Extreme weather strikes around the globe - update

As the weather gets more extreme, disaster strikes around the globe. The Guardian reports three people killed as storms continue to batter southern UK. The Vancouver Sun reports that a U.S. Northeast snowstorm kills 25. And the Sacramento Bee reports Six dead and 1,000 injured in fresh Japan snow storm.

What is the story behind these extreme weather events? The image below tells the story. The Arctic has been much warmer than it used to be, due to numerous feedbacks that accelerate warming in the Arctic. This reduces the temperature differential between the Arctic and lower latitudes, which changes the Jet Stream and Polar Vortex, in turn making the weather at many places ever more extreme.

 earlier forecasts by cci-reanalyzer.org

Above image illustrates the situation, showing an Arctic Ocean that is warmer than the higher latitudes of the Asian and North American continents.

Arctic sea ice has meanwhile reached record lows, as illustrated by the image below.

The situation can be expected to get even worse. The image below shows sea ice extent, as measured by the NSIDC, which is one day ahead compared to above image.

Below, two regular contributors to the Arctic-news blog comment on the situation.

Paul Beckwith: Paul Beckwith with sign (arrows highlighted by Sam Carana, from earlier post) In the video below, Paul Beckwith discusses the above sign and the situation in general.

Dr. Malcolm Light, Earth Scientist, comments: The volume of water transported by Gulf Stream off the east coast of the United States has increased by three times since the 1940s due to a massive increase in wind drag. This increase in the south westerly wind drag is a result of the continuously increasing pressure difference set up between the continental air mass over North America, heated by fossil - fuel generated carbon dioxide, and the marine air of the Atlantic. The increased energy entering the Gulf Stream as heat and its associated winds and storm systems are what are now pummeling Great Britain and Europe. This heat is also transported further north by branches of the Gulf Stream into the Arctic Ocean, where it is destabilizing the subsea methane hydrates, releasing increasing volumes of methane into the Arctic atmosphere and causing temperature anomalies this last winter of more than 20 degrees Celsius. As a consequence of the extremely high Arctic temperatures and pressures, the normal freezing Arctic air has been displaced into Canada and the United States, causing catastrophic blizzards that have never been seen before. When the floating Arctic ice cap melts towards the end of next year, the Arctic Ocean will then become more aggressively heated by the sun and the northern offshoots of the Gulf Stream. Under these circumstances, the cold Arctic air will be confined over the Greenland ice cap and the Arctic atmosphere will rotate anticlockwise around Greenland, transferring the fast-increasing amounts of its atmospheric methane to Canada and the United States and causing a further increase in the energy of the Gulf Stream. Therefore the United Kingdom and Europe must brace themselves for even more catastrophic weather systems, widespread flooding and massive wind damage from the start of the last quarter of next year.

Below is a comparison of methane readings for the week from February 9 to 16, 2014, compared to the same period in 2013.

The comparison shows that there is a lot of methane over the Arctic Ocean that wasn't there last year. Furthermore, high methane readings show up where currents move the sea ice out of the Arctic Ocean, in areas such as Baffin Bay. This indicates that methane that is released from the seafloor of the Arctic Ocean appears to be moving underneath the ice and entering the atmopshere where the sea ice is fractured or thin enough to allow the methane to pass through.

Also note that more orange areas show up on the southern hemisphere in 2014, indicating that more methane from the northern hemisphere is now spreading south beyond the equator. This in addition to indications that more methane is rising and building up at higher altitudes, as discussed in an earlier post.

As said before, the situation calls for comprehensive and effective action, as discussed at the Climate Plan blog.

Post by Sam Carana.

Extreme weather strikes around the globe

Editorial note: this post has meanwhile been updated as Extreme weather strikes around the globe update.

As the weather gets more extreme, disaster strikes around the globe.

Here's a snapsnot from today's news. In London, the BBC reports, flooded homes along the River Thames are being evacuated and thousands more are at risk. In Japan, reports Reuters, eleven people died, more than a thousand were injured and tens of thousands lost power when the worst snowstorm in decades hit Tokyo and areas around the Japanese capital before heading north to blanket the tsunami-hit Pacific coast. Many countries in the Middle East were hit by snow. The BBC reports that heavy snow in northern Iran has left around 480,000 homes without power and some towns and villages cut off.

What is causing these extreme weather events? The image below tells the story. While at times it has been cold at many places around the world, when averaged over the past 30 days, temperatures around the globe have actually been several degrees higher than they used to be. The Arctic has been hit hardest, with anomalies as high as 21°C over this 30 day period. This affects the Jet Stream and Polar Vortex, which in turn is making the weather ever more extreme.

The situation is further illustrated by the cci-reanalyzer.org forecasts below.

And while the sea ice didn't look too bad at the start of the year, growth has meanwhile stopped, as illustrated by the image below.

Added below are two videos by Paul Beckwith, further discussing the situation.

Editor's note: Reanalysis of temperature anomaly Jan 12 - Feb 10, 2014.

Meanwhile, I've added another image (above), created with NOAA's reanalysis, which compares temperatures to a larger dataset, and the colors look a lot different, so NOAA may indeed have mixed the colors up somewhat in the initial image, as Albert suggested at the Facebook discussion (click on image below).

Anyway, the point made in the post remains, i.e. that as global warming continues, warming in the Arctic accelerates more rapidly than at lower latitudes, which weakens the polar vortex and jet stream in a self-reinforcing feedback that causes the Arctic to warm up even further compared with lower latitudes.

As said, the situation calls for comprehensive and effective action, as discussed at the Climate Plan blog.

Post by Sam Carana.

High methane readings over Greenland

High methane readings have been recorded over Greenland since the start of February 2014. The image below shows methane readings of 1950 ppb and higher in yellow on February 9, 2014.

The animation below shows that high methane readings (1950+ ppb in yellow) have been showing up over Greenland since the start of February 2014.

[ Note: this animation is a 3.28 MB file that may take some time to fully load ]

What could have caused these high methane readings? The persistence with which the methane shows up over Greenland indicates that it did indeed originate from Greenland.

The above animation also illustrates that high methane readings show up every other image. The IASI readings come from a satellite that is orbiting the poles twice daily, with a 12-hour interval, so the satellite passes the North Pole twice every day. This makes that the images follow a day-versus night pattern, indicating that the high methane readings follow a circadian rhythm, suggesting a pattern that is in line with temperature differences between day and night.

There often is a difference in methane readings between day and night, but rarely is it as distinct as is currently the case over Greenland. And indeed, more is currently happening to temperatures over Greenland than mere differences in temperature between day and night.

As discussed in earlier posts such as this one, the once-common temperature difference between the Arctic and lower latitudes has been shattered, and this is weakening the Jet Stream and the Polar Vortex, in turn making it easier for cold air to flow down to lower latitudes and for warmer air to enter the Arctic. As a result, temperatures over Greenland can go from one extreme to another and back, as illustrated by the image with selected cci-reanalyzer.org forecasts below.

[ click on image to enlarge ]

Above image shows that, in some areas over Greenland, temperature anomalies may go down as low as as minus 20 degrees Celsius one day, then climb as high as 20 degrees Celsius a few days laters, to hit temperature anomalies as low as minus 20 degrees Celsius again some days later. These are swings of 40 degrees Celisus that can hit an area over the course of a few days. 

This could explain the methane over Greenland. Methane is present in the Greenland ice sheet in the form of hydrates and free gas. These huge temperature swings are causing the ice to expand and contract, thus causing difference in pressure as well as temperature. The combined shock of wide pressure and temperature differences is causing movement and fractures in the ice allowing methane to rise to the surface and enter the atmosphere.

The image below puts things in perspective, comparing methane over Greenland with methane over the Arctic Ocean.

Above image shows that the amounts of methane over Greenland are huge, while methane is still being released from the seafloor of the Arctic Ocean, in particular along the faultline that runs from the north of Greenland to the Laptev Sea. 

Few people seem to have anticipated these methane releases from the mountains of Greenland. Even worse, similar processes could be going at times on Antarctica, the Himalayas and the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. I warned about this danger, e.g. in the May 2013 post Is Global Warming breaking up the Integrity of the Permafrost?. The danger that methane will be released in large (and growing) quantities from hydrates and free gas contained in the ice over mountains appears to have been ignored by the IPCC, which puts more weight on my estimate that methane release from hydrates currently amounts to 99 Tg annually, vastly more than the most recent IPCC estimates of 6 Tg per year. 

Without action on climate change, these methane releases threaten to rise even further and cause runaway global warming. This calls for comprehensive and effective action as discussed at the Climate Plan blog. 

Post by Sam Carana.

As continental U.S. freezes, Alaska gets record high temperatures

While much of the continental United States endured several cold snaps in January 2014, record-breaking warmth gripped Alaska. Spring-like conditions set rivers rising and avalanches tumbling. NASA Eartobservatory illustrates the above words with the two images below.

Above map depicts land surface temperature anomalies in Alaska for January 23–30, 2014. Based on data from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite, the map shows how 2014 temperatures compared to the 2001–2010 average for the same week. Areas with warmer than average temperatures are shown in red; near-normal temperatures are white; and areas that were cooler than the base period are blue. Gray indicates oceans or areas where clouds blocked the satellite from collecting usable data.

A persistent ridge of high pressure off the Pacific Coast fueled the warm spell, shunting warm air and rainstorms to Alaska instead of California, where they normally end up. The last half of January was one of the warmest winter periods in Alaska’s history, with temperatures as much as 40°F (22°C) above normal on some days in the central and western portions of the state, according to Weather Underground’s Christopher Bart. The all-time warmest January temperature ever observed in Alaska was tied on January 27 when the temperature peaked at 62°F (16.7°C) at Port Alsworth. Numerous other locations—including Nome, Denali Park Headquarters, Palmer, Homer, Alyseka, Seward, Talkeetna, and Kotzebue—all set January records.

The combination of heat and rain has caused Alaska’s rivers to swell and brighten with sediment, creating satellite views reminiscent of spring and summer runoff. On January 25, 2014, the Aqua satellite collected this image of sediment flowing into the Gulf of Alaska from numerous rivers along the state’s southeastern coast.

All of the heat, moisture, and melting snow has elevated the risk of avalanches. A series of extremely large avalanches in late January sent snow and debris crashing onto the Richardson Highway, blocking the road and cutting the port town of Valdez off from highway access. The avalanches dumped a mound of snow 100 feet (30 meters) tall and up to 1,500 feet (460 meters) long on the highway.

Below are two videos with forecasts for the period from February 4, 2014, to February 11, 2014. The top video shows temperature forecasts and the bottom video shows temperature anomaly forecasts.

Warmer temperatures over the Arctic have resulted in a slowdown of sea ice are growth, as illustrated by the image below (yellow line top left shows 2014 values).

Related posts

- Forecast: America to be hit by temperatures as low as minus 40 degrees
http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2014/01/forecast-america-to-be-hit-by-temperatures-as-low-as-minus-40-degrees.html

- The Biggest Story of 2013
http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2013/12/the-biggest-story-of-2013.html

- Polar jet stream appears hugely deformed
http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2012/12/polar-jet-stream-appears-hugely-deformed.html

Post by Sam Carana.

Forecast: America to be hit by temperatures as low as minus 40 degrees

The image on the right shows that large parts of North America, the Arctic Ocean and Siberia are experiencing low temperatures.

What many people may not realize is that temperatures in the Arctic are actually a lot higher than they used to be around this time of year.

Temperatures in the Arctic have risen due to feedbacks as described in the post The Biggest Story of 2013.

As a result, temperature anomalies above 20 degrees Celsius now feature in the Arctic. As the image on the right illustrates, the once-common temperature difference between the Arctic and lower latitudes has been shattered, and this is weakening the Jet Stream and the Polar Vortex, in turn making it easier for cold air to flow down to lower latitudes and for warmer air to enter the Arctic, as described in posts at this blog for years, e.g. this post.

This is illustrated by the image below, showing that the Arctic is hit by an overall temperature anomaly of 6.55 degrees Celsius, while some areas in the Arctic feature anomalies above 20 degrees Celsius.

Forecasts show that on February 2nd, 2014, 1200 UTC, the Arctic will be hit by a temperature anomaly of 7.85 degrees Celsius, while on February 6th, 2014, 1200 UTC, the U.S. will be hit by temperatures as low as -40 degrees, as illustrated by the image below.

The video below shows temperature forecasts from February 1to February 8, 2014.

The video below shows temperatire anomalies from February 2 to February 9, 2014.

Meanwhile, the Gulf Stream keeps pushing warm water into the Arctic Ocean, as illustrated by the image below.

Click on image to enlarge - view updated animation at earth.nullschool.net 

The image below shows how high sea surface temperature anomalies stretch out from the point where the Gulf Stream travels at high speeds, off the coast of North America, all the way into the Arctic Ocean.

This has already resulted in methane eruptions from the seafloor of the Arctic Ocean that started several months ago and are continuing to date - ominous signs of more to come. The image below, which compares peak methane levels at two altitudes between January 2013 and January 2014, suggests that January 2014 peak levels have increased strongly, compared to January 2013 peak levels. Furthermore, that the rise in average peak readings has been most dramatic at the higher altitude.

This suggests that huge quantities of methane have indeed been released from hydrates under the Arctic ocean, and that much of the methane is rising and building up at higher altitudes. The increasing appearance of noctilucent clouds further confirms indications that methane concentrations are rising at higher altitudes.

Of course, the above analysis uses a limited dataset, but if verified by further analysis, it would confirm a dramatic rise in the presence of methane in the atmosphere due to releases from hydrates. Moreover, it would confirm the immensity of threat that releases from the Arctic Ocean will escalate and trigger runaway warming, as high methane concentrations over the Arctic are contributing to the anomalously high temperatures there. The risk that this will eventuate is unacceptable, which calls for comprehensive and effective action such as discussed at the ClimatePlan blog.

Methane Man

At the 2014 State of the Union address, President Obama said that the all-of-the-above energy strategy he announced a few years ago is working, describing natural gas as the bridge fuel that can power our economy.

Just do NOT tell them the monster exists

President Obama said: "Businesses plan to invest almost $100 billion in new factories that use natural gas. I’ll cut red tape to help states get those factories built, and this Congress can help by putting people to work building fueling stations that shift more cars and trucks from foreign oil to American natural gas."

President Obama added: "And when our children’s children look us in the eye and ask if we did all we could to leave them a safer, more stable world, with new sources of energy, I want us to be able to say yes, we did."

Methane levels going through the roof

Sadly, President Obama doesn't. President Obama missed yet another opportunity to articulate a plan to shift to genuinely clean energy, and instead chose to persist supporting all types of energy, in particular natural gas.

As the U.S. shifts to natural gas, more methane is entering the atmosphere. At the same time, methane eruptions from the seafloor of the Arctic Ocean continue to contribute to the temperature rises in the Arctic that are making the weather ever more extreme. The image below shows surface temperature anomalies above 20°C in the Arctic, while anomalies below -20°C feature at lower latitudes.

Post by Sam Carana.

Arctic in early January 2014

In early January 2014, Arctic sea ice extent reached levels as low as they were in early January 2013, as illustrated by the image below.

Methane levels over the Arctic remain extremely high. The image below shows methane readings for the period January 1 - 11, 2014, with the inset showing the situation in 2013 for the same period.

Similarly, the image below makes a comparison between methane recorded in 2013 and in 2014 for this period (January 1-11), this time focusing on the Arctic and only showing methane readings of 1950 ppb and higher in yellow.

Below a combination of images by Dr. Leonid Yurganov, also comparing methane levels between early 2013 and 2014. The difference isn't as marked in the image below as in the above image, as the highest value in the image below is 1920+ ppb, whereas the above image highlights levels of 1950+ ppb.

These high methane releases from the seafloor of the Arctic Ocean are contributing to the over 20°C temperature anomalies that have hit parts of the Arctic Ocean recently, as illustrated by the image below.

In conclusion, the Arctic is hit by three kinds of warming, while there are at least 13 feedbacks that further accelerate warming in the Arctic, as described in the post The Biggest Story of 2013.

Post by Sam Carana.

Methane emerges from warmer areas

As the year draws to a close, it's time to review where warming has occured most strongly in 2013. Surface temperature anomalies in November 2013 were 0.77°C, the highest global November anomalies on record. In November 2013, high temperature anomalies occurred in the Arctic, well over 9°C north and south of Novaya Zemlya.

Indeed, global warming is hitting the Arctic particularly hard, and some models have underestimated the pace at which this is occuring. Most heat goes into the oceans, which - due to the Gulf Stream - contributes to accelerated warming in the Arctic, where also less monitoring takes place than over land. Stefan Rahmstorf, Co-Chair of Earth System Analysis at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, says at RealClimate:

A new study by British and Canadian researchers shows that the global temperature rise of the past 15 years has been greatly underestimated. The reason is the data gaps in the weather station network, especially in the Arctic. If you fill these data gaps using satellite measurements, the warming trend is more than doubled in the widely used HadCRUT4 data.

Where did warming occur most strongly in 2013? The red/orange areas on the image below shows surface temperature anomalies of more than 2°C for the year from December 13, 2012, to December 12, 2012.

As the image shows, temperature anomalies have hit Earth most strongly in the cryosphere, i.e.
- in Antarctica, as discussed at this post;
- on the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau, as earlier discussed at this post;
- in the Arctic, as discussed below.

Over the past 90 days, the Arctic Ocean has shown surface temperature anomalies of over 5°C and in some spots over 8°C.

Looking at anomalies over longer periods can mask the occurrence of much higher anomalies on individual days. As an example, temperature anomalies of over 20°C were recorded over a large part of the Arctic Ocean on November 17, 2013. 

Baffin Bay, west of Greenland, has until now received little attention. High temperature anomalies over the past year show up on the top image. These high temperatures are the more striking given that a cold sea current runs through Baffin Bay, as shown on the image below. 

Methane has emerged strongly from areas that have warmed most in 2013. In August 2013, high concentrations of methane showed up over Siberia. High methane releases have further occurred in all three parts of the cryosphere mentioned above, i.e. from the heights of Antarctica, as discussed at this post, on the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau, as earlier discussed at this post, and in the Arctic, as discussed in many posts at the Arctic-news blog.

Huge methane concentrations have featured over Baffin Bay recently. The animation below shows huge methane emissions emerging from Baffin Bay on December 2nd, 2013. The power behind these methane releases is strong enough to make it difficult for thicker ice to form in Baffin Bay. The animation below shows an area marked by a red rectangle where it looks like the water would have been covered with thicker ice, had there not been so much methane bubbling up in the area.

This area with very thin ice in Baffin Bay is further illustrated in the Naval Research Laboratory 30-day Arctic sea ice thickness animation below.

This constitues yet another feedback, i.e. methane bubbling up from the seafloor of the Arctic Ocean with a force strong enough to prevent sea ice from forming in the area. 

Post by Sam Carana.

Arctic Methane Impact

The image below covers a period of just over one day. On November 26, 2013, peak readings were as high as 2392 ppb.

The green circle highlights an area with high methane levels just north of Greenland. This methane likely originates from hydrates along the fault line that crosses the Arctic Ocean. As the Naval Research Laboratory animation below shows, sea ice in that area is rather thick. How it is possible for the methane to appear there? The answer must be, it seems, that there is so much movement in the sea ice in this area, that there are many cracks through which the methane can rise.

Above animation shows how a huge part of the sea ice, meters thick, is pushed along the edges of Greenland into the Atlantic Ocean, as a result of strong winds, as also illustrated by the animation below.

Methane has now been showing up prominently over the entire Arctic Ocean for more than a month and it doesn't look like this situation is coming to an end soon. The animation shows methane over the Arctic Ocean over a period of six days, with each frame covering a period of one day.

What is the impact of all this methane on temperatures over the Arctic? The NOAA image below shows surface temperature anomalies for a 30-day period.

When temperatures are averaged over longer periods, peaks will obviously show up less severe. Yet, on above image an area shows up in the Arctic where anomalies have averaged 15 degrees Celsius or more over this 30-day period.

When looking at individual days, anomalies of over 20 degrees Celsius can show up, on above image over quite a large area. While the weather can vary a lot and depends on a lot of factors, there is no doubt that the methane cloud hanging over the Arctic Ocean will have contributed to such anomalies. Since this methane isn't just going away soon, this spells bad news for what is ahead in the Arctic.

And while most efforts to contain global warming focus on ways to keep global temperature from rising with more than 2°C, a polynomial trendline already points at global temperature anomalies of 5°C by 2060. Even worse, a polynomial trend for the Arctic shows temperature anomalies of 4°C by 2020, 7°C by 2030 and 11°C by 2040, threatening to cause major feedbacks to kick in, including albedo changes and methane releases that will trigger runaway global warming that looks set to eventually catch up with accelerated warming in the Arctic and result in global temperature anomalies of 20°C+ by 2050.

Post by Sam Carana.

Arctic Methane Release and Rapid Temperature Rise are interlinked

The image below shows methane readings on November 17, 2013 p.m.

[ click on image to enlarge ]

Very high methane readings are present over the Laptev Sea, the East Siberian Sea and the Beaufort Sea. The situation may be even worse than what it seems at first glance. The pointed shape in the Laptev Sea doesn't imply low methane levels in that area. The IASI (Infrared Atmospheric Sounding Interferometer) instrument measuring methane only covers a certain width. The pointed shapes that show up on above image and the bottom inset, are areas where no measurements were taken, resulting from the way the polar-orbiting satellite circum-navigates the globe, as pictured on the top inset. These pointed shapes are visible as light-grey areas on the image below.

Additionally, no data were available for the areas colored darker grey on above image. At lower altitudes, this absence of data can be due to mountains in the area. It can also be that measurements are obscured by clouds, in which case no data are visible for the respective area; again, this doesn't imply that no methane was present there.

So, while there are no data for some areas in the Laptev Sea on Nov. 17, the conclusion must noretheless be that methane was actually present at very high levels all the way from the Laptev Sea to the East Siberian Sea. This conclusion is supported by data from earlier days, e.g. as shown in this post.

Therefore, the situation in the Laptev Sea is worse that it looks at first glance and levels may actually have been even higher on Nov. 17 than the peak reading of 2304 ppb that was recorded on that day. Similarly, more methane may actually be present closer to the North Pole than is showing up on above images.

Why methane is rising from the Arctic seabed

For some time now, huge amounts of methane have been released from the seabed of the Arctic Ocean, reaching the atmosphere at levels of up to 2662 ppb (on November 9, 2013). What caused this? Before examining this further, let's first go back to what was said in an earlier post about warm water off the coast of North Anmerica.

A dust storm approaches Stratford, Texas, in 1935. From: Wikipedia: Dust Bowl

During the 1930s, North America experienced a devastating drought affecting almost two-thirds of the United States as well as parts of Mexico and Canada. The period is referred to as the Dust Bowl, for its numerous dust storms.

Rapid creation of farms and use of gasoline tractors had caused erosion at massive scale.

Extensive deep plowing of the virgin topsoil of the Great Plains in the preceding decade had removed the natural deep-rooted vegetation that previously kept the soil in place and trapped moisture even during periods of drought and high winds.

So, when the drought came, the dust storms emerged. But what caused the drought?

A 2004 study concludes that the drought was caused by anomalous tropical sea surface temperatures (SST) during that decade and that interactions between the atmosphere and the land surface increased its severity (see image above right with SST anomalies).

As the above chart shows, SST anomalies in the days of the Dust Bowl were not greater than 1°C. It is in this context that the current situation in the Arctic must be seen. In 2013, SST anomalies of 5°C or more showed up in virtually all areas in the Arctic Ocean where the sea ice disappeared; some areas are exposed to sea surface temperature anomalies even higher than 8°C (14.4°F), as discussed in the post Arctic Ocean is turning red.

As the above Naval Research Laboratory image shows, strong winds can push a lot of sea ice out of the Arctic Ocean. The resulting absence of sea ice can disrupt vertical sea currents that would otherwise cool the seabed. Furthermore, strong winds can boost warming of the seabed of the Arctic Ocean by mixing warm surface water down the vertical water column. Such feedbacks have been discussed in earlier posts such as the Diagram of Doom. Changes that take place in the Arctic can also cause extreme weather patterns elsewhere, as discussed in an earlier post on changes to the Polar Jet Stream.

Indeed, events can be closely interlinked and the world is now stumbling from one extreme weather event into another. Moreover, things look set to get worse every year. And this can in turn make things even worse in the Arctic. Water off the coast of North America, after reaching 'Record Warmest' temperatures in July 2013, proceeded to travel to the Arctic Ocean, where it is now warming up the seabed.

NOAA: part of the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of North America reached record warmest temperatures in July 2013

Below, Malcolm Light explains:

Pollution clouds pouring eastwards off the coast of Canada and the United States are the main culprits in heating the Gulf Stream as this region has the highest oceanic evaporation on Earth.

While the mean speed of the Gulf Stream is 4 miles per hour (6.4 km/hour or 1.78 metres/second), the water slows down as it travels north.

In the much wider North Atlantic Current, which is its North Eastern extension, water flows at about 0.51 metres/second (3.5 times slower), while the West Spitzbergen (Svalbard) current flows at about 0.35 metres/second (5 times slower).

Consequently, it will take quite some time for the summer-heated Gulf Stream waters to reach the Laptev Sea.

In addition, because the Gulf Stream does a closed circuit in the tropical Atlantic, passing close to West Africa (Canary Current) and returning back to the Gulf along the hurricane tracks (North Equitorial Current), it is able to continuously feed hot water into the North Atlantic Current over a very long time period.

This explains why methane is continuously boiling off the subsea methane hydrates from the Eurasian Basin and Laptev Sea during September to November this year and will continue to be emitted past January 2014.

How much will temperatures rise?

The atmospheric temperature increase in Australia this year (0.22^oC) indicates that in 10 years it will exceed 2.2^oC and in 30 to 40 years, 6.6^oC to 8.8^oC.

This is the same as the predicted temperature increase from the Arctic methane build up and will lead to total global deglaciation and our extinction by the middle of this century.

There is in addition a delayed carbon dioxide and methane temperature anomaly of 12^oC to 20^oC.  The 20^oC  methane delayed temperature anomaly is the same as the temperature anomaly of the hot clouds that have been blowing around the Arctic this year, indicating that the Arctic has almost caught up with the methane delayed global warming heating.

The stage is therefore set for a giant firestorm, drought and sea level rise mostly caused by the uncontrolled build up of methane in the atmosphere due to the carbon dioxide induced global warming destabilization of the Arctic permafrost and subsea methane hydrates.

So, what to do?

The power, prestige and massive economy of the United States have been built on cheap and abundant fossil fuels and Canada is now trying to do the same. Will the US and Canada, in the short time frame we have left (3 decades), be able to eliminate their extreme carbon footprints? Note that Australia, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates have similar extreme carbon footprints as well. An additional problem is that reducing emissions from coal-fired power plants will also reduce sulfur emissions that currently mask the full wrath of global warming.

A Comprehensive Climate Plan must include ways to reduce methane levels

What we have got to do is eliminate as much of the atmospheric methane by whatever means we are able to devise,  to bring its concentration down to about 750 ppb. This level will eliminate the methane delayed temperature anomaly and give the massive industrial nations a little leaway to get their houses in order.

All the scientific expenditure and ingenuity of the major industrial nations should be engaged in developing methods of breaking down atmospheric methane without burning it. Methods of increasing the tropospheric and stratospheric hydroxyl concentrations and using radio - laser systems such as the Alamo - Lucy projects and their applications to HAARP must be developed and tested with the utmost urgency as should local methods of converting carbon dioxide and methane via catalysts into other products. We have to get rid of this methane monster before it devours us all. A French group of scientists and engineers have started work on the Alamo-Lucy projects in Europe. If we fail to reduce the fast growing methane content of the atmosphere in the next few decades we are going to go the same way as the dinosaurs.

I cannot emphasise more, how serious humanity’s predicament is and what we could do to try to prevent our certain extinction if we continue down the present path we are following. If we compare ourselves to the Titanic we are only moments away from hitting the iceberg.

Three more images are added to further illustrate Malcolm Light's words. The above image highlights how much temperatures have been rising in the Arctic over the past few decades. In above image, anomalies are visualized by latitude, but are averaged by longitude globally, masking even higher anomalies that can be experienced at specific areas along the same longitude. At times, some areas in the Arctic do already experience anomalies of over 20°C, as also shown by the image below. 

Finally, the image below, from a post at the methane-hydrates blog. 

All this calls for comprehensive and effective action, as described at the Climate Plan blog. 


Related

- Causes of high methane levels over Arctic Ocean

http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2013/10/causes-of-high-methane-levels-over-arctic-ocean.html

- Climate Plan

http://climateplan.blogspot.com

- Horrific amounts of methane over Laptev Sea

http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2013/11/horrific-amounts-of-methane-over-laptev-sea.html

- Methane Levels going through the Roof

http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2013/11/methane-levels-going-through-the-roof.html

- Unfolding Methane Catastrophe

http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2013/10/unfolding-methane-catastrophe.html

- Methane Release caused by Earthquakes

http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2013/09/methane-release-caused-by-earthquakes.html

- Temperature Rise

http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2013/09/temperature-rise.html

- North Hole

http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2013/09/north-hole.html

- The LUCY project

http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/decomposing-atmospheric-methane.html

- The Alamo Project

http://facebook.com/AlamoProject

Post by Sam Carana.