EU ice2sea report offers new estimates of sea level rise

Posted on May 16, 2013 by Bob Berwyn
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The EU’s ice2sea program helps to determine potential future impacts of rising sea levels.

Research focuses on contribution of melting glaciers, ice caps and ice shelves

By Summit Voice

FRISCO — After four years of studies and more than 150 peer-reviewed papers, The EU-funded ice2sea program has concluded that melting ice may not contribute as much to sea level rise as some other studies have suggested.

Under a moderate greenhouse gas emissions scenario, the contribution from continental ice will likely amount to between 3.5 and 36.8 centimeters (1.4 to 14.5 inches) by 2100, the program’s leaders said this week, unveiling a new report that summarizes their research. The report is online at the ice2sea home page.

Some of the ice2sea studies have:

The new report includes several case studies outlining the impacts of sea level rise to specific areas, including economically valuable developed areas like the port of Rotterdam and the Thames Estuary, as well as natural areas with unique natural values, like the Machair ecosystems in Ireland and Scotland that thrive in a delicate balance of land and sea. (more…)

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Antarctic clams may take a hit from global warming

Posted on April 19, 2013 by Bob Berwyn

Study shows climate change may affect overall population numbers

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Changes in Antarctic clam populations could have a ripple effect on other species in the region like these blue-eyed cormorants in the South Shetlands. Bob Berwyn photo.

By Summit Voice

FRISCO — Warming ocean temperatures and increased glacial outflow around Antarctica may have a big impact on clams living on the ocean floor. Younger clams try to move away when they sense warmer temperature or reduced oxygen levels, but older clams stay put.

The findings by a team of British and German scientists indicate how climate change may affect biodiversity in the region, suggesting that the overall population of Antarctic clams may dwindle, since it’s the older animals that reproduce.

“Our study shows that the physiological flexibility of young clams diminishes as they get older. However, the species has evolved in such a way that the fittest animals, that can tolerate life in an extreme environment, survive to reproduce into old age,” said Doris Abele, of the Alfred Wegener Institute in Germany. “Climatic change, affecting primarily the older clams, may interfere with this evolutionary strategy, with unpredictable consequences for ecosystems all around Antarctica.” (more…)

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Climate: Does El Niño drive West Antarctic warming?

Posted on April 17, 2013 by Bob Berwyn

Ice cores suggest current climate is in the natural range of variability

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Climate scientists track Antarctic changes, Bob Berwyn photo.

By Summit Voice

FRISCO — Ice cores from West Antarctica spanning the last 2,000 years suggest that recent warming and glacier loss in the region is comparable to other warm periods during that span.

Most of the recent warming may be related to powerful El Niño phases in the tropical Pacific in the 1990s, said University of Washington researcher Eric Steig. The ice core record shows similar temperature spikes in the 1830s and 1940s, he said, adding that the recent warming  cannot be attributed with confidence to human-caused global warming.

Steig built on previous research showing that rapid thinning of Antarctic glaciers was accompanied by rapid warming and changes in atmospheric circulation near the coast. The new study suggests that the 1990s were not all that different from some of those earlier warm spells. (more…)

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Climate: Antarctica surface melting speeds up

Posted on April 14, 2013 by Bob Berwyn

Ice core study shows rapid pace of change along Antarctic Peninsula

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Warmer summer temperatures along the Antarctic Peninsula are starting to take a toll on ice and snow in the region. Bob Berwyn photo. (Dundee Island).

By Bob Berwyn

FRISCO — Careful study of a 1,200-foot long ice core sample spanning 1,000 years suggests that summer ice melt in parts of the Antarctic Peninsula region has intensified almost tenfold. About 5 percent of the annual snowfall has been melting in recent years, compared with only about 0.5 percent during the coolest phase (about 600 years ago) of that 1,000-year span.

“This is the first time it has been demonstrated that levels of ice melt on the Antarctic Peninsula have been particularly sensitive to increasing temperature during the 20th Century,” said Dr. Nerilie Abram, a climate researcher at Australian National University who studied the ice core from James Ross Island.

Most of the increased melting occurred during the past half-century, corresponding with the era of increasing greenhouse gas emissions and a remarkable warmup around the peninsula and some other parts of Antarctica. Borehole temperature estimates from the West Antarctic Ice Sheet also indicate rapid acceleration of West Antarctic warming during the past two decades. (more…)

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Climate: Some penguins expanding range as ice melts

Posted on April 8, 2013 by Bob Berwyn

Adélie penguins breed in ice-free areas

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An Adélie penguin on Paulet Island. Bob Berwyn photo.

By Summit Voice

FRISCO — While populations of ice-loving chinstrap and emperor penguins in Antarctica may be squeezed by global warming, Adélie penguins may actually benefit from warmer  temperatures, according to University of Minnesota Polar Geospatial Center researchers.

Scientists from the United States and New Zealand studied a combination of aerial photography beginning in 1958 and modern satellite imagery from the 2000s, finding that the population size of an Adélie penguin colony on Antarctica’s Beaufort Island near the southern Ross Sea increased 84 percent (from 35,000 breeding pairs to 64,000 breeding pairs) as the ice fields retreated between 1958-2010. The biggest changes came in the last three decades, as average summer temperature in that area increased about .5 degrees Celsius.

The study showed that available habitat for Adélie penguins on the main portion of the Beaufort colony, on the south coast, increased 71 percent since 1958, with a 20 percent increase from 1983-2010. The extent of the snow and ice field to the north of the main colony did not change from 1958-1983, but then retreated 543 meters from 1983-2010. (more…)

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Antarctic Peninsula’s melt season lengthens dramatically

Posted on March 28, 2013 by Bob Berwyn

Warmer temps linked with ice shelf break-ups

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A longer melt season along the Antarctic Peninsula has consequences for wildlife — and for the long-term fate of the coastal ice shelves. Bob Berwyn photo.

By Summit Voice

SUMMIT COUNTY — The melt season on the Antarctic Peninsula is growing longer — in some cases it has doubled, and several major ice shelf breakup events in the region coincided with longer than usual melt seasons, according to a a new study that analyzed data from 30 weather stations.

“We found a significant increase in the length of the melting season at most of the stations with the longest temperature records,” said Dr. Nick Barrand, who carried out the research while working for the British Antarctic Survey. “At one station the average length of the melt season almost doubled between 1948 and 2011,” said Barrand, who now works for the University of Birmingham. (more…)

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Climate: Arctic sea ice stays below average in February

Posted on March 7, 2013 by Bob Berwyn

Downward trend continues …

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Antarctic sea ice was above normal in February and throughout the southern hemisphere summer, but that doesn’t balance the losses in Arctic sea ice, according to climate scientists. This NASA image shows ice in the Weddell Sea. Visit this NASA Earth Observatory web page for more information on Antarctic sea ice.

By Summit Voice

FRISCO — With the spring equinox approaching, Arctic sea ice is nearing its maximum seasonal extent for the year, and the National Snow and Ice Data Center is reporting that there is no sign of any significant rebound in ice extent from the record-low levels of the last couple of years.

The average February Arctic sea ice extent has been declining at rate of 2.9 percent per decade since 1979, resulting in an overall decline of more than 1.57 million square kilometers (606,000 square miles) from 1979 to 2013. Read the full NSIDC report here. (more…)

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Record-breaking NASA balloon flight over Antarctica gathering data on high energy cosmic rays

Posted on January 26, 2013 by Bob Berwyn

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Giant balloon has circumnavigated Antarctica three times

By Summit Voice

FRISCO — Somewhere out in deep space, an as-yet unknown source is producing high-energy cosmic rays that bombard the Earth on a regular basis. After gathering data from a record-setting unmanned balloon flight over Antarctica, NASA scientists hope to  better understand where these energetic atomic nuclei are produced and how they achieve their very high energies.

The record-breaking balloon carried an instrument with a name that’s straight out of science fiction comic book, the Super Trans-Iron Galactic Element Recorder. So far, the balloon has been aloft for 46 days. Taking advantage of the unbroken circumpolar winds, the balloon is on its third orbit around the South Pole.

You can track the balloon on its flight by visiting this page: http://www.csbf.nasa.gov/antarctica/ice.htm and learn more about NASA’s balloon programs here: http://www.wff.nasa.gov/balloons. (more…)

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New ice core data from Greenland offers chilling clues about the direction of Earth’s climate

Posted on January 24, 2013 by Bob Berwyn

‘Our kids and grandkids are definitely going to look back and shake their heads at the inaction of this country’s generation’

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For several days in July 2012, the surface of the Greenland ice sheet melted over a larger area than at any time in more than 30 years of satellite observations. An estimated 97 percent of the ice sheet surface had thawed by July 12, with satellite data providing a picture of an extreme melt event about which scientists are very confident. Graphic courtest Nicolo E. DiGirolamo, SSAI/NASA GSFC, and Jesse Allen, NASA Earth Observatory.

By Summit Voice

FRISCO — Last summer’s unusual melting at the surface of Greenland’s ice cap has a historic precedent, but you have to go back more than 100,000 years, to an extremely warm interglacial period of Earth’s history, to find it, according to an international science team’s  analysis of ice core samples spanning millennia of climate history.

The new study, published this week in Nature, offers clues about where the planet is headed in terms of increasing greenhouse gases and rising temperatures, according to CU-Boulder ice core expert Jim White — another researcher whose detailed knowledge of climate science has led him to advocate for reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.

“Unfortunately, we have reached a point where there is so much carbon dioxide in the atmosphere it’s going to be difficult for us to further limit our impact on the planet,” White said. “Our kids and grandkids are definitely going to look back and shake their heads at the inaction of this country’s generation. We are burning the lion’s share of oil and natural gas to benefit our lifestyle, and punting the responsibility for it.” (more…)

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Climate: Study suggests recent West Antarctic glacier changes are nearly unprecedented

Posted on January 19, 2013 by Bob Berwyn

Data to help refine sea level rise forecasts

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West Antarctica‘s Pine Island Glacier. Photo courtesy European Space Agency.

By Summit Voice

FRISCO — After studying the paleoclimate record of West Antarctica, an international team of scientists say some of the recent observed changes in the Pine Island and Thwaites glaciers may well be exceptional and are unlikely to have happened more than three or four times in the last 10,000 years.

Radiocarbon dates of tiny fossilized marine animals found in Antarctica’s seabed sediments offer new clues about the recent rapid ice loss from the West Antarctic Ice Sheet and help scientists make better predictions about future sea-level rise.  This region of the icy continent is thought to be vulnerable to regional climate warming and changes in ocean circulation. (more…)

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