Emergency Meeting: White House Officials Told Arctic Ocean Could Be Ice-Free Within Two Years

[GliderGuider]

Emergency Climate Meeting: White House Officials Told Arctic Ocean Could Be Ice-Free Within Two Years

This week, a number of top scientists, experts, DoD and Homeland Security Department notables are convening an emergency meeting warning White House officials that the Arctic Ocean could be ice-free during summertime within two years.

This A-Team (A for Arctic) includes NASA’s chief scientist Gale Allen, National Science Foundation Director Cora Marett, Director of the Oceans Institute of the University of Western Australia marine scientist Prof Carlos Duarte, and nine other top Arctic specialists together with key representatives from the US Department of Homeland Security and the Pentagon.

The Washington meeting is the second major climate emergency meeting of its kind to occur within the past month. Just a few weeks ago, the UK held its own climate meeting in response to severe and unprecedented weather occurring throughout Europe this winter and spring.

Scientists and specialists descending on the White House are now echoing increasingly urgent warnings coming from Arctic experts such as Peter Wadhams and Dr. Wieslaw Maslowski that the Arctic Ocean could be essentially ice free by 2016 plus or minus three years. Trends analysis confirms these scientists’ predictions showing that current average volume melt rates put the Arctic in an ice-free state sometime around 2016. Even worse, an outlier melt year similar to 2007 or 2010 would result in ice-free conditions this year (2013) or in any year following. The result is that the two year warning, in the extreme worst case, could be too late.

They can't say they didn't know.

[Fumesucker]

1. This is going to be really inconvenient

What the hell are we going to do for ice floes for all those old people whose SS is going to be cut?

[emmadoggy]

2. Does anyone know where our prediction thread went?

Scary shit, and yet almost everyone I know is completely oblivious to this and if you mention it they stare at you blankly like they haven't a clue why it's a problem.

[limpyhobbler]

7. Yes.

I try bringing it up with people, the climate urgency. Whether friends, family, or co-workers, nobody seems to care.

Maybe people think that if it were really a big problem the news would be talking about it, and the government would be working on it. Unfortunately nope.

[stuntcat]

8. what you said-

"almost everyone I know is completely oblivious to this and if you mention it they stare" That's exactly how it is. I cannot have ANY hope, no one I know will even learn thing one about the environment, everyone's oblivious to what's happening to the oceans, to the animals. People horrify me.

[longship]

3. No Arctic ice in summer is a very serious thing.

It goes beyond the melted ice.

Ice reflects the sun's energy; ice free ocean surfaces absorb it. That's one huge positive feedback system.

If the Arctic ice is melting, so are the Greenland glaciers and ice fields. Sea ice does not mean a huge increase in sea level beyond that caused by simple thermal expansion (bad enough -- just ask the Maldives). But the Greenland ice fields increasingly melting into the ocean do mean significantly higher sea levels. And, of course, there's also the positive feedback of decreased reflectivity already reported in Greenland to accelerate the melt.

If those weren't enough, there is the huge Arctic tundra melting, which holds huge reservoirs of methane -- a hugely effective greenhouse gas. Already methane is bubbling up in places like Alaska and northern Siberia which have not thawed for many, many years, likely before humans lived there. The release of tundra methane is another positive feedback mechanism, forcing the planet even warmer.

We may be fucked if we don't open our eyes and take action.

In times like these I always fall back on sage philosophical advice from an unequivocal authority:

Joe bless all of us.

[XemaSab]

4. So since we're already hosed

there no reason not to build Keystone, right?

[MFM008]

5. SO when does he drop the bad news????

That the XL pipeline is a GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO??????????

[neverforget]

6. But the Earth isn't warming!

I think I'm going to throw up. We're doomed.

[stuntcat]

9. What a boon for industry that will be!!!

Last edited Sat May 4, 2013, 10:22 PM - Edit history (1)

Imagine all the ships going through! Businesspeople must be totally stoked!

[RobertEarl]

10. Don't forget, all that free fresh water

Already we are seeing gobs more rain... in places.

Let's see... how can Obama milk this cow?

He can't tell us all to quit shopping. So that's out.

He has rich friends in the oil biz, so carbon tax is a big no.

I guess what you say is the only thing positive he can do or say. Build solar ships!

[HooptieWagon]

11. We used to have a huge fleet of solar ships...

[GliderGuider]

12. They'd come back in a flash, except for one little problem

Most of the trees that could be used for masts have been turned into suburban decking and wall paneling...

[HooptieWagon]

13. Some had steel masts.

The last of the windjammers had steel masts and rigging instead of wood and rope.
The main reason for steam replacing sail was the smaller crews required to run them, and more direct routes (faster voyage) since steamships didn't have to sail a longer route to get in the trade winds (or avoid them if contrary).

[GliderGuider]

14. Hard to make steel masts with solar power...

The main reason we replaced sail with steam was thermodynamics. Steam engines release vastly more concentrated power than sails, so even if they do massively increase entropy (i.e. CO2) they provide more exergy to the system of civilization. Steam enables us to create much more complex socioeconomic structures than does wind power because the energy gradient is so much steeper. Too bad about the entropy, though...

The liberation of more power can't be done without simultaneously increasing the entropy generated in the process. Entropy in all its various guises is what's killing us right now.

[HooptieWagon]

15. It still boiled down to the 2 reasons I mentioned.

A 200' sailing ship required a crew of about 60, all of whom needed a level of skills. A 200' steamship required a crew about half that, and some could be unskilled like stokers. A modern 1000' supertanker only requires a crew of 12-15. Of course, a modern sailing ship wouldn't require the crew size of the old clipperships.
Also, for a sailing ship (even a modern one) to travel from Panama to Gibralter, they have to go N up the N American coast to about Nova Scotia, due east across the Atlantic, then south along the European coast... in order to carry favorable winds. That is many thousands of miles more than a powered vessel, which can take a great circle route through the doldrums.

[GliderGuider]

16. True, but that's a proximate cause rather than a root cause.

Why does it matter so much that sailing ships used more men and took longer? This applies not just to steamships, but to every aspect of human endeavour. What makes humans prefer energy efficiency and steep energy gradients whenever we can exploit them?

[HooptieWagon]

17. Obviously, they were ignorant of long-term impact.

Manpower was becoming expensive. Coal, to make steel and generate steam, was cheap. Even if they knew about carbon emissions and had instruments and knowledge to measure it, profits in their lifetime was the guiding principle. Pretty much as now, unfortunately.

[GliderGuider]

18. As you say, we're not ignorant today. Why are we still doing it?

Or to put it another way, whenever people face a choice between saving a bit of the environment or keeping their jobs, they always opt for the jobs. No matter what they know about the environment. More knowledge hasn't changed our behavior much.