Greenland Glacier Reverses Course, Growing Again After Shrinking for Years
“That was kind of a surprise. We kind of got used to a runaway system.”
A new NASA study shows that a major Greenland glacier once touted as one of the fastest shrinking ice and snow masses on Earth is growing again.
The Jakobshavn glacier around 2012 was retreating about 1.8 miles and thinning nearly 130 feet annually. But it started growing again at about the same rate in the past two years, according to a study in Monday’s Nature Geoscience. Study authors and outside scientists think this is temporary.
“That was kind of a surprise. We kind of got used to a runaway system,” said Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland ice and climate scientist Jason Box. “The good news is that it’s a reminder that it’s not necessarily going that fast. But it is going.”
Polar bears will welcome this news, which have substantially increased in numbers over the past decade.
The reason for the expansion is being attributed to a natural climate cycle.
A natural cyclical cooling of North Atlantic waters likely caused the glacier to reverse course, said study lead author Ala Khazendar, a NASA glaciologist on the Oceans Melting Greenland project. Khazendar and colleagues say this coincides with a flip of the North Atlantic Oscillation — a natural and temporary cooling and warming of parts of the ocean that is like a distant cousin to El Nino in the Pacific.
The water in Disko Bay, where Jakobshavn hits the ocean, is about 3.6 degrees cooler than a few years ago, study authors said.
The findings have led to some scientists questioning the concept of “climate change” as a cut-and-dry, black-and-white theory.
Other Arctic glaciers may be undergoing similar growth. That suggests the ebb and flow of glaciers in a warming world may be more complicated and harder to predict than previously thought, says Willis.
One important factor is that it’s not just about a warming atmosphere. “The water is warming, too,” says Willis. “Oceans are doing a huge part of the work in terms of driving Greenland’s ice melt.”
Interestingly, scientists have started to use biomarker proxies used to reconstruct both Arctic and Antarctic sea ice conditions since the Early Holocene (i.e., about 11,500 years ago) reveal that today’s sea ice changes are not unusual. Additionally, they decided that there is more extensive Arctic and Antarctic sea ice during recent decades than nearly all of the last 10,000 years.
The reports related to this finding indicate the shrinkage is “temporary.” Climate change believers are hanging onto this word as vigorously as anti-Trumpers are hanging on to the phase “not exonerated” in the Mueller Report.
A fast shrinking Greenland glacier takes a U-turn and is growing again, NASA finds. It’s good news, but likely temporary and it shows how important water temperatures are to glaciers. https://t.co/jVrTHh3EvV pic.twitter.com/IWCBPytGJk
— seth borenstein (@borenbears) March 25, 2019
Don’t get too excited: It’s only temporary, scientists say. https://t.co/zfdZE227Kk
— USA TODAY (@USATODAY) March 26, 2019
Massive Greenland glacier said to be one of the main contributors to global sea level rise is GROWING again due to cooling local temperatures – but NASA warns it’s only temporaryhttps://t.co/VD0bUG2TEE via @MailOnline
— Climate Realists (@ClimateRealists) March 26, 2019
Meanwhile, publications began to notice the connection to climate and solar activity we have often covered.
…The back story here is that all weather is derived from the sun and that we are now heading into a potentially deep sunspot minimum, which may once again show significant lowering of global temperatures.
That is the direct opposite of many who believe that climate change is raising global temperatures.
You should look at various reliable sources on both sides and make up your own mind!
…As of the writing of this column, the sun has not seen sunspots for 33 days in a row, only to have sunspot AR2734 appear in the northern hemisphere on Wednesday.
It is a tiny one and goes to show you that we need to do a lot more research on the Sun, to understand its complex cycles.
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Comments
Damn this global warming, it leave me feeling cold!
Aaaaa, the glacier is retreating, it’s the end of the world!
Aaaaa, the glacier is advancing, it’s the end of the world!
Seriously?
This is the worst kind of global warming, the one where glaciers grow!
Observational scientists see something they haven’t seen before, and sometimes mistake it for something new, rather than newly recorded.
I’m glad to see an article that is less breathless.
NASA warns it’s only temporary. Gee, no kidding? Thanks for the, ah, warning. I thought it would be permanent and ultimately turn the earth into one giant ice cube.
When you look at normal cyclic ice ages in comparison to our life span, they might as well be permanent.
As I recall, Dallas has had 3 100 year storms in the past three years. That means that their estimate of 100 year storms is wrong. So I looked it up and found this explanation: https://dfw.cbslocal.com/2018/09/27/study-100-year-rain-events-texas/
Regardless of rather or climate change is man made or a normal cyclic problem, we are seeing that public policy should be to avoid developing certain areas. It might be reasonable to build elevated structures where flooding will be less than ten feet, but when we see areas flooded 30 feet deep, then people should not be allowed to build there, and there should be no public money used to bail out those who do build.
So much for Houston, eh?
That was kind of a surprise.
What, the “science” isn’t settled?
Anything which reverses, even “temporarily” (which hasn’t been shown yet, but their faith is touching) is not, by definition, a “runaway” anything.
That’s just not how the dreaded “positive feedback loop” works.
Just as they tweak their computer models to exactly conform with past events including the “pause”, they tweak their narrative to confirm with The Narrative. Instead of continually questioning their results to keep an open mind, they religiously view each variable not within the confines of their dogma. Flat earth-spherical earth…. Earth centered-sun centered universe….. nothing new but more hideously costly as a mistake.
You might have to squint, but maybe you can discern the trend:
Cumulative change in the total mass (in Gigatonnes, Gt) of the Greenland Ice Sheet
Here’s from someone who should know:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8nbeD1mwCdo
The cycles of glacial expansion and contraction are due to activity related to a gigantic aquifer beneath the glacier. It is melting from underneath. It has nothing at all to do with climate.
Pasadena Phil: The cycles of glacial expansion and contraction are due to activity related to a gigantic aquifer beneath the glacier. It is melting from underneath.
Not according to Kristin Poinar, your cited expert. She is talking about up to a one meter rise in sea levels by the end of the century due to global warming. While her specialty is glacier melt, her stated purpose is to help “policymakers and stake-holders make informed decisions on the growing number of issues that climate change and sea-level rise affect.”
http://www.scholastic.com/browse/article.jsp?id=3749910
Watch it again. You missed the part where she dismissed any Greenland melt-off contributing to the rise in sea levels that have been rising steadily since the Ice Age ended. That is the information that she is providing to those interested in getting climate change right. Maybe they can then begin making “informed” decisions.
There was also another NASA major discovery last year where they located a giant crater that was created about 12,000 years ago that almost wiped out humanity. The Great Flood?
No one denies that sea levels are rising nor that global temperatures are rising. It’s that there is absolutely no scientific proof that is caused by humans nor that it is accelerating.
Pasadena Phil: You missed the part where she dismissed any Greenland melt-off contributing to the rise in sea levels that have been rising steadily since the Ice Age ended.
Kristin Poinar: “We never thought that an ice sheet could lose mass into the ocean this quickly. Since these measurements began in the ice sheet has lost so much ice that if that water were piled up on our smallest continent it would drown Australia knee-deep.”
Zachriel:“We never thought that an ice sheet could lose mass into the ocean this quickly. Since these measurements began in the ice sheet has lost so much ice that if that water were piled up on our smallest continent it would drown Australia knee-deep.”
So…..???? The ice mass is being lost because of a natural aquifer-related cycle. And “smallest continent”….”Australia knee-deep”… You miscontrue the meaning of that statement. I placed that ice melt on the top of my head, it would reach the sun.
Pasadena Phil: The ice mass is being lost because of a natural aquifer-related cycle.
And, according to Poinar, what has changed so that the ice mass is being lost now? It’s due to Earth’s warming climate.
See Poinar et al., Limits to future expansion of surface‐melt‐enhanced ice flow into the interior of western Greenland, Geophysical Research Letters 2015: “As the climate warms, melting is increasing at higher elevations (farther inland) on the ice sheet surface. An outstanding question is whether this surface meltwater can access the bed through moulins, and if so, whether the seasonal melt‐induced speedup that presently occurs at lower elevations will be observed at new inland locations… Overall, in the next several decades, the inland migration of melt is unlikely to produce large changes in flow due to increased basal lubrication or the thawing of a frozen bed.”
Good grief. You are hearing what you want to hear. She explicitly states that it’s a cycle and goes through how it works. Give it up. You are being intentionally obtuse.
Zach’s a paid-to-comment commie, committed to stealing your money through the global warming scam. He has no idea what he is pushing, just reposts the nonsense.
He’s as big a scam as globull warming.
And yet, surprisingly, once in a while he makes a valid point.
No, sometimes he says something that sounds like it’s a good point. But once you dig in, you learn different. He is troll determined to end intelligent and informed discussion.
The global climate is cyclical. Every stage of it is temporary.
tom_swift: What, the “science” isn’t settled?
While there is strong confidence that anthropogenic global warming is occurring, how the excess heat is being distributed through the climate system is still a matter of intensive study.
tom_swift: Anything which reverses, even “temporarily” (which hasn’t been shown yet, but their faith is touching) is not, by definition, a “runaway” anything.
That’s not necessarily the case. Even with runaway feedbacks, there are often countervailing influences. For instance, in an explosion, surrounding air pressure can cause a great deal of turbulence as the fireball expands. In any case, anthropogenic global warming isn’t considered a runaway effect, but a forcing which includes both positive and negative feedbacks, and with a long lag. That means the system will reach equilibrium once humans stop emitting, albeit at a warmer temperature.
In the late 1700’s, Cap’t Cook explored the Inside Passage of Alaska and the the entrance to Glacier Bay was blocked by icebergs and glaciers. There has been a major retreat of glaciers prior to the industrial revolution.
Anyway… if glaciers retreat or advance it’s always “climate change” .. so why are they surprised?
Perhaps you didn’t read the article above where a commenting climatologist said it was considered a runaway system?
Or do you pretend to be the bigger climate expert toiling away on blog comment boards?
Run along, little troll. You don’t even know what a positive feedback loop is.
alaskabob: There has been a major retreat of glaciers prior to the industrial revolution.
Gosh, what will those crazy climate scientists come up with next?!
healthguyfsu: Perhaps you didn’t read the article above where a commenting climatologist said it was considered a runaway system?
He was referring to the Jakobshavn glacier, which represents about 10% of the Greenland icecap. And even then, the melt is apparently subject to fluctuations due to changes in local sea temperatures. In any case, once humans stop emitting greenhouse gases, the climate system will eventually reach a new equilibrium, albeit at a higher temperature.
“In any case, once humans stop emitting greenhouse gases, the climate system will eventually reach a new equilibrium, albeit at a higher temperature.”
Are you going to continue to repeat this ad nauseum? It also demonstrates that you get your science from vox. It has the same declarative buffoonery seen in poor journalistic interpretation of science.
Humans will never stop emitting greenhouse gases unless they cease to exist. That’s a simple fact. Climate, including ocean/earth/air temperature, would still fluctuate over a period of months, years, decades, and centuries even if human emission was zero. That is also a fact.
There is still no solid basis for your claim for two reasons: 1. Humans do not have to cease to exist to reach an equilibrium.
2. The equilibrium set point will still shift and cycle even if humans do cease to exist.
healthguyfsu: Humans will never stop emitting greenhouse gases unless they cease to exist.
Humans have only been significant net emitters of greenhouse gases for a few decades, so there is no reason to suppose they will always be net emitters, especially when there are deleterious effects.
healthguyfsu: Climate, including ocean/earth/air temperature, would still fluctuate over a period of months, years, decades, and centuries even if human emission was zero.
Sure, but the current warming is anomalous and expected to increase at a rapid rate if humans don’t mitigate their emissions.
healthguyfsu: 1. Humans do not have to cease to exist to reach an equilibrium.
Not at all. Humans are more than capable of controlling their emissions.
healthguyfsu: 2. The equilibrium set point will still shift and cycle even if humans do cease to exist.
Sure, but the current warming is anomalous and expected to increase at a rapid rate if humans don’t mitigate their emissions.
Excuse me… I think you spilled some kool-aide down your front. I noticed it earlier today. If you keep your coat buttoned it might not show.
Spoken like a true believer.
Expected to increase based on models built on the assumptions of other models.
And you didn’t say net emissions the first time (which only shows that you believe in silly accounting tricks like offsets and credits). Don’t you know that both humans and cows fart, even in a post-industrial society??? Ask AOC about it.
Quit breathing you commie goon and that will eliminate some smog.
healthguyfsu: And you didn’t say net emissions the first time
You said, “Humans will never stop emitting greenhouse gases unless they cease to exist.” Humans emit CO2 when they respirate, but animal respiration is carbon neutral. Humans have always emitted CO2, but they have only recently become net emitters due to their use of fossil fuels.
healthguyfsu: Expected to increase based on models built on the assumptions of other models.
Climate science is mechanistic, which means each aspect of the system can be studied. This provides multiple avenues for investigation, and multiple lines of evidence to build confidence in our understanding. Start with CO2 being a greenhouse gas, and how an increase in greenhouse gases will tend to warm the surface while also cooling the stratosphere.
“”the climate system will eventually reach a new equilibrium, albeit at a higher temperature.””
The “climate system” is NEVER in “equilibrium” and hasn’t been since the planet had an atmosphere.
txvet2: The “climate system” is NEVER in “equilibrium” and hasn’t been since the planet had an atmosphere.
While the Earth’s climate system is never in perfect equilibrium, it has been in a rough equilibrium for centuries. Greenhouse gas emissions are causing a significant and rapid disequilibrium.
“While there is strong confidence…”
You’re a confidence man alright. Pure and utter bullshit pushed by a paid-to-comment commie.
This is clearly Mother Gaia giving us all a Thumbs-Up for seriously considering The Green Raw Deal in the US Senate……
The coming ice age will reverse the flow of migrants across the border. Pretty soon everyone will be heading south – Manny and Sid and legals and illegals and believers and deniers.
I, for one, welcome our overlord weather gods and do solemnly declare my property as New Canada.
New Canada will no longer render foreign aid (pay taxes) to the US government, unless presented with an itemized bill for each expenditure. New Canada will then review the bill and decide which portions align with its interests; only these items will be paid. New Canada is an open carry domain and trespassers will be warned and removed, if necessary. New Canada believes in the sanctity of life for everyone, regardless of race, gender, etc. and that every person is an individual with both rights AND responsibilities. New Canada will not play favorites for political gain.
New Canada > Current US.
There is observable evidence of anthropogenic influences at local and regional scopes, but the evidence of global effects are under investigation, and a consensus of conjectures is based on models (i.e. hypotheses) that have demonstrated no skill to forecast or hindcast. In particular, there are open questions of distribution and retention of heat, whether of natural or anthropogenic sourcing.
n.n: the evidence of global effects are under investigation, and a consensus of conjectures is based on models (i.e. hypotheses) that have demonstrated no skill to forecast or hindcast.
That is incorrect.
I agree that the hindsight is 20/20… bad prediction x correction for past mistakes equals correct prediction* of the past. Now, as for predicting future, that will require a retrospective correction of future events when they become historical.
alaskabob: I agree that the hindsight is 20/20
You may want to look again. The chart shows both the hindcast and the forecast. Note that it is not merely a qualitative, but a quantitative forecast.
These Global Climate Change religious zealots are going to be quite surprised when they learn about the Maunder Minimum sun cycle.
I can just hear them screeching about someone blaspheming.
Over the past half million years glacial periods have lasted approximately 100,000 years and interglacial periods, such as the one we are currently experiencing, have lasted approximately 10,000 years. Our current Holocene interglacial period is pretty long in the tooth. We are much more likely to be heading into a cold snap than into a greenhouse situation. When one looks at the dearth of sunspot activity, that outcome seems to be even more likely.
Coincidence does not infer causality. We just happen to be here to witness one of the thousands of climate-cycle changes that have taken place over the most recent hundreds of millions of years. To suggest that WE have a significant influence is a bit egotistical. We are no more capable of creating these global effects than we are at stopping them (for example, Kilauea 2018). The planet is in charge, period.
BBC just released another Blue Earth documentary series and I guess one of their writers made a gaff, because they stated “(the oceans) are an essential life support system, regulating our planets temperature and weather.” I am not disputing the accuracy, but rather, am shocked that somehow the truth actually appeared in a BBC propa .. documentary.
Ultimately, core activity is heavily insulated from surface activity yet it does have a significant impact on ocean temperature starting at the bottom.
Hydrothermal vents are found at deep ocean sites where the earth’s crust is thin. These spew heat from the intense molten activity far below the mantle. This activity seems to be increasing by some measures and decreasing by others. No one really knows, but we have those oh so reliable “models” to predict it. However, this is yet another layer of uncertainty that also has a huge impact on ocean temperatures and ultimately climate.
So, what do we do? we stack predictive models on other speculative, predictive models on each other and the whole thing is a house of cards. Why do you think all of these surprises keep popping up? Because one model’s predictive capabilities are limited, and stacking models on one another to make a bold prediction has major limitations. Such exercises are useful for scientific inquiry and evolution of understanding, but it is far from dogmatic.
This is the very heart of the problem with politicizing this research. One side saw an opportunity to pounce and use scare tactics, and one of their heroes said to never let a good crisis go to waste.
Major Wood: Coincidence does not infer causality.
True, but climate science is based on causative mechanisms, natural and anthropogenic. Considering only natural mechanisms, the Earth’s surface would be slowly cooling. Considering human emissions, the Earth’s surface and lower atmosphere are warming while the upper atmosphere is cooling, quantitatively consistent with an increasing greenhouse effect.
Bullshit commie.
All climate is temporary for God’s sakes , or else we would be dealing with dinosaurs in our back yards? You can see
When I read that the Arctic once looked like Miami Beach I realized that climate is never stable for very long. With or without humans the Earth has gone through horrific changes in climate. Other then local pollution actions there isn’t much we can really do because we do not know the cause of the large climate changes of the past. The new mantra is that no matter what happens empirically, too hot or too cold, the reason is always global warming!
The Sahara Desert used to be lush and green. There was an ice age, etc. But the left is trying to convince us that climates haven’t shifted until man came along.
The Sahara Desert used to be lush and green. There was an ice age, etc. But the left is trying to convince us that climates haven’t shifted until man came along.
That this specific glacier has started growing is news. But throughout the last 50 years of media-induced panic over retreating glaciers there has never been a time when all glaciers were retreating. There have at all times been many that were growing, we just seldom heard about them.
IF the Greenland ice sheet is melting, gravity would pull the melting ice towards sea level, through the mountains and valleys and into the ocean. The few miles before it reaches the ocean is where it is called a glacier. So if the ice is melting, wouldn’t the ice flow towards the ocean, making the glacier “grow”? I’m not a scientist by an means, but I did see the Mendenhall glacier in Juneau, AK every summer from 2004 to 2011. It definitely looked smaller every summer than the one before.
Portage Glacier near Anchorage was retreated big time in the last 50 years but other glaciers have grown… I think Taku has.
But how much of that retreat happened very early in that period? Or, if you start counting from, say, 1940, how much of the loss till now happened before 1950? I ask because of the pictures of Muir Glacier in August 1941, 1950, and 2004.
They’ve known for at least 30 years that ice can form quickly
https://www.livescience.com/63423-lost-squadron-unearthed-greenland-glacier.html
91 meters (300 feet) buried these planes
More in depth: https://crev.info/2018/08/ww2-aircraft-found-300-ft-greenland-ice/
But, but, the science is settled.
That’s what Al Gore told me back in, what, 2003.
Meanwhile in 2015 scientists from the universities of Leipzig and Lyon published what they discovered about isoprene. Isoprene is an atmospheric gas that aids in cloud formation. In other words, it cools the earth. Previously it was thought that isoprene could only be formed biologically by terrestrial plants and phytoplankton. But the researchers from Leipzig and Lyon found that isoprene is also formed by the sun’s interaction with the the surface micro layer of the ocean, which consists of organic material.
In other words, it can be formed abiotically. The ocean may be be generating twice as much isoprene as previously thought. Perhaps twice as much. Nobody knowys. So much for the settled science.
In other news, in a peer reviewed article in the magazine “Nature” in 2015 it was revealed that the algorithms used to count dry land forest (one of twenty six forest types) undercounted the extent by forty percent. Hand counting the satellite imagery was far more accurate. And by extension the earth is covered by nine percent more forest in toto than previously thought.
And nobody has reviewed the other forest types. Which we don’t burn as much any more thanks to the gift of fossil fuels.
Seriously, f*** these people and where can I buy a ’63 Pontiac Catalina convertible with a 421 six pack so I can save the goddamed planet.
Go for a GTO or Bonneville! GTO with three deuce carbs. Oh, yes the Catalina was hot!
I meant to say that the discoveries about isoprene were published in 2015 while the discoveries about dryland forest were published a year later.
It’s not about the environment,it never was.
U.N. Official Reveals Real Reason Behind Warming Scare
2/10/2015
Economic Systems: The alarmists keep telling us their concern about global warming is all about man’s stewardship of the environment. But we know that’s not true. A United Nations official has now confirmed this.
At a news conference last week in Brussels, Christiana Figueres, executive secretary of U.N.’s Framework Convention on Climate Change, admitted that the goal of environmental activists is not to save the world from ecological calamity but to destroy capitalism.
“This is the first time in the history of mankind that we are setting ourselves the task of intentionally, within a defined period of time, to change the economic development model that has been reigning for at least 150 years, since the Industrial Revolution,” she said.
Referring to a new international treaty environmentalists hope will be adopted at the Paris climate change conference later this year, she added: “This is probably the most difficult task we have ever given ourselves, which is to intentionally transform the economic development model for the first time in human history.”
The only economic model in the last 150 years that has ever worked at all is capitalism. The evidence is prima facie: From a feudal order that lasted a thousand years, produced zero growth and kept workdays long and lifespans short, the countries that have embraced free-market capitalism have enjoyed a system in which output has increased 70-fold, work days have been halved and lifespans doubled.
Figueres is perhaps the perfect person for the job of transforming “the economic development model” because she’s really never seen it work. “If you look at Ms. Figueres’ Wikipedia page,” notes Cato economist Dan Mitchell: Making the world look at their right hand while they choke developed economies with their left.
https://www.investors.com/climate-change-scare-tool-to-destroy-capitalism
Wait a minute, you’re telling me that climates and weather haven’t remained static throughout Earth’s history. Huh…
If the Earth’s population is increasing, would the health and welfare of Earthlings benefit more from the planet’s temperature cooling, or warming?
The scientist’s explanation of greenhouse gasses is brilliant. Even a disciple of the church of Al Gore could understand it.
#C02 Is Not The Cause Of #ClimateChange – Canada Senate Proves #GlobalWarming Is A Lie For Financial Gains.
https://www.facebook.com/troy.lessard.58/videos/2799836980240846/
Lefties must be ecstatic. This is exactly what they hoped would happen.
To paraphrase a Congressman from Georgia, who said that a Pacific Island would capsize because of the “weight of the military bases on it (https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/tipping-point/).” Maybe the Greeniacs are worried that if the Glacier melts, the Island will sink, displacing enough water to raise the sea levels…Sounds like a story line from “Pinky and the Brai