You know how sometimes you go into a motivation rabbit hole and you just can't climb back out into the light?  I have been going to work earlier than normal and it's dark all the time and a glass of wine and a movie has been sounding way more appealing than suiting up and going running. Not to say that nothing is getting done. I have been revamping the backyard, which is my excuse for not running on some days (cross training!) and there is a never-ending supply of leaves to be raked. And I've purged the closets again and again. And now it's December, the month of parties and friends and eating and merriment and although fun, it sometimes gets a little overwhelming! I look forward to January, when things quiet down and I get back into the running groove. Until then, here's what's been happening!

Running: In October, I ran 167  miles. I am actually surprised at this number, as I was sick for a couple of weeks and went home to visit my parents one weekend. In November I ran 125 miles, which doesn't surprise me, as I was sick (again!) and I had my Mom in town one weekend. My longest run was the Quad Dipsea (28 miles) and man was I sore afterward! As for the biking plan, it's pretty much gone out the window, as I got a flat and I have been lazy about fixing it! I need to get back on track with that for sure! However, I have already reached my 2,000 mile running goal for the year and have way overshot my 250,000 ft climbing goal (I have about 400,000 feet of climbing so far this year)!

Reading: In October and November, I read 5 books each month, the best being Lots of Candles, Plenty of Cake, which talks about aging and having too much stuff and life in general. It was a quick and easy read that, although I am not of the same age, I could relate to a lot of the author's tales. Otherwise, a lot of them were just so-so and I especially was not a fan of The Nest, which got great reviews or A Little Life, which was really depressing and just went on and on.

Travel: Having traveled a lot during the summer and then gone on vacation in September, October and November were more like decompression months, where I stayed home a lot and worked in the yard and/or around the house. I did get up to see my brother a couple of times in Santa Rosa, I went to visit my parents once and I took a couple of smaller trips to Auburn, Sacramento and Tahoe. I found a great video game arcade and bar in Sacramento that has all of the old games, like Donkey Kong and Mrs. Pac Man. Along with pizza and beer and the fact that the games still cost a quarter, it can't get much better than that!!

December is almost over and Christmas is nearly upon us! I hope that you and yours have a great time wherever you are and I will see you all next year!!

What do you like to do when the weather gets cold and its dark outside? What are your plans for the holidays?

Remember the Paris Agreement? It was sealed on 12 December 2015, when nations triumphantly pledged to strengthen the global response to the threat of climate change, by "holding the increase in the global average temperature to well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels and pursuing efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels, recognizing that this would significantly reduce the risks and impacts of climate change."

Months before the Paris Agreement was sealed, temperatures had already risen to more than 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels. Meanwhile, temperatures have been above the 1.5°C guardrail for most of the year 2016, i.e. for seven out of eleven months and this may well become eight out of twelve months once the full data for December 2016 is available. It was more than 1.5°C (2.7°F) warmer than pre-industrial for 10 out of the 14 months from October 2015 to November 2016.

The situation is dire. Little or no action is taken on climate change. Earth faces a potential temperature rise of more than 10°C or 18°F by 2026.

[ click on images to enlarge or go to original post ]

The situation in the Arctic is critical. While Earth as a whole is experiencing rapid warming, warming in the Arctic is escalating even faster and this rise is accelerating, due to feedbacks such as snow and ice demise and destabilizing sediments at seafloor of the Arctic Ocean. These sediments contain huge amounts of methane in the form of hydrates and free gas.

Albedo changes associated with decline of Arctic sea ice and snow and ice cover on land in the Arctic could lead to a 1.6°C warming, while methane eruptions from the seafloor could well cause an additional 1.1°C temperature rise over the next decade.

This temperature rise will trigger further feedbacks such as a rise of water vapor in the atmosphere. Water vapor is a potent greenhouse gas that will further accelerate the temperature rise. In combination with further elements, the danger adds up to a potential global temperature rise of 10°C or 18°F by 2026.

The danger is described in more detail at the Extinction page. Below are further images illustrating the danger.

Potential temperature rise of more than 10°C or 18°F by 2026 (from: Climate Plan Summary, see also: the extinction page)

Over the entire year 2016, warming was most profound over the Arctic Ocean, which was more than 2.5°C or 4.5°F warmer than 1981-2010, as illustrated by the image on the right.

The Arctic is hit particularly hard by warming. Warming of the air over the Arctic Ocean is taking place much faster than elsewhere on Earth, as illustrated by the animation underneath on the right.

This animation shows how this anomaly developed over the past few years, each time showing a 365-day period, starting in 2014 and each time shifted by roughly one month.

On November 19, 2016, the Arctic was 7.3°C or 13.14°F warmer than it was in 1979-2000, as the image below shows.

On that day, the Arctic Ocean in many places showed temperature anomalies at the top end of the scale, i.e. 20°C or 36°F warmer than it was in 1979-2000.

From the post Accelerating Warming of the Arctic Ocean.

These high temperatures over the Arctic Ocean reflect warm water of the Arctic Ocean, with heat added from the Atlantic Ocean and the Pacific Ocean. The image below shows the warming of the oceans. Temperatures are rising particularly rapidly on the Northern Hemisphere.

[ Ocean warming, from earlier post ]

The huge amounts of energy entering the oceans translate into higher temperatures of the water and of the air over the water, as well as higher waves and stronger winds. The North Atlantic Ocean is warming up rapidly and much ocean heat is carried by the Coriolis force along the Gulf Stream from the coast of North America through the North Atlantic into the Arctic Ocean.

The image below, from an earlier post, shows sea surface temperature anomalies on August 12, 2016, in the left-hand panel, and sea surface temperature anomalies in the right-hand panel.

Sea surface temperature and anomaly. Anomalies from +1°C to +2°C are red, above that they turn yellow and white

Above image also shows that on August 12, 2016, sea surface temperatures near Svalbard (at the location marked by the green circle) were as high as 18.9°C or 65.9°F, an anomaly of 13.6°C or 24.4°F.

Above image shows on October 31, 2016, sea surface temperatures near Svalbard (at the location marked by the green circle) were as high as 17°C or 62.7°F, an anomaly of 13.9°C or 25°F.

The image on the right shows that sea surface temperatures near Svalbard (green circle) were as high as 14.1°C or 57.3°F on December 6, 2016, 12.1°C or 21.7°F warmer than in 1981-2011.

This rise in ocean heat contributes strongly to the demise of Arctic snow and ice cover, and threatens to trigger ever larger eruptions of methane from the seafloor of the Arctic Ocean.

Thick sea ice covered with snow can reflect as much as 90% of the incoming solar radiation. After the snow begins to melt, and because shallow melt ponds have an albedo (or reflectivity) of approximately 0.2 to 0.4, the surface albedo drops to about 0.75. As melt ponds grow and deepen, the surface albedo can drop to 0.15, while the ocean reflects only 6% of the incoming solar radiation and absorbs the rest.



Over the past few years, trends have been pointing at zero thickness soon, i.e. in a matter of years. Rapid loss of sea ice thickness has taken place over the years, as discussed in a recent post. A trend based on PIOMAS volume data (preliminary for 2016) points at zero sea ice by end 2021, as illustrated by the graph below.

Collapse of the sea ice could well occur much earlier than the trend indicates. Thin sea ice is more vulnerable to the stronger storms that can be expected to hit the Arctic Ocean during the northern summer more frequently, and they could push huge amounts of ice out of the Arctic Ocean.

The sea ice also acts as a heat buffer, by absorbing energy in the process of melting. In other words, as long as there is sea ice, it will absorb heat and this will prevent this heat from raising the temperature of the water in the Arctic. Once the sea ice is gone, this latent heat must go elsewhere.

As the sea ice heats up, 2.06 J/g of heat goes into every degree Celsius that the temperature of the ice rises. While the ice is melting, all energy (at 334J/g) goes into changing ice into water and the temperature remains at 0°C (273.15K, 32°F).

Once all ice has turned into water, all subsequent heat goes into heating up the water, at 4.18 J/g for every degree Celsius that the temperature of water rises.

The amount of energy absorbed by melting ice is as much as it takes to heat an equivalent mass of water from zero to 80°C.

Arctic sea ice volume has now decreased so much that this buffer is now largely gone and that a lot more heat will be absorbed by the Arctic. Sea ice acted as a buffer that used to consume massive amounts of ocean heat carried along sea currents into the Arctic Ocean. A huge amount of energy used to be absorbed by this buffer, i.e. by melting ice and transforming it into water. The energy that used to be absorbed by melting ice is as much as it takes to warm up an equivalent mass of water from zero°C to 80°C. Without sea ice to consume heat, the heat must go somewhere else. Much of this heat will then suddenly speed up warming of the water of the Arctic Ocean, rather than going into melting the ice as it did previously. So, the water of the Arctic Ocean will suddenly warm up dramatically. Remember that the Arctic Ocean in many areas is very shallow, in many places it's less than 50 m deep, as discussed in an earlier post.

[ The Buffer has gone, feedback #14 on the Feedbacks page ]

Disappearance of the sea ice would mean that the buffer has gone, further increasing the danger of huge abrupt releases of methane from the seafloor of the Arctic Ocean. The danger is that this extra heat will reach the seafloor and destabilize methane hydrates that are contained in sediments at the bottom of the Arctic Ocean. This could result in huge methane eruptions. It is hard for methane plumes to get broken down in the water, given the abrupt and concentrated nature of such releases and given that the Arctic Ocean is in so many places very shallow. Once that methane enters the atmosphere, it will strongly contribute to further warming of the atmosphere over the Arctic.

As the water of the Arctic Ocean keeps warming, the danger increases that methane hydrates at the bottom of the Arctic Ocean will destabilize. As said, increases in temperature due to albedo changes and methane releases in the Arctic will go hand in hand with further feedbacks, including increased levels of water vapor in the atmosphere, warmer river water running into the Arctic Ocean and more soot from wildfires that will settle on the remaining sea ice.

Above image shows sea surface temperature anomalies in the Arctic (latitude 60°N-90°N) on October 9, 2016, compared to 1961-1990.



Above image shows sea surface temperature anomalies in the Arctic (latitude 60°N-90°N) on September 18, 2016, compared to 1961-1990.

Above image shows sea surface temperature anomalies in the Arctic (latitude 60°N-90°N) on September 4, 2016, compared to 1961-1990.

Above image shows sea surface temperature anomalies in the Arctic (latitude 60°N-90°N) on August 16, 2016, compared to 1961-1990.

Sea surface temperatures west of Svalbard were as high as 14.6°C (58.2°F) on December 29, 2016. Sea surface temperature went up at the end of December at this spot, while the longer-term average went down in line with the change in seasons. From the post: Accelerating Warming of the Arctic Ocean

Above image shows sea surface temperature as high as 14.6°C or 58.2°F on December 29, 2016, near Svalbard, as a result of warm water being pushed from the North Atlantic into the Arctic Ocean. From the post: Accelerating Warming of the Arctic Ocean.


Above image, from an earlier post, illustrates how a cold freshwater lid on the North Atlantic could result from stronger evaporation, in combination with meltwater, causing more heat to get carried into the Arctic Ocean underneath the sea surface, due to reduced heat transfer to the atmosphere from water on its way to the Arctic Ocean.

(view more images at the methane page)

Note that there is a huge lack of monitoring of the situation regarding methane in the Arctic. Above image shows high methane levels recorded at Barrow, Alaska, that were later removed by NOAA.

While there may be uncertainty, due to limited availability of data, such uncertainty does not make the problem go away. The situation is critical; in many respects, we can just count ourselves lucky that much larger methane eruptions haven't occurred as yet. 

The image on the right shows historic growth rates of methane (CH4), carbon dioxide (CO₂) and nitrous oxide (N2O). Methane levels increased most (256% of 1750 levels in 2015, red), much more than carbon dioxide (144% of 1750 levels in 2015, blue) or nitrous oxide (121% of 1750 levels in 2015, green).

The image below shows the recent situation, with trends pointing at an increase in the methane burden by a third by 2030 and a doubling by 2040.

[ click on images to enlarge or go to original post ]

Why again is methane so important? On a 10-year timescale, methane causes more warming than carbon dioxide. Unlike carbon dioxide, methane's Global Warming Potential rises as more of it is released. Methane's lifetime can be extended to decades, in particular due to depletion of hydroxyl in the atmosphere.

[ click on images to enlarge or go to original post ]

Ominously, methane levels were very high over the Laptev Sea (solid magenta color north of Siberia) on November 9, 2016. The image below also shows that on November 9, 2016, methane levels were as high as 2633 parts per billion.

[ click on images to enlarge or go to original post ]

As the water of the Arctic Ocean keeps warming, the danger increases that methane hydrates at the bottom of the Arctic Ocean will destabilize.

The danger is further illustrated by the two images above and below, recorded by the MetOp2 satellite on the afternoon of Christmas eve and Christmas.

Continued warming could trigger huge abrupt methane eruptions leading to mass destruction and extinction.

To top it off, the image below shows that growth in CO₂ levels appears to be accelerating.

[ click on images to enlarge or go to original post ]

According to NOAA, mean global carbon dioxide grew from 2004-2014 by an average 2.02 ppm per year. For 2015 the growth rate was 2.98 ppm. As an indication for what the 2016 growth rate will be, global CO₂ levels grew by 3.57 ppm between September 2015 and September 2016, and by 3.71 ppm between October 2015 and October 2016.

[ Potential temperature rise from preindustrial to 2026. For details see original post and the Temperature page.

The final two images show a potential temperature rise from preindustrial to 2026 of 9.7°C (annual average) and 10.02°C (monthly peak), and below a prognosis of the number of climate-related global deaths in line with the action taken.

[ click on images to enlarge or go to original post ]

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


Links

A pdf of the extinction page and a summary of the Climate Plan can be downloaded from
https://sites.google.com/site/samcarana/climateplan/Climate-Plan-by-Sam-Carana.pdf?attredirects=0&d=1

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

• Climate Plan - Summary
http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/summary.html

• Methane
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/methane.html

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

• FAQs (Frequently asked questions)
http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/faq.html

• Seafloor Methane

http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2016/12/seafloor-methane.html

• Monthly CO₂ not under 400 ppm in 2016
http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2016/11/monthly-co-not-under-400-ppm-in-2016.html

• How Much Warming Have Humans Caused?
http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2016/05/how-much-warming-have-humans-caused.html

• Sea ice is shrinking
http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2016/11/sea-ice-is-shrinking.html

• Less, sea ice, warmer water
http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2016/11/less-sea-ice-warmer-arctic-ocean.html

• Accelerating Warming of the Arctic Ocean
http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2016/12/accelerating-warming-of-the-arctic-ocean.html

Methane levels over the Arctic Ocean are higher than elsewhere on Earth. As the animation below shows, methane levels were as high as 2436 parts per billion (ppb) on the afternoon of December 5, 2016, with most methane rising up from the water, in particular over the Arctic Ocean.

Rise in the atmosphere of methane on December 5, 2016 (MetOp 1 pm), from 1000 mb, i.e. close to
sea level, up to a pressure of 586 mb, which corresponds with an altitude of 3833 m.

Methane levels over the Arctic Ocean have been high for more than a month. The video below, with a soundtrack by Daniel Kieve, shows methane levels from October 26, 2016 to November 25, 2016.

&nbsp

These high methane levels come at a time when there's hardly any sunlight reaching the Arctic, which pretty much rules out the possibility that algae blooms or other biological sources were causing these high methane levels. Instead, these high methane levels appear to be the result of methane eruptions from the seafloor of the Arctic Ocean, caused by warming water of the oceans.

Indeed, large quantities of methane appear to be erupting from seafloor of the Arctic Ocean and, as this methane rises in the atmosphere, it moves closer to the Equator, resulting in higher methane levels there as well. Above image further illustrates that seafloor methane appears to be pushing up mean global methane level at higher altitudes.

The image below shows the temperature rise of the oceans. Temperatures are rising particularly rapidly on the Northern Hemisphere.

[ Ocean warming, from earlier post ]

The huge amounts of energy entering the oceans translate into higher temperatures of the water and of the air over the water, as well as higher waves and stronger winds. Much of that heat is carried by the Coriolis force along the Gulf Stream from the coast of North America via the North Atlantic into the Arctic Ocean.

As the image on the right shows, sea surface temperatures near Svalbard (green circle) were as high as 14.1°C / 57.3°F on December 6, 2016, 12.1°C / 21.7°F warmer than in 1981-2011.

The rise in ocean heat is threatening to cause ever larger eruptions of methane from the seafloor.

As described at the Extinction page, methane eruptions from the seafloor could well cause a 1.1°C temperature rise over the next ten years, and in combination with other elements, this is threatening to cause global temperature to rise 10°C or 18°F by 2026.

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


Links

• A pdf of the extinction page and an introduction to the Climate Plan can be downloaded from
https://sites.google.com/site/samcarana/climateplan/Climate-Plan-by-Sam-Carana.pdf?attredirects=0&d=1

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

• Methane
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/methane.html

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

• Old Mother Nature, by Daniel Kieve
https://soundcloud.com/danielkieve/old-mother-nature

Political parties are the heart and soul of our democratic system.  They are the crucial interface between voters and professionals, providing the space for hard-pressed volunteers who may not wish to become professionally involved in politics to nonetheless become active agents in the body politic.  They have also been facing significant decline over many years.  While there has been a slight recovery in the UK since 2013 – especially for Labour and the SNP – the overall figures are depressing. 

The website Democratic Audit estimates that only 1% of the UK population is a member of a political party.  In the 1950s, parties famously calculated their members in the millions.  The Conservatives were dominant with their 3 million or so members, but Labour garnered some 1 million too. 

Labour is now the dominant party with half of their 1950s figure – 515,000 members according to a House of Commons Library briefing.  The Conservative figure is more difficult to get hold of – many of the constituency parties  don’t file complete returns, and the party still runs quite a federalist structure with significant opposition to centralising party membership.  Nevertheless, figures published in 2013 suggest the Conservatives have a mere 149,800 members.  The Lib Dems have some 79,000 members.

Party membership decline is evident across Europe, although it remains most marked in Britain.  The Democratic Party (PD) in Italy has some 500,000 members, while the two behemoths of German politics – the CDU and SPD – have around 477,000 members each.  To that figure the CDU could add those of its ally, the separate, Bavarian only CSU party which has over 146,000 members. 

Why does this matter?  Because the health of the parties is a major indicator of the health of a representative democracy.  Parties provide a key focus of engagement for citizens.  It allows them to meet with their elected representatives, have a role in choosing them, gives them a chance to offer themselves for election at local and national levels and offers a platform to change party policies. 

This is about much more than simply attaching oneself to a single cause, as offered by the pressure groups.  This is about a full and broad involvement in the democratic process.  This is about committing to action and nailing political colours to a mast – any mast. 

Parties are the foundation stones of any representative democratic system, and they depend utterly on members for both financial resources and the all important human resources.  It should come as little surprise that a growing national disengagement with politics has been accompanied by such a decline in party memberships.   Interestingly, as the memberships get smaller, the relative importance of the remaining members gets bigger.

Labour saw a spike in numbers as a result of their leadership troubles, with the Momentum movement organising effectively to get sympathisers to join and confirm Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership of the party.  Party memberships have always tended to be more radical than their outward-facing elected representatives, but as those memberships decline so the impact of a hard-core radical few makes even greater waves across the national party.  For Labour it has been the election of its most left-wing – and polling suggests unelectable – leader ever.  For the Conservatives, it gave euro-scepticism a crucial place in the party’s bloodstream and led to the Brexit referendum. 

Party memberships can absolutely define politics on the wider stage.  They can also make life difficult for specific representatives.  MPs may represent up to 100,000 people in their constituencies, but their attention can often be dragged towards the few who are members and office holders in their own party.   Labour’s MP for Brighton and Hove, Peter Kyle, faced serious de-stabilisation in September when one of his local members, briefly elected as Vice-Chairman, started agitating against him for not supporting Jeremy Corbyn.  Today, the deputy chairman of Loughborough Conservative Party went on the BBC’s “Sunday politics” to denounce his own MP, Nicky Morgan, for criticising Theresa May.  The two party office holders speak only for themselves, where Morgan and Kyle represent thousands of voters of differing hues, but that hasn’t stopped a brief but strong media focus on those party critics.

There are signs of a resurgence in the importance of party membership.  Labour’s spike – increasing its membership from 270,000 to 515,000 in less than a year thanks to the leadership election – is seen in other parties too.  The Liberal Democrats saw their membership rise significantly after their crushing General Election defeat, as liberal-minded voters sought to engage once again in a liberal fight-back, seen most recently in the success of Sarah Olney – a member of just one year’s standing – being elected as MP to the former Conservative held seat of Richmond Park.  The SNP saw a spike in membership after losing the independence referendum.  It is interestingly Conservative party membership which appears to have been least affected, even though its political bias has probably had the single most important impact on British politics in over 40 years.

As the importance of party members re-asserts itself, so elected representatives become more responsive.  The Observer’s Andrew Rawnsley notes that Labour MPs, since the re-election of their bete noir Jeremy Corbyn as leader, have been quietly re-working their constituency parties to ensure the election of supportive office-holders.   The internet supporters of Momentum have been less inclined to go the extra mile in attending local party meetings, and as Rawnsley notes, it is at these unglamorous occasions where real power can be wielded. 

The larger the membership of a party becomes, the more it can reflect the different shades of opinion in the society from which it grows, and the more effective an interface it is between ordinary voters and the professional politicians.  A larger party base, too, increases the range of talents available to parties in selecting their elected representatives, and ultimately their leaders. 

The health of a democracy, after all, plays out in the health of its parties.  

It won't be dull with President Donald Trump in the White House, with even the transition period providing plenty of comment.  Here's a few reads to keep up to date.

At the UCL Mishcon Lecture last night, Jonathan Freedland of the Guardian gave the liberal tour-de-force warning of the appalling times to come under President Trump.  More on that below, but one article he recommended is the Tony Schwartz one from the New Yorker.  Schwartz ghost-wrote the Trump book "Art of the Deal", and in a fit of buyer's remorse, as Freedland put it, came clean about the real Donald Trump.  The New Yorker piece is here.

Trump has tried to re-awaken the memory of the Republicans' favourite president of recent years, Ronald Reagan, but how good was Reagan really?  An article in Salon suggests Reagan was the most ill-informed president to ever take office, and slept through much of his presidency - read it here.  Some may indeed be wanting Trump to sleep throughout most of his presidency as well - but that would mean leaving the governing side of things to Mike Pence, Stephen Bannon and Reince Priebus, with Mike Flynn steering foreign affairs.  Hardly a recipe for calm.

Salon gave Chris Christie one of their un-coveted "Bullshitter of the Day" awards and it makes entertaining reading here, as Christie tries to persuade everyone he'd rather play out his governor's term than accept the non-existent role coming from the Trump team.

Freedland also mentioned the phenomenon of "fake news", and the Washington Post carried a great expose of it in this piece, as they interviewed two prolific - and definitely not true-believing - manufacturers of news to the gullible right. Perhaps the most eye-opening thing you'll read this week.

Oh, and that Trump victory?  Two million votes behind Clinton, as this Politico report reminds us.  Forget the "Revolution in America"; what about "A broken democracy"?

Finally the Mishcon Lecture itself, as delivered by Jonathan Freedland and attended to in person by a few of SGS's finest and brightest, can actually be accessed in glorious video here.  If you missed it, give it a watch.  Well worth an hour of any Trump sceptic's time.

Arctic sea ice extent fell 0.16 million km² from November 16 to November 19, 2016, as illustrated by above ads.nipr.ac.jp/vishop image. The image below, based on NSIDC data, shows the Arctic sea ice shrinking 49,000 km² in four days.

This is happening at a time when there is little or no sunlight reaching the Arctic, as illustrated by the image below.

The image below was created by Torstein Viddal and earlier posted at the Arctic Sea Ice Collapse blog.

This recent fall in extent is partly due to strong winds, as illustrated by the image on the right.

Mostly, though, the lack of sea ice over the Arctic Ocean is caused by very warm water that is now arriving in the Arctic Ocean.

During the northern summer, water off the coast of North America warms up and gets pushed by the Coriolis force toward the Arctic Ocean. It takes several months for the water to travel along the Gulf Stream through the North Atlantic.

It has taken until now for the Arctic Ocean to bear the brunt of this heat.

As the image below shows, record sea surface anomalies showed up near Svalbard on October 31, 2016, when this heat first arrived in the Arctic.

On October 31, 2016, the Arctic Ocean was as warm as 17°C or 62.7°F (green circle near Svalbard), or 13.9°C or 25°F warmer than 1981-2011. This indicates how much warmer the water is beneath the surface, as it arrives in the Arctic Ocean from the Atlantic Ocean.

Moreover, Antarctic sea ice is also falling, reflecting the warming of oceans globally. For some time now, Antarctic sea ice extent has been at a record low for the time of the year.  On November 19, 2016, the combined extent of Arctic and Antarctic sea ice was 22.423 million km², as the image below shows.

This constitutes a fall in global sea ice extent of 1.085 million km² (418,900 square miles) since November 12, 2016, when global sea ice extent was 23.508 million km².

Let's look at those figures again. On Saturday November 12, 2016, global sea ice extent was 23.508 million km². On Saturday November 19, 2016, global sea ice extent was 22.423 million km². That's a fall of more than one million km² in one week.

By comparison, that's more than the combined size of ten European nations (such as Switzerland, Austria, Hungary, Germany, Denmark, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, the United Kingdom and Ireland).

Or, it's more than the combined size of seventeen States of the United States (such as Ohio, Virginia, Tennessee, Kentucky, Indiana, Maine, South Carolina, West Virginia, Maryland, Hawaii, Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Connecticut, Delaware and Rhode Island).

How much additional energy does Earth retain, due to such an albedo change? If it was a total albedo flip, it would be some 0.68 W/m². A conservative estimate would be a 50% albedo flip, as the image below illustrates, so this would mean that Earth now retains some 0.34 W/m² extra energy.

Thick sea ice covered with snow can reflect as much as 90% of the incoming solar radiation. After the snow begins to melt, and because shallow melt ponds have an albedo (or reflectivity) of approximately 0.2 to 0.4, the surface albedo drops to about 0.75. As melt ponds grow and deepen, the surface albedo can drop to 0.15, while the ocean reflects only 6% of the incoming solar radiation and absorbs the rest.



So, this one-week fall in sea ice extent means there now is an additional warming of some 0.34 W/m². By comparison, the warming impact relative to the year 1750 of all carbon dioxide emitted by people was 1.68 W/m² in the most recent IPCC assessment report (AR5).

There's more! As sea ice declines, there is not only albedo loss due to a fall in extent, but there is also albedo loss over the remaining sea ice, which turns darker as it melts.

The image below shows the fall in extent of Antarctic sea ice up to November 20, 2016. On November 20, 2016, Antarctic sea ice extent was 2.523 million km² less than its extent was at the same time of the year in 2015.

How much more energy is now retained by Earth than in 2015? Assuming a 50% albedo flip for this extent loss and a similar albedo loss that's taking place over the remaining ice, this means that Earth is now retaining an extra amount of energy (compared to 2015) that is equal to all the warming relative to pre-industrial due to carbon dioxide emitted by people.

Above image shows how the difference between 2016 and 2015 Antarctic sea ice extent grew between November 4 and November 23. On November 23, 2016, Antarctic sea ice extent was 2.615 million km² smaller than on November 23, 2015.

That means that a huge amount of sunlight is now absorbed by the ocean, rather than reflected back into space.

The animation on the right (added later) shows the decline of the sea ice around Antarctica over the period from November 16, 2016, to January 4, 2017. For comparison, the blue line shows the 1979-2000 average.

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