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> Meanwhile Antarctic sea ice has trended up over the past 5 decades https://nsidc.org/cryosphere/seaice/characteristics/difference.html https://nsidc.org/cryo
by gitrog 6y ago
> Meanwhile Antarctic sea ice has trended up over the past 5 decades
https://nsidc.org/cryosphere/seaice/characteristics/difference.html https://nsidc.org/cryosphere/seaice/characteristics/differen...
The Antarctic is a physical land mass. The Antarctic sea ice always melts away during the spring/summer. The Antarctic is surrounded by ocean, making precipitation an often occurrence, which funnily enough means that it snows more on the land when ocean temperatures rise slightly, and this snow helps build the seasonal ice around the Antarctic.
In contrast, the Arctic isn't a land mass, it's only ice, and it's mostly surrounded by land, making precipitation a less often occurrence and making the effects of rising ocean temperatures more devastating.
Basically, there's no going back once the Arctic melts, and by the time we see the Antarctic ice receding we'll be in serious trouble.
> Sea ice volume is above 2012 in the Arctic
2012 was an outlier, but sure.
> And Greenland has had massive, earlier than usual gains in ice this year
See the explanation for landmasses above.
> Cheyenne, WY saw record breaking cold this past week
> Northern Hemisphere snow mass is nearly 400 Gigatons above average for this time of year
Climate change will have variable effects on local weather around the world. An upward trend in global average temperature doesn't mean everywhere is going to get hotter all the time.
- taneq 6y agoThis was predicted back in the 90s - the poles are so far below freezing that warmer temperatures increase polar snowfall (since they increase evaporation but remain cold enough for snow to form). I don't think we predicted the Arctic ice disappearing this fast, though.
- eisbaar 6y agoBut doesn't arctic ice all be floating in sea water mean it has no effect on sea levels? Why "there is no going back"? Since it has been ice free in the past and then ice came back, why shouldn't it happen again?
- gitrog 6y agohttps://nsidc.org/news/newsroom/20050801_floatingice.html https://nsidc.org/news/newsroom/20050801_floatingice.html Salt water is denser than fresh water. The displacement of the Arctic ice is less than the displacement of the water contained in that ice when it melts. So the sea levels will rise. Though, that's not the only problem... Think of the Arctic as exactly what it is, a giant ice cube, keeping your drink (or, you know, the world) cool. The smaller the ice cube gets, the smaller its effect on keeping your drink cool. When it's gone, your drink quickly goes to room temperature. It's highly unlikely that we can survive like we currently do without the Arctic. Sure, the ice might come back in 10 000 years or so, not particularly useful to us in the short term though, is it? And the problem isn't that the Earth goes through natural cycles of cooling and warming, it's that our actions are accelerating the warming of the Earth, meaning we've got even less time to figure out how we as a species would survive the natural heating of the Earth.
- titzer 6y agoThermal expansion of the oceans will contribute significantly to sea level rise. That is, until that is dwarfed by Greenland melting, followed by Antarctica.