Showing posts with label Peter Wadhams. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Peter Wadhams. Show all posts

Saturday, May 3, 2025

Arctic sea ice May 2025

[ Arctic sea ice thickness, click on images to enlarge ]
The above combination image shows Arctic sea ice thickness on March 13, 2025 (left), April 28, 2025 (center) and May 13, 2025 (right). The image on the right shows more open water off the coast of Siberia.


[ Arctic sea ice concentration ]
The above image is a screenshot of part of a NASA Worldview satellite image for May 1, 2025. The image similarly shows open water off the coast of Siberia. The red dots indicate fires. 

The image on the right, adapted from NSIDC, shows Arctic sea ice concentration on May 13, 2025. 

Arctic sea ice is under threat as numerous conditions are becoming increasingly dire, as discussed in earlier posts such as this one. 

For some of these conditions, further updates are added below (carbon dioxide, temperature, variables and Arctic sea ice). 

Carbon dioxide

A daily carbon dioxide (CO₂) concentration of 431.25 parts per million (ppm) was recorded on May 10, 2025, at Mauna Loa, Hawaii, the highest daily average on record. 
CO₂ concentrations haven't been below 430 ppm for 14 days in a row at Mauna Loa, Hawaii, as illustrated by the above image, which shows CO₂ for the last 31 days through May 10, 2025. The image below gives another view of daily concentrations. 

One has to go back millions of years in time to find CO₂ concentrations this high, while the impact of high CO₂ concentrations back in history was lower due to lower solar output and the rate of change was also much slower, as also discussed in an earlier post.

The image below illustrates that the weekly mean CO₂ concentration at Mauna Loa, Hawaii, was 430.60 ppm in the week beginning on April 27, 2025, i.e. 4.02 ppm higher than the weekly value from one year ago (green inset).
Weekly CO₂ for the week starting May 4, 2025, was 430.86 ppm at Mauna Loa, Hawaii, compared to 426.92 ppm one year ago, a difference of 3.94 ppm, as illustrated by the image below.


The annual global average surface concentration of carbon dioxide (CO₂) for 2024 was 422.79 parts per million (ppm). CO₂ concentrations grew by 3.75 ppm during 2024, the highest growth rate on record, as discussed in an earlier post.

Temperature 

The global surface air temperature was 15.72°C on 9 May 2025, the highest temperature on record for this day, as illustrated by the image below. 

The global surface air temperature was 15.75°C on 10 May 2025, again the highest temperature on record for this day. The image below shows ERA5 daily temperature anomalies from end 2022 through May 10, 2025, with two trends added, a black linear trend and a red cubic (non-linear) trend that reflects stronger feedbacks and that follows ENSO (El Niño/La Niña) conditions more closely. This red trend warns about further acceleration of the temperature rise.


The shading added in the above image reflects the presence of El Niño conditions that push up temperatures (pink shading), La Niña conditions that suppress temperatures (blue shading), or neutral conditions (gray shading). The trends warn about feedbacks and further mechanisms pushing up temperatures over the next few years.

The above image shows two bases to compare the anomalies with, 1991-2000 (left axis) and 1901-1930 (right axis). Neither of these two bases is pre-industrial, anomalies will be higher when using a genuinely pre-industrial base. 

The image below shows NASA monthly data through April 2025 compared to a custom 1903-1924. This 1903-1924 base is not pre-industrial either, anomalies will be higher when using a genuinely pre-industrial base. The monthly temperature anomaly has now been more than 1.5°C higher than this 1903-1924 base for 22 consecutive months (July 2023 through April 2025, marked with red text). Anomalies are rising rapidly, the red line (2-year Lowess Smoothing trend) points at 2°C higher than 1903-1924 getting crossed in the course of 2027.

[ more than 1.5°C above base for 22 consecutive months, trend points at 2°C above 1903-1924 crossed in 2027 ]
The picture can change when using a different base that anomalies are compared with. To illustrate this, the image below uses the decade from 1904 through 1913 as a custom base, resulting in higher anomalies and a trend pointing at 2°C above this base (1904-1913) getting crossed in the course of 2026.
[ trend points at 2°C above 1904-1913 getting crossed in 2026 ]
An earlier analysis of pre-industrial suggests that using 1750 as a base could add as much as 0.3°C to the historic rise, while using a 3480 BC base could add as much as 0.79°C to the historic rise. 

Those who seek to sabotage climate action typically call for use of a base that minimizes the historic temperature rise. A higher historic rise can imply that temperatures are already higher than the thresholds that politicians at the adoption of the Paris Agreement pledged wouldn't be crossed, and it can also imply that the temperature rise is accelerating more due to stronger feedbacks such as more water vapor in the atmosphere and disappearance of lower clouds, so that would constitute a stronger call for climate action. 

The Arctic is hit hardest by the temperature rise, as illustrated by the image below, which shows temperature anomalies compared to 1951-1981 for the period from November 2024 through April 2025. 


The image below illustrates that the global temperature was at a record high for the time of year for five days in a row, i.e. from April 24, 2025, through April 28, 2025.

Variables

Some variables have a short-term impact on the temperature rise, including volcanoes, sudden stratospheric warming, sunspots and El Niño/La Niña variations. There have been no volcano eruptions and no sudden stratospheric warming events recently that could have provided significant cooling. Sunspots are at a high point in this cycle, which pushes up temperatures. Regarding ENSO (El Niño-Southern Oscillation), current conditions are ENSO-neutral, highlighting the significance of the high current temperatures, while a new El Niño may emerge soon. The image below shows NOAA's ENSO outlook dated May 11, 2025.


The image below shows temperatures through May 9, 2025, in Niño 3.4, an area in the Pacific (inset) that is critical to the development of El Niño.

[ temperature in Niño 3.4 area ]

Mechanisms such as self-amplifying feedbacks and crossing of tipping points, and further developments such as loss of the aerosol masking effect, can jointly contribute to further accelerate the temperature rise, resulting in a rise from pre-industrial of more than 10°C, while in the process also causing the clouds tipping point to get crossed and that can push the temperature rise up by a further 8°C, as discussed in earlier posts such as this one.

Arctic sea ice volume and area

Loss in sea ice can dramatically push up temperatures, as discussed in earlier posts such as this one. High ocean temperatures are causing Arctic sea ice volume to be very low compared to earlier years. The image below shows Arctic sea ice volume over the years in red for April, the month when Arctic sea ice typically reaches its maximum volume for the respective year. 

The image below shows Arctic sea ice volume from 2000, with markers indicating volume in September (red) and in April (blue), corresponding to the year's minimum- and maximum volume. 
The image below shows Arctic sea ice volume through May 14, 2025.
The image below illustrates that Arctic sea ice disappears not only as it melts away from below, due to heating up of the water of the Arctic Ocean. Arctic sea ice can also disappear as it gets broken up by ocean currents and moves out of the Arctic Ocean. The image shows how, on May 6, 2025, the sea ice gets broken up just north of the northern tip of Greenland, due to ocean currents that will also move the pieces to the south, alongside the edges of Greenland, toward the North Atlantic. 

[ click on images to enlarge ]
On May 13, 2025, Arctic sea ice area was second lowest on record for that day, as illustrated by the image below. 
The comparison with the year 2012 is important, since Arctic sea ice area reached its lowest minimum in 2012. Arctic sea ice area was only 2.24 million km² on September 12, 2012, i.e. 1.24 million km² above a Blue Ocean Event. While on May 13, 2025, Arctic sea ice area was only 0.8 million km² lower than on May 8, 2012, the difference between anomalies typically gets narrower in May. Therefore, if the difference between 2025 and 2012 will widen again, a Blue Ocean Event may occur in September 2025, as discussed in an earlier post. 

Methane

Loss of Arctic sea ice can also trigger a very dangerous feedback: eruptions of methane from the seafloor of the Arctic Ocean. Methane in the atmosphere is already very high and large additional methane releases threaten to cause hydroxyl depletion, in turn extending the lifetime of all methane currently in the atmosphere. 

Data for the annual increase in methane have been updated by NOAA. in 2024, there was a higher increase than in 2023, the 2024 increase was almost 10 parts per billion (ppb).   

The image below shows the annual methane increase data (red circles), with two trends added. A quadratic trend (blue) is based on all available data (1894 through 2024), while a quintic trend (pink) is based on 2017 through 2024 data. The pink trend warns about a huge increase in methane, which could eventuate due to eruptions of seafloor methane.

Below are warnings from earlier posts. 
[ from earlier post, also note the recent discussion on monthly methane ]
[ from earlier post ]
Also noteworthy is this analysis by Andrew Glikson and work by Peter Wadhams et al. 

In the video below, methane emissions are discussed by Peter Wadhams, Paul Beckwith, Peter Carter and Herb Simmens
 

Methane concentrations in the atmosphere have been around 1960 parts per billion (ppb) recently at Mauna Loa, Hawaii, as illustrated by the image below. 

Methane is more potent as a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide. Methane also has indirect effects, such as ground-level ozone and stratospheric water vapor, while methane partly turns into carbon dioxide. Importantly, the warming potential of a pulse of methane will decrease over time, given methane's relatively short lifetime. 

Accordingly, there are different ways to calculate methane's carbon dioxide equivalent (CO₂e). Also important is whether a specific concentration of methane is used (in ppb) or the weight is used of a pulse of methane. In each of these cases, different multipliers can be used to calculate methane's CO₂e.

When using a multiplier of 200, a methane concentration of 1960 ppb would translate into 392 ppm of CO₂e. As mentioned above, a daily CO₂ concentration of 431.25 ppm was recorded at Mauna Loa, Hawaii, on May 10, 2025. So, when adding up these two, the joint CO₂e would be 823.25 ppm CO₂e, i.e. just 376.75 ppm short of the clouds tipping point (at 1200 ppm). This joint total doesn't yet include contributions of nitrous oxide and other drivers, so the situation is even more dire. Moreover, concentrations of greenhouse gases are increasing and they may increase even more dramatically soon.

So, what multiplier is best used when calculating methane's CO₂e? The IPCC already uses a slightly higher GWP for methane emissions from fossil fuel fugitive emission sources than for other methane emissions. So, the idea of using different multipliers in different scenarios is not new. 

One multiplier could be used that does include cooling aerosols and another one that doesn't. Most carbon dioxide results from burning coal and oil, which comes not only with high CO₂ emissions, but also with co-emissions of cooling aerosols. On the other hand, there are little or no cooling aerosols co-emitted with methane emissions. Therefore, inclusion of cooling aerosols could result in a higher multiplier to be used when translating concentrations of methane into CO₂e, compared to carbon dioxide.

[ warming contributions, from earlier post, click on images to enlarge ]

[ warming responsibility by sector ]
To illustrate this point, the above image shows contributions to warming from 2010 to 2019, using IPCC AR6 data. If masking (cooling) would be included in the image by subtracting cooling by sulfates from CO₂, then the contribution of CO₂ would be proportionally lower, while the contribution of methane would be proportionally higher than what the image shows. 

The image on the right is from a recent analysis by Gerard Wedderburn-Bisshop.    

Given the dire outlook and given methane's higher potency as a greenhouse gas, it makes most sense to seek urgent and dramatic reductions in methane and such action should not be allowed to be sabotaged by those who propose a low multiplier when calculating methane's CO₂e.

IPCC

Meanwhile, the IPCC remains silent. No updates or special reports on topics such as acceleration of the temperature rise. Instead, the IPCC keeps persisting in downplaying the potential for such dangerous developments (in terms of the severity, probability, ubiquity and imminence of their impact), in efforts to hide the most effective climate action. The IPCC keeps pointing at less effective policies such as support for BECCS and biofuel, while continuing to make it look as if there was a carbon budget to divide among polluters, as if polluters could continue to pollute for decades to come.

Climate Emergency Declaration

The situation is dire and the precautionary principle calls for rapid, comprehensive and effective action to reduce the damage and to improve the situation, as described in this 2022 post, where needed in combination with a Climate Emergency Declaration, as also discussed at this group.



Links

• University of Bremen - sea ice
https://seaice.uni-bremen.de/start

• NASA Worldview
https://worldview.earthdata.nasa.gov

• NSIDC - National Snow and Ice Data Center - Sea Ice Today
https://nsidc.org/sea-ice-today

• NOAA - Daily Average Mauna Loa CO2
https://gml.noaa.gov/ccgg/trends/monthly.html

• NOAA - Weekly Average Mauna Loa CO2

• Climate Reanalyzer
https://climatereanalyzer.org

• Danish Meteorological Institute - Arctic sea ice volume and thickness
https://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/icethickness/thk.uk.php

• Kevin Pluck - seaice.visuals.earth
https://seaice.visuals.earth

• Record high increase in carbon dioxide
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2025/04/record-high-increase-in-carbon-dioxide.html

• NOAA - ENSO: Recent Evolution, Current Status and Predictions - 5 May 2025
https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/lanina/enso_evolution-status-fcsts-web.pdf

• NOAA - trends in methane
https://gml.noaa.gov/ccgg/trends_ch4

• The methane time bomb - by Andrew Glikson (2018)

• Copernicus
https://climate.copernicus.eu

• Increased transparency in accounting conventions could benefit climate policy - by Gerard Wedderburn-Bisshop   











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Friday, February 23, 2024

Stephen Salter, a giant in combating climate change passes away

   Stephen Salter (2012)
Stephen Hugh Salter, MBE, FRSE, Emeritus Professor of Engineering Design at the University of Edinburgh, was born December 7, 1938, and passed away peacefully on February 23, 2024, at the age of 85.

Stephen Salter was a giant who persisted to dedicate his life to combating climate change, and he did so in many ways until the very end. 

Stephen's work on wave energy led to Salter's Duck (1974), a device able to both generate energy and reduce wave strength. In 1977, Stephen built a multi-directional wave tank at the University of Edinburgh. 

In 2011, Stephen looked at ways to capture methane released in the Arctic, such as by covering lakes and parts of seas by sheets to collect the methane (drawing below).

Empty and filled extruded rubber trough cases with 4 times enlarged views of end and centre

Stephen was perhaps best known for his work on marine cloud brightening, i.e. deploying vessels to spray salt particles into the air in an effort to reduce sea surface temperatures, and thus also reducing sea ice loss and reducing the strength of extreme weather events including storms and hurricanes.

In the video below, Stephen discusses marine cloud brightening in a TEDx talk in 2016. 


Marine cloud brightening | Prof. Stephen Salter | TEDx Talks Published 15 Nov 2016

The image below is from the post Hurricane Moderation at Arctic-news.blogspot.com. 


In the video below, by theedinburghreporter, Stephen Salter talks about marine cloud brightening.


In the video below, Stephen Salter is interviewed by Nick Breeze (2022). 


Below is a screenshot from the above video by Nick Breeze. 

Stephen Salter discusses sending solar energy back out to space by means of Marine Cloud Brightening.
Screenshot by Sam Carana from video by Nick Breeze.

Stephen Salter (2022): "A jolly small change in reflectivity of the clouds will be sending solar energy back out to space enough to balance what the excess is that's being retained here by greenhouse gases (4:26-4:41). Maybe 10 cubic meters of water a second as sub micron drops sprayed in the right place would offset all the damage we've done since pre-industrial times (5:15-5:24)." 

Our hearts are saddened by this huge loss, and our thoughts are with Stephen's family and his many friends. Stephen's work will not be forgotten.

Added below is a video featuring Stephen Salter, Peter Wadhams, Paul Beckwith, Robert Tulip, Herb Simmens, Alaxandra Price and Win Rampen. 



Links

• Futuristic fleet of 'cloudseeders' - by John Latham (2007)
https://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/6354759.stm

• Sea-going hardware for the cloud albedo method of reversing global warming - by Stephen Salter, Graham Sortino and John Latham (2008)
https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsta.2008.0136

• Can we capture methane from the Arctic seabed? (2011)

• Professor Stephen Salter receives top Academy Award (2012)

• Leading wave energy pioneer Prof Stephen Salter (2012) 
https://www.theengineer.co.uk/content/in-depth/leading-wave-energy-pioneer-prof-stephen-salter

• Coded modulation of computer climate models for the prediction of precipitation and other side-effects of marine cloud brightening (2013)

• Marine cloud brightening | Prof. Stephen Salter | TEDxHeriotWattUniversity |  TEDx talk (2016)
• Hurricane Moderation (2018)
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2018/09/hurricane-moderation.html

• Talking to Professor Stephen Salter - TheEdinburghReporter (May 23, 2019)

• Speaking with Professor Stephen Salter - The Edinburgh Report (June 1, 2019)

• Professor Stephen Salter at Holyrood speaking about project to arrest climate change

• John Latham obituary (2021)
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2021/may/30/john-latham-obituay

• Stephen Salter - Whole interview by Nick Breeze ClimateGenn (2022)



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Saturday, May 22, 2021

Arctic Ocean invaded by hot, salty water


Sea surface temperatures on the Northern Hemisphere have been rising dramatically over the years, as illustrated by above image, indicating that the latent heat tipping point is getting crossed, while the methane hydrates tipping point could get crossed soon, depending on developments.

At the moment, the surface temperature of most of the Arctic ocean's is still below 0°C.

Heat is entering the Arctic Ocean from the south, as illustrated by the image on the right. Hot, salty water is entering the Arctic Ocean from the Atlantic Ocean as currents dive underneath the ice, causing the ice to melt from below. 
[ click on images to enlarge ]

The image on the right, from the NSIDC article A step in our Spring, compares sea ice age between March 12 to 18 for the years 1985 (a) and 2021 (b).

The bottom graph (c) shows a time series from 1985 to 2021 of percent ice coverage of the Arctic Ocean domain. The Arctic Ocean domain is depicted in the inset map with purple shading.

At the end of the ice growth season in mid-March, 73.3% of the Arctic Ocean domain was covered by first-year ice, while 3.5% was covered by ice 4+ years old. 

This compares to 70.6% and 4.4% respectively in March 2020.

In March 1985, near the beginning of the ice age record, the Arctic Ocean region was comprised of nearly equal amounts of first-year ice (39.3%) and 4+ year-old ice (30.6%).

Sea ice that hasn't yet survived a summer melt season is referred to as first-year ice. This thin, new ice is vulnerable to melt and disintegration in stormy conditions. Ice that survives a summer melt season can grow thicker and less salty, since snow that thickens the ice contains little salt. Thickness and salt content determine the resistance of the ice to melt. Multiyear ice is more likely to survive temperatures that would melt first-year ice, and to survive waves and winds that would break up first-year ice.

The image on the right shows a forecast of the thickness of the sea ice, run on May 20, 2021 and valid for May 21, 2021. 

An area is visible north of Severnaya Zemlya toward the North Pole where thickness is getting very thin, while there is one spot where the ice has virtually disappeared. 

The spot is likely a melting iceberg, the animation on the right shows that the spot has been there for quite a few days, while the freshwater in this spot appears to result from melting amid salty water. 

Overall, sea ice is getting very thin, indicating that the buffer constituted by the sea ice underneath the surface is almost gone, meaning that further heat entering the Arctic Ocean will strongly heat up the water. 

As the animation underneath on the right shows, freshwater is entering the Arctic Ocean due to runoff from land, i.e. rainwater from rivers, meltwater from glaciers and groundwater runoff from thawing permafrost. 

At the same time, very salty water is entering the Arctic Ocean from the Atlantic Ocean. 

The map below shows how salty and hot water from the Atlantic Ocean enters the Arctic Ocean along two currents, flowing on each side of Svalbard, and meeting at this area north of Severnaya Zemlya where thickness is getting very low. 

The blue color on the map indicates depth (see scale underneath). 

The image below, by Malcolm Light and based on Max & Lowrie (1993), from a recent post, shows vulnerable Arctic Ocean slope and deep water methane hydrates zones below 300 m depth. 

Malcolm Light indicates three areas: 
Area 1. Methane hydrates on the slope;
Area 2. Methane hydrates on the abyssal plane; 
Area 3. Methane hydrates associated with the spreading Gakkel Ridge hydro-thermal activity (the Gakkel Riidge runs in between the northern tip of Greenland and the Laptev Sea). 


The freezing point of freshwater is 0°C or 32°F. For salty water, the freezing point is -2°C or 28.4°F.

During April 2021, sea ice was about 160 cm thick.

In June and July 2021, thickness will fall rapidly, as illustrated by the image on the right by Nico Sun. 

Sea ice acts as a buffer, by consuming energy in the process of melting, thus avoiding that this energy causes a temperature rise of the water. 

As long as there is sea ice in the water, this sea ice will keep absorbing heat as it melts, so the temperature will not rise at the sea surface and remain at zero°C. The amount of energy that is consumed in the process of melting the ice is as much as it takes to heat an equivalent mass of water from zero°C to 80°C.

The accumulated ice melt energy until now is the highest on record, as illustrated by the image on the right, by Nico Sun.

The image below further illustrate the danger. As the temperature of the water keeps rising, more heat will reach sediments at the seafloor of the Arctic Ocean that contain vast amounts of methane, as discussed at this page and in this post.

Ominously, methane levels reached a peak of 2901 ppb at 469 mb on May 13, 2021. 

Research

In the extract of a 2008 paper, Natalia Shakhova et al. conclude: ". . we consider release of up to 50 Gt of predicted amount of hydrate storage as highly possible for abrupt release at any time."


The video below contains excerpts from Nick Breeze's interview with Natalia Shakhova at the European Geophysical Union in Vienna, 2012, on the likelihood and timeframe of a large methane release from the seafloor of the Arctic Ocean. 

Natalia Shakhova: "The total amount of methane in the atmosphere is about 5Gt. The amount of carbon in the form of methane in this Arctic shelf is - approximately - from hundreds to thousands Gt and, of course, only 1% of [such an] amount is required to double the atmospheric burden of methane."

"But to destabilize 1% of this carbon pool, I think, not much effort is needed, considering the state of the permafrost and the amount of methane involved, because what divides the methane from the atmosphere is a very shallow water column and the weakening permafrost, which is losing its ability to seal, to serve as a seal, and this is, I think, not a matter of thousands of years, it's a matter of decades, at most hundred years." 

(Natalia talks with Igor Semiletov)
Natalia Shakhova: "Just because this area is seismically and tectonically active, and there was some investigation that the tectonic activity was increasing, and the seismic activity, the destabiliation of the ground, just mechanical forcing destabiliation [may suffice to act as] additional pathway for this methane to escape. There are many factors that are very convincing for us [to conclude] that it might happen."

Elaborating on the timeframe.
Natalia Shakhova: "Not any time, any time sounds like it might happen today, it might happen tomorrow, the day after tomorrow . . " 
Igor Simelitov: "It might!"


The image below was created with content from a 2019 paper by Natalia Shakhova et al. It concludes that methane releases could potentially increase by 3-5 orders of magnitude, considering the sheer amount of methane preserved within the shallow East Siberian Arctic Shelf seabed deposits and the documented thawing rates of subsea permafrost reported recently.

In a 2021 paper by researchers from Europe, Russia and the U.S., results from field research are published showing that methane is getting released from locations deep below the submarine permafrost. Lead author, Julia Steinbach, from Stockholm University, says: “The permafrost is a closed lid over the seafloor that’s keeping everything in place. And now we have holes in this lid.” 

In the video below, Nick Breeze interviews Igor Semiletov on methane plumes detected during this 2020 field research over the East Siberian Arctic Shelf (ESAS).


In the video below, Nick Breeze interviews Örjan Gustafsson on field research on methane in the East Siberian Arctic Shelf (ESAS)


In the video below, Peter Wadhams analyses the threat of Arctic methane releases.


In the video below, Guy McPherson discusses the situation.


In conclusion, temperatures could rise dramatically soon. A 3°C will likely suffice for humans to go extinct, making it in many respects rather futile to speculate about what will happen in the longer term. On the other hand, the right thing to do is to help avoid the worst things from happening, through comprehensive and effective action as described in the Climate Plan.

Links

• NOAA Climate at a Glance

• Danish Meteorological Institute - Arctic temperature
http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/meant80n.uk.php

• Freezing point of water - Climate Change: Arctic sea ice

• Arctic surface temperature

• NSIDC: A step in our Spring, image credit: T. Tschudi, University of Colorado, and W. Meier and J.S. Stewart, National Snow and Ice Data Center/Image by W. Meier

• Arctic sea ice - thickness and salinity - navy.mil
https://www7320.nrlssc.navy.mil/GLBhycomcice1-12/arctic.html

• CryosphereComputing - by Nico Sun
https://cryospherecomputing.tk

• A 4.5 km resolution Arctic Ocean simulation with the global multi-resolution model FESOM 1.4 - by Qiang Wang et al. 

• Max, M.D. & Lowrie, A. 1993. Natural gas hydrates: Arctic and Nordic Sea potential. In: Vorren, T.O., Bergsager, E., Dahl-Stamnes, A., Holter, E., Johansen, B., Lie, E. & Lund, T.B. Arctic Geology and Petroleum Potential, Proceedings of the Norwegian Petroleum Society Conference, 15-17 August 1990, Tromso, Norway. Norwegian Petroleum Society (NPF), Special Publication 2 Elsevier, Amsterdam, 27-53.
https://www.elsevier.com/books/arctic-geology-and-petroleum-potential/vorren/978-0-444-88943-0

• Extinction by 2027- by Malcolm Light
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2021/05/extinction-by-2027.html


• Anomalies of methane in the atmosphere over the East Siberian shelf: Is there any sign of methane leakage from shallow shelf hydrates? - by Shakhova, Semiletov, Salyuk and Kosmach (2008)
https://www.cosis.net/abstracts/EGU2008/01526/EGU2008-A-01526.pdf

• Understanding the Permafrost–Hydrate System and Associated Methane Releases in the East Siberian Arctic Shelf - by Natalia Shakhova, Igor Semiletov and Evgeny Chuvilin 
https://www.mdpi.com/2076-3263/9/6/251

• A Massive Methane Reservoir Is Lurking Beneath the Sea 


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Tuesday, July 16, 2019

Most Important Message Ever

This is the most important message ever posted.
Please share it widely and add your comments!
(click on share in the box underneath this post)

A catastrophe of unimaginable proportions is unfolding. Life is disappearing from Earth and runaway heating could destroy all life. At 5°C heating, most life on Earth will have disappeared. When looking only at near-term human extinction, 3°C will likely suffice. Study after study is showing the severity of the threat, yet too many keep ignoring or denying it, at the peril of the world at large. Have a look at the following:

Crossing the 2°C guardrail

The image below shows two trends, a long-term trend (blue) and a short-term trend (red) that better reflects El Niño peaks.


The image confirms an earlier analysis that it could be 1.85°C (or 3.33°F) hotter in 2019 than in 1750.

June 2019 was the hottest June on record, it was 2.08°C (or 3.74°F) hotter than the annual global mean 1980-2015, which was partly due to seasonal variations, as the image below shows.


This gives an idea of how hot it will be mid 2019. July 2019 is on course to be hottest month on record, further highlighting the danger that a strengthening El Niño could cause a steep temperature rise soon.

Remember the 2015 Paris Agreement, when politicians pledged to act on the threat of climate change, including by “Holding the increase in the global average temperature to well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels . . . ”

The image at the top highlights the danger of a rapid temperature rise occurring soon and of the 2°C (or 3.6°F) guardrail getting crossed soon, i.e. in 2020 (the blue long-term trend, based on 1880-June2019 data), or in 2019 (red trend, based on 2011-June 2019 data). Moreover, the danger is that temperatures will not come down after crossing 2°C, but instead will continue in a steep rise toward 3°C.


We are already at about 2°C above pre-industrial

In the image at the top, NASA data are adjusted, as discussed in an earlier post. Such adjustment is appropriate for a number of reasons. 

Firstly, NASA uses the period 1951-1980 as their default baseline. Most of the adjustment is due to the use of a 1750 baseline, which better reflects pre-industrial.

Furthermore, air temperatures over oceans and higher polar anomalies are more appropriate, as confirmed by a recent study that concludes that missing data have been responsible for an underestimation of global warming by 0.1°C, and as illustrated by the image on the right, from a recent study, which shows the difference between using surface air temperature globally (black line), versus when sea surface temperature are used for oceans (dark blue line) and in case of incomplete coverage (light blue line).

At a 3°C rise, humans will likely go extinct

The image at the top shows two trends, a long-term trend in blue and a short-term trend in red which follows variations such as El Niño more closely. The blue trend points at a 3°C (or 5.4°F) rise by 2026, while the red trends shows that a 3°C rise could eventuate as early as in 2020 in case of a persistently strengthening El Niño.

At a 3°C rise, humans will likely go extinct, as habitat for humans (and many other species) will disappear. Such a rise will cause a rapid decline of the snow and ice cover around the globe, in turn making that less sunlight gets reflected back into space. Associated changes are discussed in more detail at this page and this page, and include that the jet stream will further get out of shape, resulting in more extreme weather events such as droughts, heatwaves and firestorms. Changes to the jet stream will also contribute to a further strengthening of storms, which threatens to push large amounts of hot, salty water into the Arctic Ocean, triggering eruptions of more and more seafloor methane.

From a 4°C rise, Earth will have a moist-greenhouse scenario

As the temperature rise gains further momentum, runaway heating may well turn Earth into a lifeless planet. This danger was discussed in a 2013 post, warning that, at 4°C rise, Earth will enter a moist-greenhouse scenario and without anything stopping the rise, it will continue to eventually destroy the ozone layer and the ice caps, while the oceans would be evaporating into the atmosphere's upper stratosphere and eventually disappear into space.

[ from an earlier post ]
At 5°C rise, most life on Earth will be extinct

At 5°C rise, most life on Earth will be extinct. A 2018 study by Strona & Bradshaw indicates that most life on Earth will disappear with a 5°C rise (see box on the right).

As the temperature keeps rising, chances are that all life on Earth will go extinct, as Earth would be left with no ozone layer to protect life from deadly UV-radiation. Furthermore, Earth would no longer have water, an essential building block of life. Soil moisture, ground water and water in oceans would evaporate and eventually disappear into space, as discussed in an earlier post.

There are several reasons why the temperature will keep rising well beyond a 5°C rise, as discussed below.

Could Earth go the same way as Venus?

At first glace, such a lifeless planet scenario may seem unlikely, as Earth did experience high temperatures before, but each time it did cool down again. While many species went extinct as a result of steep temperature rises, each time some species did survive the mass extinction events in the past.

This time, however, the situation is much more dire than during previous mass extinctions, and temperatures could keep rising, due to:
  • Brighter Sun - The sun is now much brighter than it was in the past;
  • No sequestration - The rapidity of the rise in greenhouse gases and of the associated temperature rise leaves species little or no time to adapt or move, and leaving no time for sequestration of carbon dioxide by plants and by deposits from other species, nor for formation of methane hydrates at the seafloor of oceans; 
  • No weathering - The rapidity of the rise also means that weathering doesn't have a chance to make a difference. Rapid heating is also dwarfing what weathering (and vegetation) can do to reduce carbon dioxide levels; and
  • Methane - Due to the rapid temperature rise, there is also little or no time for methane to get decomposed. Methane levels will skyrocket, due to fires, due to decomposition of dying vegetation and due to releases from melting terrestrial permafrost and from the seafloor (see more on methane further below). 

The methane threat

Our predicament

The predicament of this geological time is that methane in hydrates has been accumulating for a long time, especially in the Arctic, where there is little or no hydroxyl present in the atmosphere in the first place, while some 75% of the East Siberian Arctic Shelf (ESAS) is shallower than 50 m, as also discussed in this earlier post and this earlier post.

As more methane rises abruptly from the seafloor in plumes, the chance reduces that it will get decomposed in the water, and especially so in the Arctic where long uni-directional sea currents prevent microbes to return to the location of such plumes.

Shallow seas (light blue areas on the image on the right) make waters prone to warm up quickly during summer peaks, allowing heat to penetrate the seabed.

Methane rising through shallow waters will also enter the atmosphere more quickly. Elsewhere in the world, releases from hydrates underneath the seafloor will largely be oxidized by methanotroph bacteria in the water. In shallow waters, however, methane released from the seabed will quickly pass through the water column.

Large abrupt releases will also quickly deplete the oxygen in the water, making it harder for bacteria to break down the methane.

[ from an earlier post ]
The image on the right highlights methane's accelerating rise, showing levels of methane (CH₄), carbon dioxide (CO₂) and nitrous oxide (N₂O) in the atmosphere that are, respectively, 257%, 146% and 122% their 1750 levels.

Hydroxyl depletion extending methane's lifetime

The graph on the right also shows that methane levels in the atmosphere remained almost unchanged during the period 2000-2007. One explanation for this is that, as the world heated up due to the rising levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, the amount of water vapor in the atmosphere rose accordingly (at a rate of 7% for each degree Celsius rise), which translated into more hydroxyl getting produced that resulted in more methane getting decomposed. So, while methane emissions kept rising, the amount of methane in the atmosphere remained relatively stable, as more methane got decomposed. Eventually, in 2007, the continued rise in methane emissions started to overwhelm the capacity of hydroxyl to decompose methane.  

The danger is that, as huge amounts of methane get released rapidly, hydroxyl depletion will extend its lifetime, in turn further accelerating heating and resulting in further releases of seafloor methane.

Methane's GWP

Measured over a few years, methane's global warming potential (GWP) is very high. The image on the right, from IPCC AR5, shows that over a 10-year timescale, the current global release of methane from all anthropogenic sources exceeds all anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions as agents of global warming; that is, methane emissions are more important than carbon dioxide emissions for driving the current rate of global warming.

The values for methane's GWP that are used in the image on the right are also used in the image below, which shows that over the first few years, methane's GWP is more than 150 times higher than carbon dioxide.


Above image is actually conservative, as the IPCC also gives higher values for methane's GWP in AR5, i.e. for fossil methane and when including climate change feedbacks, while there also is additional warming due to the carbon dioxide that results from methane's oxidation. Furthermore, research published in 2016 and 2018 found methane to be more potent than IPCC's GWP for methane in AR5, so it seems appropriate to use 150 as methane's GWP for periods of a few years.

Self-reinforcing feedback loops further accelerate heating in the Arctic and just one of them, seafloor methane, could suffice to cause runaway heating.

from an earlier post (2014)  
As the image below shows, in which a GWP of 150 for methane is used, just the existing carbon dioxide and methane, plus seafloor methane releases, would suffice to trigger the clouds feedback tipping point to be crossed that by itself could push up global temperatures by 8°C, within a few years.


As described on above image and in an earlier post, a rapid temperature rise could result from a combination of elements, including albedo changes, loss of sulfate cooling, and methane released from destabilizing hydrates contained in sediments at the seafloor of oceans.

[ from an earlier post ]
In the video below, Professor Peter Wadhams and Stuart Scott discuss the threat of large methane releases (recorded March 2019, published July 2019).


Seafloor methane releases could be triggered soon by strong winds causing an influx of warm, salty water into the Arctic ocean, as described in an earlier post and discussed in the 2017 video below. In the above images, methane is responsible for a temperature rise of as much as 1.1°C in a matter of years, but the rise won't stop there. A study published in 2012 calculates that 1000-fold methane increase could occur resulting in a rise of as much as 6°C within 80 years, with more to follow after that.



In the May 2019 video below, Professor Guy McPherson and Thom Hartmann discuss our predicament.



The situation is dire and calls for comprehensive and effective action, as described in the Climate Plan.


Links

• Extinction Alert
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2019/02/extinction-alert.html

• Geographical Distribution of Thermometers Gives the Appearance of Lower Historical Global Warming - by Rasmus Benestad et al.
https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2019GL083474

• July on course to be hottest month ever, say climate scientists - The Guardian
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/jul/16/july-on-course-to-be-hottest-month-ever-say-climate-scientists

• Radiative forcing of carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide: A significant revision of the methane radiative forcing - by Maryam Etminan et al. (2018)
https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/2016GL071930

• Large regional shortwave forcing by anthropogenic methane informed by Jovian observations - by William Collins et al. (2016)
https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/4/9/eaas9593

• Estimating and tracking the remaining carbon budget for stringent climate targets - by Joeri Rogelj et al.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-019-1368-z

• As El Niño sets in, will global biodiversity collapse in 2019?
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2018/11/as-el-nino-sets-in-will-global-biodiversity-collapse-in-2019.html

• Methane hydrates
https://methane-hydrates.blogspot.com/2013/04/methane-hydrates.html

• Damage of Land Biosphere due to Intense Warming by 1000-Fold Rapid Increase in Atmospheric Methane: Estimation with a Climate–Carbon Cycle Model, by Atsushi Abata et al. (2012)
https://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/full/10.1175/JCLI-D-11-00533.1

• Extreme weather
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/extreme-weather.html

• Feedbacks in the Arctic
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/feedbacks.html

• Albedo and Latent Heat
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/albedo.html

• Earth is on the edge of runaway warming
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2013/04/earth-is-on-the-edge-of-runaway-warming.html

• When Will We Die?
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2019/06/when-will-we-die.html

• Warning of mass extinction of species, including humans, within one decade
http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2017/02/warning-of-mass-extinction-of-species-including-humans-within-one-decade.html

• Climate Plan
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/climateplan.html



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