Climate Central scores grade F in geography

There's a lot of it about - sea I mean. There's also a lot of reports around just now in which alarmists appear almost to be gloating over a paper in Geophysical Research Letters titled The gravitationally consistent sea-level fingerprint of future terrestrial ice loss (Spada et al . 2013), [h/t Spiel Climate.] That bastion of truth and objectivity might not be said to be gloating, but there's an element of "See - told you so!" in their article Ice Melt Means Uneven Sea Level Rise Around the World. More of that and their "grade F" later.

What that paper says (in essence) comes as no surprise to me. Sea level rise around the globe is far from even. There are many reasons for that "lumpiness", two of them being thermal expansion and gravitational effects.

We solve the sea-level equation to investigate the pattern of the gravitationally self-consistent sea-level variations (fingerprints) corresponding to modeled scenarios of future terrestrial ice melt. These were obtained from separate ice dynamics and surface mass balance models for the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets and by a regionalized mass balance model for glaciers and ice caps. For our mid-range scenario, the ice melt component of total sea-level change attains its largest amplitude in the equatorial oceans, where we predict a cumulative sea-level rise of ~25 cm and rates of change close to 3 mm/yr from ice melt alone by 2100. According to our modeling, in low-elevation densely populated coastal zones, the gravitationally consistent sea-level variations due to continental ice loss will range between 50 and 150% of the global mean. This includes the effects of glacial-isostatic adjustment, which mostly contributes across the lateral forebulge regions in North America. While the mid range ocean-averaged elastic-gravitational sea-level variations compare with those associated with thermal expansion and ocean circulation, their combination shows a complex regional pattern, where the former component dominates in the Equatorial Pacific Ocean and the latter in the Arctic Ocean.

That mouthful is down to modelling, of course, and if you accept their estimates of ice melt, I see little wrong with their results. What I do see that's wrong, is all the alarmist pundits jumping on the bandwagon and extrapolating what the paper says about their little corner of the globe, or the "poster-children" of predicted sea-level rise, like Bangladesh, Tuvalu, etc. As my pet subject is the study of sea-level and changes thereof, I find myself often peering at maps while I sip my gin-and-tonic. Authors of articles like the one at Climate Central might find it beneficial to do the same - peering, that is, though sipping G&T would do them no harm either. Alex Kirby, their geographer in chief, says

Improved projections of the contribution of ice to sea level rise produced by Ice2sea will feed into the fifth assessment report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. In 2007, the IPCC’s fourth report highlighted ice-sheets as the most significant remaining uncertainty in projections of sea-level rise.

The researchers found that ice melt from glaciers and from the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets is likely to be critically important to regional sea-level change in the equatorial Pacific ocean

There the rise will be greater than the global average increase, affecting in particular western Australia, Oceania and the small atolls and islands in the region, including Hawaii. Another area which should expect an above-average increase is the east coast of South Africa and Madagascar.

The first paragraph is interesting - "will feed into the fifth assessment report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change" given that it's just undergone the review stage. Late entries anyone? However, the next paragraph states exactly what's in the abstract above; "regional sea-level change in the equatorial Pacific ocean", yet what Alex considers to be in the equatorial Pacific ocean is interesting. He thinks western Australia and Hawaii are included, and he also appears to think that the Hawaiian islands are "small islands".

Given that Honolulu is only a couple of degrees south of the Tropic of Cancer, and that only half of the western Australian coast is north of the Tropic of Capricorn, I think he's stretching the definition of "equatorial" just the teeniest bit. The biggest of the Hawaiian islands is about 250km north-south.  Still, why let a few inconvenient geographical facts stand in the way of a good story?

Perhaps he, other alarmists, and IPCC authors, might like to peruse the abstract of A synthesis of the Antarctic surface mass balance during the last 800 yrs (Frezzotti et al 2013) [h/t Greenie Watch]

Global climate models suggest that Antarctic snowfall should increase in a warming climate and mitigate rises in the sea level. Several processes affect surface mass balance (SMB), introducing large uncertainties in past, present and future ice sheet mass balance. To provide an extended perspective on the past SMB of Antarctica, we used 67 firn/ice core records to reconstruct the temporal variability in the SMB over the past 800 yr and, in greater detail, over the last 200 yr.

Our SMB reconstructions indicate that the SMB changes over most of Antarctica are statistically negligible and that the current SMB is not exceptionally high compared to the last 800 yr. High-accumulation periods have occurred in the past, specifically during the 1370s and 1610s. However, a clear increase in accumulation of more than 10% has occurred in high SMB coastal regions and over the highest part of the East Antarctic ice divide since the 1960s. To explain the differences in behaviour between the coastal/ice divide sites and the rest of Antarctica, we suggest that a higher frequency of blocking anticyclones increases the precipitation at coastal sites, leading to the advection of moist air in the highest areas, whereas blowing snow and/or erosion have significant negative impacts on the SMB at windy sites. Eight hundred years of stacked records of the SMB mimic the total solar irradiance during the 13th and 18th centuries. The link between those two variables is probably indirect and linked to a teleconnection in atmospheric circulation that forces complex feedback between the tropical Pacific and Antarctica via the generation and propagation of a large-scale atmospheric wave train.

Perhaps Spada et al should have waited a bit before publishing. Perhaps Alex should read more - an atlas maybe? Perhaps I'll have another G&T.

Pachauri - "record northern summer Arctic ice growth"

The Australian interviews "The UN's climate change chief" Rajendra Pachauri.

Rajendra Pachauri has acknowledged a 17-year pause in global temperature rises, confirmed recently by Britain's Met Office, but said it would need to last "30 to 40 years at least" to break the long-term global warming trend.

The "long-term global warming trend" is only just around 40 years long now. (My bold in any quotes following.)

In a wide-ranging interview on topics that included this year's record northern summer Arctic ice growth, the US shale-gas revolution, the collapse of renewable energy subsidies across Europe and the faltering European carbon market, Dr Pachauri said no issues should be off-limits for public discussion.

What? Say that again! Okay - "this year's record northern summer Arctic ice growth". I thought that was it. The northern hemisphere hasn't had a summer yet (or did I miss it? - I slept late last Sunday). Any more gems of climate insight from the world's leading retired railway engineer (I'm in the mood for a good laugh).

"People have to question these things and science only thrives on the basis of questioning," Dr Pachauri said.

He said there was "no doubt about it" that it was good for controversial issues to be "thrashed out in the public arena".

Aaah - that's why the review process takes place in total secrecy, with reviewers and authors sworn never to divulge one word? That's the "public arena", admission by ticket only, public need not apply? All is now clear (I think).

Dr Pachauri said the record accumulation of Arctic ice this northern summer - following a record melt last winter - was consistent with the current understanding of climate change.

He said the IPCC had "clearly specified there are going to be extreme precipitation events".

"If in the Arctic, for example, we get a huge amount of snowfall this year, you will get ice formation," Dr Pachauri said.

"That again is something that doesn't deviate from the trend, which time and again has shown that ice cover in the Arctic is shrinking."

My goodness gracious, this man clearly has all the knowledge to make him a "top man" in climate science. Arctic ice melts in the winter and accumulates in the summer. Winters are clearly so warm the ice melts, and the summers so cold it freezes in a record accumulation. This is weather on steroids - weather so extreme it's reversed itself. Kneel at the feet of the great man and learn, minions, learn. Snow causes ice formation in the Arctic - you read it here first remember. It's all becoming clear now - huge amounts of snowfall were caused by global warming - ya know, warm air holds more moisture, more moisture forms more clouds, which will of course result in more snowfall in the balmy Arctic air. If that results in more ice why doesn't that ice melt in the balmy Arctic air?

I withdraw that question, it's one I'm not qualified to ask. Quite obviously, only climate experts who've never turned up for a single IPCC working party meeting, yet still get their names on the author list are so qualified. Only the great climate expert is qualified to answer it, the great climate expert whose name I'm not worthy to utter.

Remember - ice forms in the summer, melts in the winter. Pachauri knows his stuff alright.

h/t Tom Nelson

Matterhorn scientist disintegrating in the face of global warming - the true story?

Four days ago, I expressed my astonishment (I was more than just surprised) that a scientist could think that he and his team had done groundbreaking (it's a pun) research on how thawing/freezing processes were cracking rock and creating rockfalls on Switzerland's iconic Matterhorn. Those processes are well understood, and have been for at least a hundred years, Yesterday, while searching for more Matterhorn images for my collection, I came across a real gem on ABC News - Is the Mighty Matterhorn Mountain Crumbling?

To understand how climate change is helping destabilize one of the world’s most famous mountains, Stephan Gruber of the University of Zurich offers a culinary visualization.

Imagine a piece of bread – or perhaps even better, a thick cut of raw steak – in an oven. Put a stick of frozen butter on top of it. And then turn the oven on.

Apart from the fact that I can't imagine anyone in their right mind putting a slice of steak, let alone bread in an oven with frozen butter on it, I'll go along with the analogy for now. I'm like that, broad-minded and receptive. Read on (my bold)

Two things happen:

The outside of the steak begins to cook relatively quickly. The inside stays raw for longer.

At the same time, the butter begins to melt – and seep into the steak.

Now, imagine that the steak is the mighty Matterhorn mountain, one of the most picturesque in Europe (and, yes, some of you may know it better as Disneyland’s original rollercoaster).

Climate change works in three ways:

As the world gets warmer – as the oven heats up – the outside of the Matterhorn heats up (the outside of the steak cooks). That, by itself, slowly breaks apart the ice that holds the mountain’s exterior rock surface together. So we are beginning to see more rock falls than ever before. (In 2003, a massive rock fall stranded 50 climbers.)

Does heat "break apart ice"? No, it melts it, and climate change can work in another way which doesn't even enter the closed minds of some - the world might get colder. At this point we should remind ourselves what the heated-up "outside" of the Matterhorn looks like in summer, when Herr Gruber's limited view of "climate change" is heating it up. This photo is from 2007.

The Matterhorn - East face. Source: Free Wallpaper Pic

It's clearly summer, which can be deduced from the high Sun angle. What's all the white stuff clinging to the "heated up" rock faces? Is it frozen butter? I'm keen to hear more:

Then, the butter starts melting. The butter is actually that same ice that holds much of the mountain together. As it melts, it seeps down into ice that doesn’t see the sun – say, the center of the steak – and helps cook it from the inside.

Thirdly, slowly but surely, the oven heat finally reaches the middle of the steak. Climate change finally helps warm the inside of the mountain.

And slowly but surely, the integrity of the mountain starts to diminish, both from the outside and from the inside-out.

In my total ignorance I thought it was rock that "holds much of the mountain together", but what do I and geologists know? There's more:

Before you think that this is some obscure thing that happens in places with very, very high elevations, consider this: The mountains where this is happening are located where millions of people – many in Asia – actually live.

Gruber recently released a study of how this happens – the first to show that typical patters[sic] of movement of ice exist on mountains like the Matterhorn.

That last sentence is a real killer - "the first to show that typical patterns of movement of ice exist on mountains like the Matterhorn". If they're "typical patterns" then they're already well known to exist, and they're well documented, so his study cannot be the "first". It's not "climate change" which melts ice in crevices on high mountains, it's the Sun, and it's the re-freezing at night in the summer, and in the winter which widens the cracks. Ice has a larger volume that the water which forms it. The writer himself needs a geography lesson - exactly how many of the "millions of people" are threatened in some way by rock falls at altitude?

Matterhorn disintegrating in the face of global warming - this is news?

The Independent, and cited researchers, have just discovered that freezing water weathers mountain rocks. This apparently is news. It is of course part of the Global Warming meme; perfectly natural and well-known processes that have been occurring since the earth solidified from a molten sphere are cited as evidence for "Global Warming" or "Climate Change". Not just any old "Global Warming" or "Climate Change", of course, which the earth has seen over it's non-molten history, but a new and dangerous kind which, if unchecked, will kill us all.

Matterhorn disintegrating in the face of global warming

With its four steep faces reflecting the compass points, the mighty Matterhorn has proven an irresistible and often deadly challenge to mountaineers.

But now, the mountain – one of Europe's tallest and most celebrated peaks – is falling to bits due to climate change, according to a new scientific report.

As with other Alpine mountains, experts have already documented the retreat of the peak's glaciers and the thinning of its permafrost in the wake of rising temperatures.

But scientists now say they have evidence that these rising temperatures are also prompting the physical disintegration of the mountain itself.

I first learned of frost-weathering of mountain rocks in primary school. I've been familiar with the term "frost-shattered rocks" for many decades. I've walked over mountain screes thousands to hundreds-of-thousands of years old. Scotland's mountains were once as high as the Matterhorn. The Matterhorn is ultimately destined to become deep-sea sediment. I love the "With its four steep faces reflecting the compass points" bit - how do they think the mountain got to be that shape? My school atlas from many decades ago has a picture of the Matterhorn, and an explanation for that shape - glaciers, ice, and freezing water. The normal becomes unprecedented, and history and past knowledge are dumped in favour of the "new discoveries". Not new, and you can't claim to have discovered something that's been common knowledge for several generations if not longer.

"There has been a big increase in the number of rock falls in the past decade that can't be explained simply by the fact that we're looking out for them more now," the lead researcher, Stephan Gruber, told The Independent.

His team's discovery of the key role that icy crevices play in the Matterhorn's decay suggests that global warming's deleterious effect on mountain ranges is greater than previously thought.

"We have shown the importance of icy crevices and the melting water entering them, in the process of rock falls," Mr Gruber said. "Unlike rock itself – changes to which take place over a very long period of time – just a few decades of temperatures rising by a degree or so are enough to affect the ice and water on the mountains."

"It's reasonable to expect the same processes are widespread elsewhere in the Alps at the same altitude," he added.

It's reasonable to expect the same processes are widespread elsewhere in the world and have been continuing since mountains and water and freezing temperatures came together in the same place at the same time. Climbers have been wary of ice-weakened rocks on the Matterhorn, in the Swiss Alps, and on mountains worldwide since people had the inclination to climb mountains other than to travel long distances. Here's the North face of the Matterhorn

The Matterhorn - east face. Source: Free Wallpaper Pic

See those grey mounds and slopes in the middle and foreground? They're screes - heaps of frost-shattered rock. Here they are in closeup

Screes on the slopes of the Matterhorn

They're covering the entire lower slopes of the mountain. There are buildings on them. A stream has cut its way through them. They've been growing for centuries at least. The mountain has that "four steep faces" pyramidal shape as a result of ice-weathering over millennia and longer.

"There has been a big increase in the number of rock falls in the past decade that can't be explained simply by the fact that we're looking out for them more now," the lead researcher, Stephan Gruber, told The Independent.

If they weren't "looking out for them" much in the past, how do they know there's been a "big increase"? There's been a big increase in unsubstantiated claims of the abnormal and unprecedented over the last decade too, but unlike these researchers and the Independent, I have been looking out for them. These guys need a reality pill. Reach for the Button:

A Question of Scale (3) - Latent Heat

Latent (hidden) heat plays an important role in climate and weather, but its importance is often overlooked or misunderstood. Heat is simply the energy of vibration of atoms or molecules in solids, liquids and gases. Heat is motion; motion is heat. More motion equals more heat - hotter. Less motion equals less heat - colder.

In a solid such as ice, water molecules are fixed relative to one another. They can move a small amount relative to their neighbours, but can't move freely through the solid; it's as if they were inter-connected by springs or stiff elastic. These notional "springs" are the strong attractive force which operates at the relatively short distance between the molecules.

In a liquid, molecules vibrate much more, and are free to move about, like table-tennis balls in a bucket. Shake the bucket, and the balls move about. Shake it more; balls from the bottom can move to the top, and vice-versa. They collide with one another, thus transferring energy of motion (kinetic energy). More vigorous shaking may result in a ball leaping above the others - it may even leap out of the bucket. This is a simple illustration of evaporation - balls moving through the air have effectively become a gas.

In a gas, the molecules have much greater energy of motion, and are free to move in all directions like the balls that escaped from the bucket. They collide one with another, transferring and sharing their kinetic energy. As a consequence they are much farther apart than molecules in a liquid or solid.

To transform a solid into a liquid, enough heat has to be added for the kinetic energy of the atoms or molecules to overcome the strong attraction between them. The amount of heat per unit of mass of the solid is termed the latent heat of fusion for that solid. It is many times greater than the specific heat, which is the amount of heat per unit of mass to raise its temperature by one degree Celsius (or Kelvin). Why is this important? It takes far more heat to melt ice than it does to warm ice to its melting point.

The specific heat of ice is 2.108 kJ/kgK (thousand joules per kilogram per degree Kelvin); the latent heat of fusion of ice is 334 kJ/kg. It takes 158 times as much heat to melt a given mass of ice as to raise its temperature by one degree. It appears to me that it's a common misconception that once ice is raised to its melting point it will melt rapidly. It would take 158 times longer to melt ice than to raise its temperature the last degree to the melting point, given the same rate of heat input.

We use this property of ice almost daily. A couple of ice cubes in a glass of juice or spirit lowers the temperature rapidly, but that cooling reduces the heat available for the ice to melt, which must then come from the surroundings - the sun, the air or a warm hand. A large ice-floe or iceberg can drift for months before disappearing completely. Some of the much larger ones can endure for years. The ice that does melt removes a lot of heat from the surrounding air and water, reducing the temperature difference and slowing the transfer of heat and therefore the melting rate.

Enough about ice - I can see the bottom of my glass. Conversion of a liquid into a gas, as in water to water vapour (or steam) requires an even greater input of heat energy as does melting. The figure of 334 kJ/kg for ice to water compares with 2,270 kJ/kg for water to vapour - nearly 7 times as much. This is important because it's the mechanism by which vast quantities of heat energy are transported aloft from the surface of the Earth into the atmosphere. It's a major factor in climate - some would argue (including myself) that it's the major factor.

Evaporation of water cools land and more importantly ocean surfaces, the resulting upward convection drives surface winds, and the water vapour condenses to forms clouds which block sunlight from reaching the surface. The condensation into clouds releases the latent heat into the upper atmosphere, where it's better placed to finally radiate into space and balance the incoming dynamo of the climate; energy from the sun. Water and its latent heat therefore has a major impact in cooling the Earth's surface, a direct result of its unusual properties compared with other common substances.

See this page for the properties of dihydrogen monoxide (or hydroxyl acid - it's nasty stuff, thousands of people die because of it, or a lack of it, or in it, every year).