What effect would melting ice caps have on global climate?

[BushOut06]

Melting ice caps would actually cause a cooling of the ocean in many parts of the world. What impact would this have on the global climate? Obviously a rise in sea levels would be catastrophic to anyone living on the coast, but what other effects would it have? One scenario I've read has the Gulf Stream shutting down, depriving much of Europe of its warm water and air. Eventually much of Europe would resemble Siberia. Honestly, I've read so many things that say global warming could wind up triggering a new Ice Age, quite frankly it's all rather perplexing to a layman like myself.

The one thing I do know is that the effects won't be very pleasant.

[11 Bravo]

1. I hope that fat bastard Limbaugh can't swim.

I would fly to Florida on my own nickel just to toss him a cinder block as the water rose up around his jowls.

[Warpy]

5. Alas, fat floats

he'd really need that cinderblock.

Coulter will sink like a sack of lead weights, though.

[Swamp Rat]

6. So does hot air.

Better poke a hole in IT first. :D

[hang a left]

8. you mean topped his jowls don't you?

[Random_Australian]

2. Plus rises in sea levels

but the big thing is diffs in temp ranges, we're all going to get hotter days and cooler nights. The only thing that has stopped that from happening already is 'global dimming' from all the planes contrails and pollution and whatnot. (When yankish planes were grounded post 11/9 temp ranges went way above average)

Note: Yes, we put day/month, you put month/day. so my 11/9 is your 9/11. O.K.

[wryter2000]

10. Welcome to DU Random

:hi:

[pitohui]

17. ok but 911 has a dual meaning, you know

it's a pun, 911 is not just the date but the usa phone number and hence abbreviation for emergency

that is why it's called 911

119 does not have any meaning in usa-speak so you lose the second meaning of "emergency"

[FormerRepublican]

3. Here's info about the worst "global warming" ever on Earth...

"The end of the Paleocene (55.5/54.8 Ma) was marked by one of the most significant periods of global change during the Cenozoic, a sudden global climate change, the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM), which upset oceanic and atmospheric circulation and led to the extinction of numerous deep-sea benthic foraminifera and on land, a major turnover in mammals.

In an event marking the start of the Eocene, the planet heated up in one of the most rapid and extreme global warming events recorded in geologic history, currently being identified as the 'Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum' or the 'Initial Eocene Thermal Maximum' (PETM or IETM). Sea surface temperatures rose between 5 and 8°C over a period of a few thousand years. In 1990, marine scientists James Kennett and Lowell Stott, both then at the University of California, Santa Barbara, reported analysis of marine sediments showing that, not only had the surface of the Antarctic ocean heated up about 10 degrees at the beginning of the Eocene, but that the entire depth of the ocean had warmed, and its chemistry changed disastrously. There was severely reduced oxygen in deep sea waters, and 30 to 40% of deep sea foraminifera suddenly went extinct. Geologist Jim Zachos of the University of California, Santa Cruz has connected the Eocene heat wave to drastic changes in ocean chemistry that caused the massive worldwide die-off. More recently a synchronous drop in carbon isotope ratios has been identified in many terrestrial environments.

What unleashed the PETM is unclear. Most fingers of blame point to volcanic eruptions that disgorged gigatonnes of carbon dioxide, or coastal reservoirs of methane gas, sealed by icy soil, that were breached by warmer temperatures or receding seas.

Tracking the ratio of carbon isotopes in marine calcium carbonate sediments, Kennett and Stott found a sharp decrease in the amount of heavy carbon in 55-million-year-old marine fossils, a decline that caused the relative ratio of 13C to 12C to plunge. A gas with very low amounts of heavy 13C must have literally flooded the atmosphere. In 1995, Gerry Dickens, University of Michigan, argued that only methane gas had enough light carbon to produce the early Eocene plunge. He proposed that a belch of methane escaped from ice in seafloor sediments as the Earth warmed during the latest Paleocene. The methane escaped from submarine clathrates, ice crystals that trap methane hydrate, a form of methane 'ice' that forms in cold bottom water under great pressures and is widely distributed and plentiful in sediments on the outer edges of continental margins. Methane has a global warming potential (GWP) over a 100 year period of 23<1>, meaning per kilogram it is estimated to be 23 times as effective as carbon dioxide as a greenhouse gas. The massive sublimation and release of sedimentary methane hydrates into the ocean-atmosphere reservoir upset the global carbon cycle and led to runaway global warming."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paleocene-Eocene_Thermal_Maximum

Worst case scenario - far worse than Earth has ever seen before? Big ocean burp of methane, kills all life on Earth. Regeneration - maybe.

Would global warming this time around be worst case? :shrug:

If we're lucky, it won't get that bad.

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

4. It will certainly give a kick to the Real Estate market!

(rimshot)

[11 Bravo]

11. I'm looking for ocean front property in Nevada.

Bada-boom!

[Cleita]

15. LOL! That's the best photoshop yet.

I'll bet Laura has moments when she comes out of her Xanax fog that she thinks about that.

[Cleita]

7. Land masses could decrease drastically.

I read that Florida and many islands could go underwater with the icecaps melting. On the other hand, a new ice age would increase land masses but less of them would be habitable.

It seems that no matter what we try to do to destroy earth, earth fights back. I wonder if earth will go as far to make our species extinct as a bad experiment if we don't shape up?

[wryter2000]

9. The ice currently reflects light and heat into space

If the white ice is replaced by dark blue water, the Earth will retain more heat.

[Poppyseedman]

12. I don't worry about this crap for one reason.

There are realms of scientific studies that turned out to be wrong.

50 % of what you have read is complete bull squat, flat out lies paid for by people with an agenda on both sides of the issue.

50% of what you have read is probably sincere scientists who simply don't have all the answers, but have come to an honest objective conclusion on both sides of the issue.

In between lies the truth, which means the truth as well as we know it today. Which means the truth will change as we get better understanding of our climate.

So, I don't worry about it. Probably will add 10 years to my life.

[Clarkie1]

13. Ironically, in the long-term it could lead to a new ice age.

As the ice melts, it dilutes the salinity of the surrounding ocean. This may alter major ocean currents such as the Gulf stream. Without the gulf stream current, much of Europe and the Northeastern U.S. will be, for lack of a better term, "on ice."

[Coexist]

14. the decreased salinity could cause the Gulfstream to shut down

which would be rough.

http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0130-11.htm
<snip>
In quick summary, if enough cold, fresh water coming from the melting polar ice caps and the melting glaciers of Greenland flows into the northern Atlantic, it will shut down the Gulf Stream, which keeps Europe and northeastern North America warm. The worst-case scenario would be a full-blown return of the last ice age - in a period as short as 2 to 3 years from its onset - and the mid-case scenario would be a period like the "little ice age" of a few centuries ago that disrupted worldwide weather patterns leading to extremely harsh winters, droughts, worldwide desertification, crop failures, and wars around the world.

Here's how it works.

If you look at a globe, you'll see that the latitude of much of Europe and Scandinavia is the same as that of Alaska and permafrost-locked parts of northern Canada and central Siberia. Yet Europe has a climate more similar to that of the United States than northern Canada or Siberia. Why?

It turns out that our warmth is the result of ocean currents that bring warm surface water up from the equator into northern regions that would otherwise be so cold that even in summer they'd be covered with ice. The current of greatest concern is often referred to as "The Great Conveyor Belt," which includes what we call the Gulf Stream.

http://www.wunderground.com/education/abruptclimate.asp
Scroll down to the fantastic graphic of the "Conveyor Belt"

[neoblues]

16. Let's Try Republican Logic... It would make the ocean less...

pleasant to drink... just like when the ice cubes in their Cokes. However, it represents no "real" problem for two very, umm... solid, reasons. First, since not many people really like to drink ocean water, if it gets watered down, it would have small impact--and any impact it would have would be likely to make even more people turn to consuming soft-drinks--and so Coca-Cola's stock price would go up--and thus the economy would be improved. Therefore via trickle down economics, more jobs would be created and fewer people would be poor. The second reason it's not of any "real" concern is that--as anybody knows--if the ice in your drink melts, all you need to do is go to the fridge and get more ice right from the ice-maker! So, if all the ice melts, we can just get more, right? Hmmm. Where's nature's ice maker? Well, we're not sure... but if we have to, we can build giant "ice makers" and just keep dumping the ice out on the polar caps. Yes, we Republi-Scientists have thought of everything... we realize that our ice-maker factories would need a great deal of energy, but that's easy, we can just build more power plants--and we have several options: oil, gas and/or coal--yes! Coal... Coal to ice... No more global warming theories. When we do restore all the ice on the caps we can begin... Oh, did I forget to mention that all this is totally confidential/secret? No need really, after all the whole idea that mankind could possibly affect the entire planet's climate is so absurd that nobody will believe it--even if all the ice on the caps does melt! Even then, our own refrigerators will make all the ice we individually need.

So. To recap. We can rebuild the ice caps as needed, but do so secretly since we wouldn't want anyone to think that Global Warming was real or anything--which it obviously isn't even if the ice caps do--for inxplicable reasons--melt, but no one would believe it anyway--and rightfully so since there's still ice in our refrigerators. :sarcasm:

Of course, in reality, instead of making the ocean less pleasant to drink, it would make it less salty and therefore more pleasant to drink! Though, it would still be so saline that it would cause the cells of your body to expel precious water in a hopeless attempt to balance the salinity of your blood/bodily fluids to that within the cells--and in doing so, they would die of thirst. Shortly, you'd follow.

Anyone who can grasp the notion of just how huge a balloon filled with one single ton of CO2 is, and then consider how many millions of tons of the stuff we're responsible for releasing into the atmosphere, ought to be able to make the leap that we might indeed be the cause for the obvious increase in temperatures--which should itself be undeniable given the measurably more rapid melting of the glaciers and polar ice caps... there's just no room for denial.

Oh, and as others have pointed out, if the Gulfstream shuts down Britain's gonna get really, really cold by comparison to now--though with the overall warming, that would be offset a bit--but overall, it's likely to be a real catastrophe for them. We, on the other hand, already have vast areas that struggle with drought year after year--and that's going to get much more serious. A glass of ice-water may one day be like the most desirable thing (as though we were all residents of Hell).

[bloom]

18. There are definitely a lot of extremes

I don't think people really know....



Said Portugal had it's first snow in 50 years. Seems like they had a abnormal heat wave last summer. ->


http://www.wmo.ch/index-en.html

First snow in Portugal in more than 50 years

During the last weekend of January 2006, central and southern parts of Portugal experienced their first snow in more than 50 years.

See METEOSAT image (right), courtesy of EUMETSAT and:
http://www.eumetsat.int/idcplg?IdcService=SS_GET_PAGE&ssDocName=
005199&l=en&ssTargetNodeId=115

---

(source: Japan Meteorological Agency)

Snow continues to blanket areas of Japan

On 5 February, the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) said the amount of snow piled in Tsunan, Niigata Prefecture, surpassed 4 m for the first time since official observations began in the city (1989). In January, the harsh weather conditions prompted the JMA to issue early warnings for snowfall, landslides, flooding and avalanches.

Officials in Japan have reported the snow- and cold-related deaths of some 118 people since the onset of winter, which has so far proved to be the country’s deadliest in two decades. Massive snowfalls have been recorded around the country with drifts reaching record heights in some cases. Victims included those who died when their roofs collapsed under the weight of the snow or who fell trying to clear them.

[bloom]

19. Article about "Warming Siberia could change the planet"

http://www.peopleandplanet.net/doc.php?id=2674&PHPSESSID=ead89d44eb579e6f4a91673bf55f15e4

"...As Siberia warms, though, the permafrost is going the way of the disappearing Arctic ice cap. As permafrost melts, the earth gives way underneath buildings and roads. A United Nations Environment Programme report says that 300 buildings in Yakutsk, the regional capital, have been damaged by permafrost melt. UNEP predicts that over 70 per cent of apartment buildings built between 1950 and 1990 will fail by 2010. By 2030, that total reaches 100 per cent.

The natural landscape is being transformed as well. Dr Robert Holmes, a researcher at the Woods Hole Research Center in Massachusetts, reports that in some areas of the Arctic, new lakes and marshes are being formed. ‘As the permafrost thaws, the ground surface drops somewhat,’ says Holmes, ‘causing a depression that when filled with water creates a lake.’

More water

Existing lakes are also deepening due to the thaw. Holmes notes that in Alaska, and perhaps elsewhere in the Arctic, the permafrost below some existing lakes has been pierced, draining them completely. Similarly, the New York Times reports that the freeing up of coastal ice is threatening an entire village in north-eastern Russia, as the coastline erodes away at a rate of 15 to 18 feet a year...."

[Xithras]

20. Increased global temperatures means increased ocean surface evaporation.

Without even getting into the interruption to the gulf stream (which, unlike global warming, is still an unproven and controversial idea in the scientific community), the simple act of evaporation will cause trouble.

Increased evaporation means increased cloud cover. Increased cloud cover means increased solar reflection. Increased solar reflection means that surface temps drop. Surface temperature reductions under cloud cover mean decreased agricultural output and increased snowfall.

Ice age.

The problem is that this is a slow process. It may take decades, or even a century, before global warming heats the ocean enough to begin appreciably increasing the rate of evaporation. Since the ocean is a big heat sink, when the increased cloud cover reduces the amount of sunlight hitting the ocean, it may take decades more for it to cool back off. In the meantime the planet will get very cold, and very snowy.

Once the oceans "normalize" again, the world won't automatically warm back up either. Snow is just as reflective of solar radiation as clouds are, and a few decades of snowfall will result in a world that reflects most of its energy back into space. Remember that the natural state of ANY planet is "frozen solid", that solar radiation is our only source of heat, and that the atmosphere actually collects little of it on its own. When the ground reflects the radiation back into space, it takes a LONG time for the planet to warm up again.

[bloom]

21. "In the meantime the planet will get very cold, and very snowy."

See my post #18 - some places are already getting weird snows. Plus there was snow in Athens earlier this year and all that.

On the other hand - there was rain around Baffin Island in February:

Rain? In Iqaluit? In February?
Last updated Feb 28 2006 08:51 AM CST
CBC News

Residents of Iqaluit and Pangnirtung have been stowing away their parkas and kamiks this week and pulling out raincoats.
Warm temperatures and rain showers across southern Baffin Island have broken almost every record on the books.
"The snow is melting off the roof, I can't believe it, it's unreal," says Iqaluit resident Dennis Shappa.

"If it freezes over, you know, caribou are going to have a hard time getting to their source of food," says a concerned Moses Kilabuk.
The odd weather closed Iqaluit airport for a time. Baker Lake resident Jeanne Simailak was left stranded in Iqaluit because planes were grounded due to icy conditions...

"Can you believe these temperatures? Six-point-eight degrees in Pangnirtung. That's plus. And 4.2 degrees in Iqaluit. That breaks about a 60-year record."

The normal high for this time of year is –21 C.

http://www.cbc.ca/north/story/iqaluit-rain-28022006.html

[pinto]

22. Changing the salinity of the ocean is the most compelling scenario

I've heard mentioned.

The oceans "drive" most of our weather. ie. Look at el nino/la nina cycles. They are driven by the change in ocean temps and the upwelling nature of currents along continental edges.

Melting ice caps would add an "unnatural" amount of fresh water into saline oceans in a relatively short period of time. Upwelling is a function of salinity as well as current temperatures. in fact, they effect each other.

So any changes in the global pattern of ocean currents is bound to affect climate. While el nino/la nina are recorded cyclical changes, ice cap melting is a wild card, if large enough to effect the global system.

That's my understanding of it all.

[bloom]

23. "La Niña conditions unusual for this time of year"

"According to WMO’s latest El Niño/La Nña Update, sea-surface temperatures in the central and eastern equatorial Pacific have ranged between 0-5° and 1°C below normal for the past two months. These readings are consistent with the early stages of a basin-wide La Niña event. La Niña refers to an unusual cooling of the central and eastern equatorial Pacific. La Niña can recur every few years, sometimes persisting for as long as two years.

Development of basin-wide La Niña conditions at this time of the year is highly unusual, hence there is some additional uncertainty over the extent to which typical La Niña rainfall and temperature patterns will occur for this event. Furthermore, the La Niñ conditions are expected to be relatively short-lived, with a return to neutral conditions across the equatorial Pacific likely by mid-year.

Scientists now have a better understanding of weather patterns associated with El Niño and La Niña, resulting in more accurate long-range forecasts. These and community preparation are the most powerful mitigation tools against their effects, which can trigger a wide range of extreme weather events both in central and eastern equatorial Pacific and elsewhere."

http://www.wmo.ch/index-en.html