Category Archives: News

The 2020 Arctic Sea Ice Minimum Extent

August 27, 2020NewsAMSR2, Area, AWI, DMI, Extent, JAXA, NSIDC, SIPNJim Hunt

I’ve been waiting for the results of the ARCUS SIPN August call, but despite the timetable specifying “26 August 2020 (Wednesday)” they’ve still not been published and I can wait no longer!

Hopefully the August “predictions” will be available soon, but for the moment let’s take a look at the July 2020 Sea Ice Outlook instead:

For the Arctic, the median July Outlook for September 2020 average sea-ice extent is 4.36 million square kilometers, essentially identical to the median prediction in the June report, with quartiles of 4.1 and 4.6 million square kilometers. For comparison, the historical record September low over the period of satellite observations was set in 2012 at 3.57 million square kilometers, and the second lowest record was 4.27 million square kilometers set in 2007. This year’s projection is close to the 2019 observed September sea-ice extent of 4.32 million square kilometers. As was also the case for the June report, only two of the outlooks project September sea-ice extent below the 2012 record. The consensus judgement against a new record low September sea-ice extent hence remains unchanged. Interestingly, as of this report, observed extent stands at a record low for this time of year.

Note that those numbers represent “September 2020 average sea-ice extent” and not the daily minimum. Let’s now take a look at the assorted different flavours of “Arctic sea ice extent” metric. Firstly here’s the NSIDC’s “Charctic” 5 day average extent:

Next here’s JAXA/ViSHOP extent, generally assumed to be a “2 day average”:

Next here’s the DMI version, which neglects to include 2012:

Past Evidence Supports Complete Loss of Arctic Sea-ice by 2035

August 11, 2020NewsAnthony Watts, BAS, Charles Rotter, CICE, HadGEM3, Hadley Centre, Julienne Strove, Melt Ponds, NSIDC, UKMO, WUWTJim Hunt

Our title today is shamelessly plagiarised from the “Watts Up With That” blog of our old friend Anthony Watts. However daring to be different we have redacted the initial word “Claim -“.

The WUWT blog post is bylined “Charles Rotter”, and refers to a new paper in the journal Nature Climate Change entitled “Sea-ice-free Arctic during the Last Interglacial supports fast future loss“. Here’s an extract from the abstract:

The Last Interglacial (LIG), a warmer period 130,000–116,000 years before present, is a potential analogue for future climate change. Stronger LIG summertime insolation at high northern latitudes drove Arctic land summer temperatures 4–5 °C higher than in the pre-industrial era. Climate model simulations have previously failed to capture these elevated temperatures, possibly because they were unable to correctly capture LIG sea-ice changes. Here, we show that the latest version of the fully coupled UK Hadley Center climate model (HadGEM3) simulates a more accurate Arctic LIG climate, including elevated temperatures. Improved model physics, including a sophisticated sea-ice melt-pond scheme, result in a complete simulated loss of Arctic sea ice in summer during the LIG, which has yet to be simulated in past generations of models. This ice-free Arctic yields a compelling solution to the long-standing puzzle of what drove LIG Arctic warmth and supports a fast retreat of future Arctic summer sea ice.

There’s no mention of “2035” in there, so let’s look instead at yesterday’s press release from the British Antarctic Survey:

Facts About the Arctic in August 2020

August 1, 2020NewsAMSR2, Andrew Slater, Cyclone, Fram Strait, JAXA, MODIS, PIOMAS, Polarstern, SPIE, Suomi, Thickness, Thomas Wunderlich, VolumeJim Hunt

A new month begins today, and at the moment it looks as though it’s going to be the most interesting one since August 2012. Here once again is the satellite image of the enormous cyclone that was spinning over the Beaufort/Chukchi Seas just a few days ago:

Facts About the Arctic in July 2020

July 3, 2020NewsAMSR2, Area, Beaufort Sea, Cyclone, Extent, Fram Strait, IMB Buoys, MODIS, MOSAiC, MSLP, NSR, SIPN, Terra, Vilkitsky StraitJim Hunt

The new month starts with JAXA extent “lowest for the date in the satellite record” by a whisker:

The high resolution Arctic sea ice area and extent graphs based on the University of Hamburg’s AMSR2 concentration data are also in “statistical ties” for that honour, in records going back to 2013:

Facts About the Arctic in June 2020

June 1, 2020NewsAMSR2, Area, Chaunskaya Bay, East Siberian Sea, Extent, Laptev Sea, PIOMAS, Volume, WipneusJim Hunt

As is our current habit this month’s report begins with the high resolution Arctic sea ice area and extent graphs based on the University of Hamburg’s AMSR2 concentration maps:

Area and extent are currently vying for second place with 2019 on the “lowest for the date” leader board, a little behind 2016 at this point in the 2020 melting season.

Facts About the Arctic in May 2020

May 2, 2020NewsAMSR2, Area, CryoSat-2, Extent, Hamburg Uni, NSR, NWP, Rutgers, SMOS, VolumeJim Hunt

Let us begin this month’s report from the far north with the high resolution Arctic sea ice area and extent graphs based on the University of Hamburg’s AMSR2 concentration maps:

Area is currently lowest for the date in the AMSR2 record. After briefly occupying that position extent has increased over the last few days of April due to winds causing sea ice to move in the direction of the far North Atlantic:

The Great White Con

Putting the Arctic sea ice record straight