It’s no surprise that Arctic sea ice is thinning. What is new is just how long, how steadily, and how much it has declined. University of Washington researchers compiled modern and historic measurements to get a full picture of how Arctic sea ice thickness has changed. The results, published in The Cryosphere, show a thinning in the central Arctic Ocean of 65 percent between … [Read more...]
Getting to grips with climate feedbacks
From catastrophic chain-reactions which could push us into dangerous climate change, to cooling effects which balance out global warming, climate feedbacks are an important area of research for scientists. This happens when a change in our climate causes an impact which changes our climate further - a knock-on effect which feeds back into our climate. There are two kinds … [Read more...]
24 Months to save the world
Scientist Julienne Stroeve has studied Arctic ice for decades. Every summer she travels north to measure how much ice has melted. She knows that climate change is melting the ice fast, but a recent trip surprised even her. Vast areas of Arctic ice have disappeared, beyond our worst expectations. This is what the experts warned us about. As the earth warms, it creates many … [Read more...]
Antarctic ice shelves melt from below
Scientists have discovered that many Antarctic ice shelves are losing ice not just by calving icebergs but by melting from their undersides as well. There’s much more of an iceberg under the water than above it. And, it turns out, there’s much more happening beneath the surface to Antarctic ice shelves than anyone had guessed. A team of researchers from British, Dutch and … [Read more...]
Safe drilling in the far North “a fantasy”
Commenting on Monday's ruling by a federal judge in Anchorage that Shell's oil spill plans for drilling in Alaska's Beaufort and Chukchi seas don't violate environmental laws, Greenpeace International Arctic campaigner Ben Ayliffe said: "Even a cursory glance at Shell's oil spill response plans shows that the company could not deal with an accident in these remote and … [Read more...]
Arctic to be ice-free in 40 years?
People have been warning about an ice-free Arctic ocean for years. But Jiping Liu, an atmospheric scientist at the State University of New York in Albany in the US and colleagues have gone one better. The melting of the Arctic icecap has become so fast and so certain that researchers can now confidently predict when the ocean will become ice-free, to within four … [Read more...]
Shell says oil spillage will not be recovered
While Shell previously asserted that it would be able to recover 90% of any oil spilled as a result of its planned Arctic oil drilling, they are now claiming that it is impossible to make such claims. Shell spokesperson Curtis Smith, quoted by the Washington Post: "We say in our plan we expect to 'encounter' 90 percent of any discharge on site, very close to the drilling … [Read more...]
