-impact-on-earth https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/may/31/avoiding... > Ultimately its up to us to convince the policymakers and senior leadership in corporations to make the correct decision Imagine a nation with the highest consumption of meat, where individual choices and habits have long shaped dietary preferences. In such a scenario, without widespread adoption of plant-based diets and a shift in societal norms driven by individuals, convincing policymakers and senior leadership in corporations to regulate and promote sustainable diets becomes an uphill battle. It's through our own choices and advocacy that we can lay the foundation for systemic change and address the pressing issue of climate change effectively.
- netsharc 3y ago
  Huh, "most people"? Maybe in your community, but most of the planet probably don't care. And even if they do those things, only to a degree of inconvenience that they tolerate.. separating plastic/metal/etc? Easy. Missing out on European vacations? "But it's been my life dream to see Italy! It'll only be once in my lifetime!". And the little plastic recycling they do has the effect of making them think "I'm helping!", when in reality it moves the needle very little...

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

mg 3y ago

Could we breed trees which capture more CO2? We increased crop yields multifold already: https://ourworldindata.org/crop-yields https://ourworldindata.org/crop-yields So maybe we can do the same to carbon yield? Are trees the plants which capture most CO2 per hectare?

myshpa 3y ago
> We increased crop yields multifold already With catastrophic effects. https://www.stockholmresilience.org/research/research-news/2023-09-13-all-planetary-boundaries-mapped-out-for-the-first-time-six-of-nine-crossed.html https://www.stockholmresilience.org/research/research-news/2... All planetary boundaries mapped out for the first time, six of nine crossed https://www.researchgate.net/publication/320356605_Agriculture_production_as_a_major_driver_of_the_Earth_system_exceeding_planetary_boundaries https://www.researchgate.net/publication/320356605_Agricultu... Agriculture production as a major driver of the Earth system exceeding planetary boundaries Most of it is because of animal agriculture - it uses 80% of agriculture land and about half of our crops. https://ourworldindata.org/land-use https://ourworldindata.org/land-use https://ourworldindata.org/drivers-of-deforestation https://ourworldindata.org/drivers-of-deforestation https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26231772/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26231772/ https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/may/31/avoiding-meat-and-dairy-is-single-biggest-way-to-reduce-your-impact-on-earth https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/may/31/avoiding... > Could we breed trees which capture more CO2? We don't have to breed new trees. The ones we have are enough. We have enough space to capture 2+x more CO2 than we've released into the atmosphere since industrial revolution. We could switch to plant-based diets and free an area the size of both Americas. https://ourworldindata.org/uploads/2013/10/World-Map-by-Land-Use-01.png https://ourworldindata.org/uploads/2013/10/World-Map-by-Land... On that land a regular primeval forest, Miyawayki/Amazon/Syntropic style would grow 10x faster than regular monocultures and that would also enable the biodiversity to rebound. We'd get ourselves out of overshoot in no time (given few decades, of course). https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-020-00603-4 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-020-00603-4 https://ourworldindata.org/carbon-opportunity-costs-food https://ourworldindata.org/carbon-opportunity-costs-food The overshoot threatens our civilization with crop failures. The only realistic way out of it is immediate phase-out of fossil fuels and plant-based diets. https://ourworldindata.org/emissions-by-sector https://ourworldindata.org/emissions-by-sector https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/917471 https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/917471

jiofj 3y ago

(They began counting in 1981)

edhelas 3y ago
Do I feel some climatoscepticism, or at least climatodenialism in this message ?
- jiofj 3y ago
  [flagged]
  - netsharc 3y ago
    Funny you mention religion, the deniers also have their own religion, disputing facts with their own "facts" and "truth". So what about 1981? Do you think it means it could've been lower than right now in, say, the 1970s, but the liars conveniently only started counting from the decade after? Given we have temperature data from further back and we know higher temperature = ice melts, the scientific mind would conclude there's a correlation. But oh nooo, jiofj knows better, there could be something else affecting it!
- jkhdigital 3y ago
  Pathologizing dissent is not going to change anyone’s mind.
  - Fricken 3y ago
    If something was going to change their mind it would be changed by now.
  - timeon 3y ago
    Nothing is going to.
- pauldenton 3y ago
  Comparing criticisms of data, (testing of data being a key part of science) to denying the Holocaust isn't going to win anyone over. We've heard many inaccurate predictions before, an easy one being "2 Weeks to flatten the curve" or "If you get vaccinated you'll have a 98% protection rate and can no longer catch Covid"

unpopular42 3y ago

Did we also panic in 2014 that was above average by a similar margin? I just can't remember

timeon 3y ago
Was it similar? The graph in article is showing that it was not.
thulle 3y ago
That little september bump? Compared to what seems to be a 5 month record gap?
- unpopular42 3y ago
  It was record high the whole year. http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/files/2023/09/asina_S_iqr_timeseries.png http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/files/2023/09/asina_S_iqr_...
  - thulle 3y ago
    In that case the line would've been constantly on top in the article, like the current year is below it, but it isn't. While high it intermingles with the other lines, and is nowhere as much an outlier. Also 2014 seems to've been more ice due to record snowfall, which is easier to freeze than the regular freezing of the sea. Seems to be in line with climate models predicting more erratic weather. Good example of why they weren't worried about that, since it's expected, but worried about this, since it isn't.
    - unpopular42 3y ago
      The article wants to convince you in something and naturally the visuals are adjusted to help that goal. Have a look at the raw data if you like. So far, as much as I can see, the current climate models do not predict absolutely anything in advance, but are used to explain things afterwards to show that anything is caused by co2.

neets 3y ago

What if earth is normally like one of those water planets in sci-fi where the poles are all water?

solardev 3y ago
The penguins would be pretty bummed

wallhack 3y ago

Vote out any policy maker who impedes the response to climate change. This is not something we fix as individuals, with feel-good home solutions, recycling, or planting trees. Large industry is destroying our world, on purpose, because of greed. This only gets fixed through policy and regulation. Vote.

fsloth 3y ago
Given this is a discussion forum with global reach your suggestion on implementing change to global industrial policy via voting may or may not be viable (not everyone gets to vote, and most of the countries lack global impac. US is really unique along with few other countries being able to influence global industry trends).
- EForEndeavour 3y ago
  Good point, but I don't think it changes the validity of encouraging participation in democratic process where possible. Perfect is the enemy of good.
dgan 3y ago
You are implying there are candidates who do not impede response to climate change: even the Greens are against nuclear, which in my understanding, is totally unproductive. They are also still debating "décroissance", that is "de-growth". I find crazy that no one even mentionned the word "efficiency" as in "we might not need all the resources we consume to produce everything we do today. Let's set a realistic efficiency goals and try to achieve them"
- thulle 3y ago
  I guess you could see de-growth as efficiency, lower useless production/necessary production for a good life-ratio. If we just reduced the resources needed to produce todays consumption, why wouldn't the savings just go to producing more of the same stuff? Ie. growth?
  - 3y ago

koksik202 3y ago

more area to spread the suburbs to if not covered by ice

Temporary_31337 3y ago

If the ice volume gets too low, even the Futurama style of cooling is going to stop working. https://youtu.be/0SYpUSjSgFg?si=8ovAWC1IGL9Z7JXf https://youtu.be/0SYpUSjSgFg?si=8ovAWC1IGL9Z7JXf

weinzierl 3y ago

If you want to show a trend, give us a diagram that shows a trend. A scatter plot with a trend line would be a start, maybe. One can equally interpret the diagram from the article as showing a fairly constant level - somewhat varying within a limited range - with 2023 being an outlier. All it tells about is the variance and without at least more year labels there is no way to read anything about the trend from it. [I'm not saying the article is wrong or right, just that it does a very bad job supporting its thesis.]

penteract 3y ago
From the article: > Until 2016 Antarctica's winter sea-ice had actually been growing in size. >"There is a chance that it's a really freak expression of natural variability," [Dr Mallet] says There isn't an obvious trend. I'm pleased that they aren't trying to hide this and that the article is clear that we don't know everything about Antarctica (I'd imagine it's very hard to get data for annual sea ice maxima before we started measuring them). This isn't supposed to single-handedly convince anyone that climate change is happening, but show a piece of evidence that extreme weather events are becoming more frequent.
frumiousirc 3y ago
> trend You can play with the data a bit here: http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/charctic-interactive-sea-ice-graph/ http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/charctic-interactive-sea-i... Be sure to click the Antarctic button. Arctic (the default) shows 2012 as the lowest record. For Antarctica, last year was the previous minimum and was 2-sigma from the mean. Additional iso-sigma curves are not shown but I'd guess this year is at least one more sigma off the mean. I progressively activate past years and do not spot an obvious trend. So, last two years have deviated significantly with this year deviating yet more so. On the other hand, given the number of measurements, we would expect about two measurements to be outside of 2-sigma. If we do not attribute anything to 2022 and 2023 being correlated, then this is just a fluctuation. On the gripping hand, 2022 and 2023 may be the first two points of an explosive trend.
- weinzierl 3y ago

singularity2001 3y ago

To keep track of the graph (click Antarctic) : http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/charctic-interactive-sea-ice-graph/ http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/charctic-interactive-sea-i...

ChrisArchitect 3y ago

[dupe]

ChrisArchitect 3y ago
More discussion over here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37540768 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37540768

lsllc 3y ago

Dupe: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37540768 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37540768

ben30 3y ago

It’s essential to consider the multifaceted effects of our environmental interventions. For instance, the commendable move in 2020 to reduce sulfur dioxide emissions in shipping lanes had an unintended side effect. The decreased emissions meant fewer sulfur dioxide-based clouds in the atmosphere, which previously reflected a significant amount of sunlight and contributed to rain cloud formation. While reducing emissions is a positive change, the absence of these ‘reflective clouds’ might be inadvertently amplifying the heat, especially when combined with the current El Niño. This could partially explain the accelerated ice melt in Antarctica we’re observing just three years after the regulation change. It serves as a reminder that the Earth’s climate system is intricately interconnected, and actions in one area can have cascading effects.