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Earth United States Science Technology

Study Links Human Actions To Specific Arctic Ice Melt (sciencemag.org) 234

sciencehabit writes from a report via Science Magazine: Since at least the 1960s, the shrinkage of the ice cap over the Arctic Ocean has advanced in lockstep with the amount of greenhouse gases humans have sent into the atmosphere, according to a study published this week in Science. Every additional metric ton of carbon dioxide (CO2) puffed into the atmosphere appears to cost the Arctic another 3 square meters of summer sea ice -- a simple and direct observational link that has been sitting under scientists' noses. If current emission trends hold, the study suggests the Arctic will be ice free by 2045 -- far sooner than some climate models predict. The study suggests that those models are underestimating how warm the Arctic has already become and how fast that melting will proceed. And it gives the public and policymakers a concrete illustration of the consequences of burning fossil fuels. For instance, a U.S. family of four would claim nearly 200 square meters of sea ice, based on U.S. emissions in 2013. Over 3 decades, that family would be responsible for destroying more than an American football field's worth of ice.
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Study Links Human Actions To Specific Arctic Ice Melt

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  • by turkeydance ( 1266624 ) on Thursday November 03, 2016 @09:13PM (#53210287)
    yeah, it's porn
  • by pollarda ( 632730 ) on Thursday November 03, 2016 @09:16PM (#53210301)
    If greenhouse gases are truly a concern it is time to take nuclear seriously. As plenty of people on /. already know, our current reactors are based on nuclear submarine technology so there is cross pollination of ideas and techniques. However, there are plenty of alternative reactor designs such as pebble bed and molten salt reactors which are self modulating and are physically impossible to have a "melt down" or get into runaway situation. Similarly, there are plenty of ways to deal with waste that are safe and won't be disturbed for 100,000 years if we are willing to actually move forward and not get stuck in the same ruts we've been running in for the last 50 years. Nuclear is one of the few (if only) alternatives to oil that has the energy density to power a modern civilization like it or not. It's that or we continue to spew greenhouse gasses and in that case we should stop whining about it as we made our choice.
    • I'd love for nuclear power to take off. But every time people try to put it forth, there are a squintillion (that's a lot) naysayers crapping all over the concept. They talk about anti-AGW people being thick-skulled.... Try telling a Green that Nuclear Power is a vastly superior and cleaner alternative.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by vinlud ( 230623 )

      The main problem with nuclear is simply that it is fairly expensive if you calculate in the all the costs outside of operating costs. You see almost no commercially funded nuclear power plants and that is for a reason.
      With the rapidly increasing efficiency of solar panels and subsequently lowering price per unit of energy, even though sources like solar are not optimal to provide baseline power. the costs are coming down so rapidly that it becomes feasable to just transform solar into stored forms of energy

  • by Bartles ( 1198017 ) on Thursday November 03, 2016 @09:22PM (#53210331)

    Um. Any one else see a problem with using surface area to describe a volumetric substance?

    • They're likely referring to the earths surface area, as that is the what they would use to estimate how much of the suns heat is reflected back out into space because of the ice.
    • Re:3 square meters? (Score:5, Informative)

      by TapeCutter ( 624760 ) on Thursday November 03, 2016 @10:22PM (#53210525) Journal

      Um. Any one else see a problem with using surface area to describe a volumetric substance?

      Yes, it's misleading. Since the 1960's, 40-50% of the ice has melted when measured by surface area, but 70-80% of has melted when measured by volume. The volume measurements come from the US navy who declassified historical ice thickness data from it's nuclear submarine fleet about a decade ago. More recent data comes from satellite measurements.

    • Re:3 square meters? (Score:4, Informative)

      by hey! ( 33014 ) on Thursday November 03, 2016 @11:08PM (#53210637) Homepage Journal

      Sure, but they aren't describing a volumetric substance; they're describing a parameter -- sea ice extent. Sea ice volume is a different parameter.

      These two parameters are of course correlated, but not in a simple way. For example wind can blow ice away from regions of ice formation, resulting in much greater extent and volume, but less volume/extent (e.g. thinner ice). This by the way is why sometimes Antarctic ice extent increases as temperatures increase -- because winds can also increase.

  • Your pet moderators are here in force. Let the lying begin!

  • A softer or broken ice pack across Northern Canada would open a great shipping channel from Atlantic to Pacific avoiding the Panama Canal.
  • by srw ( 38421 ) on Friday November 04, 2016 @12:56AM (#53210847) Homepage
    And in related news, US spending on science, space, and technology correlates with suicides by hanging, strangulation and suffocation. http://tylervigen.com/spurious... [tylervigen.com]
  • So the Arctic ice will be gone, but this time we are prepared: This is precisely the reason we have a backup Gentlemen, we have the AntArctic.

    What?

  • by larwe ( 858929 ) on Friday November 04, 2016 @06:24AM (#53211517)
    (I won't call it "math"). This is exactly analogous to saying "five million penguin farts are unleashed every year. there are 300 million people in the USA. Therefore, over a 30 year period, a family of four is directly responsible for two penguin farts."
  • "Every additional metric ton of carbon dioxide (CO2) puffed into the atmosphere appears to cost the Arctic another 3 square meters of summer sea ice"

    That's an absurd statement. They're trying to correlate volume to area. Doesn't work. What is the thickness of the 3 sq-meters that is melting? 1 molecule? 1 meter? 1 kilometer? 4 kilometers?

    Sorry, but this is a nonsensical comparison. It is disinformation and propaganda. They need to stick with science.

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