El Niño 2017 is strengthening. On March 24, temperatures in Africa were as high as 50.6°C or 123°F.

The image below shows wildfires hitting Northern China and Far East Russia on April 4, 2017. The Amur River, which forms the boundary between China and Russia, is visible on this Terra/MODIS satellite image, with red dots indicating wildfires.

Emissions associated with such wildfires can be huge, as illustrated by the image below. On April 4, 2017, sulfur dioxide (SO₂) levels were as high as 766.29 µg/m³ at a spot (marked by the green circle, left panel) north of the Amur River, in Russia, while carbon dioxide (CO₂) levels were as high as 513 parts per million at that same spot and carbon monoxide (CO) levels there were as high as 17,402 parts per billion.

These high sulfur dioxide levels indicate that sulfur that has over the past few decades been deposited there from smokestacks of coal-fired power plants, tailpipes of vehicles, etc., can re-enter the atmosphere as a result of wildfires, confirming the conclusion of earlier studies such as by Hegg et al.

This indicates that sulfur levels in the atmosphere are higher than previously estimated, given that most previous estimates were mainly based on real-time emissions from industrial activity at the time. When adding revolitalization of previously-deposited sulfur (due to wildfires) into the picture, estimates for such aerosols' masking effect of the full wrath of global warming will be higher than previously thought, and increasingly so, as wildfires are becoming painfully more common as Earth continues to warm up.

This also implies that it becomes increasingly plausible that, when aerosol levels suddenly drop during heatwaves, wet bulb temperature starts crossing sustainability limits for humans without air-conditioning. Note that in July 2016, weather conditions at a spot in the U.S. came perilously close to this limit.

What could further contribute strongly to a rapid rise in global temperature is the combination of decline of Earth's snow and ice cover and eruptions of methane from the seafloor of the Arctic Ocean.

The Gulf Stream is heating up as the 2017 El Niño strengthens, fueled by record low global sea ice extent, which means that a lot of extra heat is getting absorbed globally (image below, by Wipneus).

Both Arctic and Antarctic sea ice extent were are record low on April 1, 2017, as the images below show.

Sea surface temperatures were as much as 5.9°C or 10.6°F warmer than 1981-2011 at the location marked by the green circle on the image below.

Over the next half year, increasingly warm waters will be carried by the Gulf Stream from the coast of North America to the Arctic Ocean. As this warmer water arrives in the Arctic Ocean, there will no longer be a large buffer of sea ice there to consume the heat, as was common for the past thousands of years and longer. Additionally, warmer water looks set to arrive in an Arctic Ocean that will be heated up like we've never seen before, as so much of the sunlight reaching the surface of the Arctic Ocean doesn't get reflected back into space anymore and as temperatures again look set to reach record highs in the Arctic during the northern summer.

Where can all this extra heat go? Sea ice will start sealing off much of the surface of the Arctic Ocean by the end of September 2017, making it hard for more heat to escape the Arctic Ocean by entering the atmosphere. The extremely dangerous situation is that it looks like much of the extra heat will instead reach sediments at the seafloor of the Arctic Ocean that contain huge amounts of methane in currently still frozen hydrates.

An image in an earlier post showed many cracks in the sea ice north of Greenland. Above image shows that huge cracks are also present in the sea ice in the Beaufort Sea.

On the combination images above and below, high concentrations of methane show up all over the Arctic Ocean, specifically over the Beaufort Sea and over and around Greenland. Note also the methane showing up over Antarctica, as discussed in an earlier post.

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


Links

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

• Extinction
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/extinction.html

• How much warming have humans caused?
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2016/05/how-much-warming-have-humans-caused.html

•Earth losing her sea ice
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2017/03/earth-losing-her-sea-ice.html

• Methane Erupting From Arctic Ocean Seafloor
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2017/03/methane-erupting-from-arctic-ocean-seafloor.html

• Nitrogen and sulfur emissions from the burning of forest products near large urban areas, Hegg et al. (1987)
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/JD092iD12p14701/full

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

• Low sea ice extent contributes to high methane levels at both poles

https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2017/03/low-sea-ice-extent-contributes-to-high-methane-levels-at-both-poles.html

• It could be unbearably hot in many places within a few years time
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2016/07/it-could-be-unbearably-hot-in-many-places-within-a-few-years-time.html

For the time of year, Arctic sea ice remains at a record low since satellite records started in 1979, both for area and extent. The image below shows Arctic sea ice area up to February 12, 2016, when area was 12.49061 million square km.

The image below shows Arctic sea ice extent up to February 12, 2016, when extent was 14.186 million square km.

The reason for the record low sea ice is that there is more ocean heat than there used to be. The image below shows that on February 12, 2016, the Arctic Ocean sea surface temperature was as warm as 11.3°C (52.4°F) at a location near Svalbard marked by the green circle, a 10.4°C (18.7°F) anomaly.

The reason for this is that the water off the east coast of North America is much warmer than it used to be.

The Gulf Stream is pushing heat all the way into the Arctic Ocean.

The image below shows that on February 14, 2016, sea surface temperature anomalies (compared to 1981-2011) off the east coast of North America were was as high as 10.1°C or 18.1°F (at the location marked by the green circle).

While sea surface looks cooler (compared to 1981-2011) over a large part of the North Atlantic, an increasing amount of ocean heat appears to be traveling underneath the sea surface all the way into the Arctic Ocean, as discussed at this earlier post.

This spells bad news for the sea ice in 2016, since El Niño is still going strong. Temperatures in January 2016 over the Arctic Ocean were 7.3°C (13.1°F) higher than in 1951-1980, according to NASA data, as illustrated by the graph on the right.

See the Controversy page for discussion

A polynomial trend added to the January land temperature anomaly on the Northern Hemisphere since 1880 shows that a 10°C (18°F) rise could eventuate by the year 2044, as illustrated by the graph on the right. Over the Arctic Ocean, the rise can be expected to be even more dramatic.

As the NASA map below illustrates, the global January 2016 land-ocean temperature anomaly from 1951-1980 was 1.13°C (or over 2°F) and the heat did hit the Arctic Ocean stronger than elsewhere.

In January 2016, it was 1.92°C (3.46°F) warmer on land than in January 1890-1910. Before 1900, temperature had already risen by ~0.3°C (0.54°F), which makes it a joint 2.22°C (4°F) rise. On the Northern Hemisphere, the rise on land was the most profound, with over 10°C (18°F) warming occurring at the highest latitudes.

Meanwhile, methane levels as high as 2539 parts per billion (ppb) were recorded on February 13, 2016, as illustrated by the image below.

The danger is that, as the Arctic Ocean keeps warming, huge amounts of methane will erupt abruptly from its seafloor.

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

Update: Arctic sea ice extent keeps falling. Last year (2015), maximum sea ice extent was reached on February 25. Could it be that maximum extent for this year was already reached on February 9, 2016? The image below illustrates this question. discussed further at the Arctic News group.

discuss this further at the Arctic News group

Arctic sea ice extent keeps falling. Last year (2015), maximum sea ice extent was reached on February 25. Could it be...
Posted by Sam Carana on Monday, February 15, 2016

The image below shows Arctic sea ice extent, with the blue dot indicating that extent for August 30, 2015, was 4.804 million square kilometers. Satellite records shows that, at this time of the year, extent was only lower in 2007, 2011 and 2012.

There are a number of reasons why sea ice looks set to decrease dramatically over the next few weeks. On above image, extent for 2015 looks set to soon cross the lines for the years 2007 and 2011, while the sea ice today is in an even worse condition than one might conclude when looking at extent alone.

Thick sea ice is virtually absent compared to the situation in the year 2012 around this time of year, as illustrated by the image below that compares sea ice thickness on August 30, 2012 (left) with August 30, 2015 (right).

Furthermore, sea surface temperatures are very high. The North Pacific, on August 31, 2015, was about 1°C (1.8°F) warmer than it was compared to the period from 1971 to 2000, as illustrated by the Climate Reanalyzer image on the right.

As the image below shows, sea surface temperature anomalies are very high around North America, both in the Pacific Ocean and in the Atlantic Ocean.

The image below shows sea surface temperatures on August 30, 2015, indicating that a huge amount of ocean heat has accumulated in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of North America.

The Gulf Stream is carrying much of this warm water toward the Arctic Ocean. Additionally, warm water from the Pacific Ocean is entering the Arctic Ocean through the Bering Strait.

Above image below shows sea surface temperature anomalies in the Arctic as at August 31, 2015.

There still are a few weeks to go before sea ice can be expected to reach its minimum, at around half September 2015, while sea currents will continue to carry warmer water into the Arctic Ocean for months to come.

There is a strengthening El Niño, while more open water increases the chance that storms will develop that will push the last remnants of the sea ice out of the Arctic Ocean, as discussed in earlier posts such as this one. Storms can also mix warm surface waters all the way down to the seafloor, as discussed in this earlier post. Typhoons increase this danger. The above image show three typhoons in the Pacific Ocean on 30 August, 2015, and the Climate Reanalyzer image on the right shows them on September 1, 2015.

These typhoons are headed in the direction of the Arctic. The Climate Reanalyzer forecast for September 8, 2015, below shows typhoons in the Pacific Ocean close to the Arctic Ocean, as well as strong wind over the Arctic Ocean.

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

Thick sea ice is virtually absent compared to the situation in the year 2012 around this time of year....
Posted by Sam Carana on Tuesday, September 1, 2015