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Unprecedented Greenland Ice Melt Stuns NASA Scientists


Sharpshooter

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Given that the last event occurred in 1889 I think the only record of it will be from ice core, and my guess is that it would be impossible to say anything beyond the fact that there was a melt layer. I find one paper mentioning the 1889 melt, but can't find anything prior to that.

In any case, as long as the surface gets reasonable warm you can get massive melt events like these. It is of course entirely possible to have such events due to natural variability alone. The real question is given the recent warming over Greenland, will these events happen more frequently? Unfortunately we don't have the statistics to say.

Finally, when interpreting such an event in the grand scheme of things, one should keep in mind that mass over Greenland has nose dived over the past decade.

Greenland_Mass_Balance.gif

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Im totally not dude.

But I am also not convnced its all man made. And then there is the real question.

What do we do about it. Say its 50 ecological and 50 human. I dont know if we can control the human part with the emerging China India and Russian markets for the dirty coal.

So I would be more interested in preparing for the end game of what we can do about it to prepare.

If anyone has any better ideas, I am certainly all ears.

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I assume if they have a core sample from that previous period, they could deduce the length of time that melting took place, no?

If they could, then perhaps they could back even further to the previous melting events, and see if there are any similarities between those duration of melts, and this last one.

I suspect that those one may have been more gradual perhaps. If it can be shown that this particular melt is the anomalous one out of the preceding however many cyclical melt events, then wouldn't there be at least some justification at looking at external causes other than the normalcy of such events?

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The centre of the ice sheet is in fact several kilometres up, which is usually below freezing. Any melting will have to be during the summer months, and unlikely that it would've last more than a few days (like the current episode). As far as I know the resolution for ice core is not that high (at most year by year), so I am afraid the details of the event will remain unknown.

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So then one of the only ways to see if this is part of the natural cycle of normal events is to wait to see if it melts just as quickly or moreso next year, and if the melting is more widespread?

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No one is really arguing for a return to preindustrial conditions, the goal is simply to stabilise the temperature at an acceptable level. in fact it is not difficult, we can deplete known reserves of oil and gas and we can still manage to stabilise below 2 degrees. Key is to stop using Coal, oil sand and methane hydrate.

As I mention in an earlier post, the technology required to transition out of a fossil fuel based economy is not far behind. There are already places where solar power is the cheapest option, and it will only get cheaper as technology further matures. On top of that you can increase efficiency, you can use government policy to change consumer behaviour.

People in China do recognise that global warming poses a severe threat, and signs seem that they are actually willing to deal with the problem. I was there in December, and was pleasantly surprised to find that that "low carbon foot print" is a selling point for a lot of products. I read their financial newspaper, and they have a few pages devoted to a weekly report on low carbon economy. At the past climate conference they also announced that they will agree to a cap by 2020. They aggressively pursue renewable energy.

We are not as powerless as you think. Question is whether there is a will to do it.

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You are aware that the elimination of coal mining and oil sands industries would represent a tremendous economic hit to a country that is already teetering at the brink right?

I hope you are willing to accept the much higher taxes and much lower levels of government service that would come part and parcel with such a decision.

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You are aware that the elimination of coal mining and oil sands industries would represent a tremendous economic hit to a country that is already teetering at the brink right?

I hope you are willing to accept the much higher taxes and much lower levels of government service that would come part and parcel with such a decision.

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Canada has severly companies pursuing alternate energry, like solar power (in fact a friend of mine is an engineer at just such a company). As the costs of fossil fuels and energy in general goes up while technology in other sources of power improves they will naturally replace those industry like digital media replaced the record player.

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You are aware that fossil fuels are finite resources, and reluctance and refusal to move away from a resource based economy today is simply kicking the can down the road right? Our economy is teetering at the brink, yet for some reason we should give up economic control to the global market?

I'm sorry, are you saying countries without natural resources all have high taxes and low government services? Or is that what Canada would be faced with because of our current situation created by reliance on said resources?

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You are aware that the elimination of coal mining and oil sands industries would represent a tremendous economic hit to a country that is already teetering at the brink right?

I hope you are willing to accept the much higher taxes and much lower levels of government service that would come part and parcel with such a decision.

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Progress always bring about changes, but a job is lost somewhere, another is created else where. Entire industries closed after the industrial revolution and the digital revolution, was there widespread hunger and chaos?

The world moves on, and when renewables become cheap enough coal and tar sand industry will go whether you like it or not. If we decide to get with the rest of the world and start working on transitioning out, the Canadian economy will be fine. But if we continue to be obstinate and pump billions into tar sand, we will truly be royally screwed when renewables breaks parity.

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Progress always bring about changes, but a job is lost somewhere, another is created else where. Entire industries closed after the industrial revolution and the digital revolution, was there widespread hunger and chaos?

The world moves on, and when renewables become cheap enough coal and tar sand industry will go whether you like it or not. If we decide to get with the rest of the world and start working on transitioning out, the Canadian economy will be fine. But if we continue to be obstinate and pump billions into tar sand, we will truly be royally screwed when renewables breaks parity.

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