More on Arctic Sea Ice Volume

Arctic Sea Ice Volume

In response to this morning's links post, commenter Stephen B argued that:

I don't think one needs to be any kind of climate scientist to understand what is about to happen to the remaining ice. In the next 3 years, at some point, the remaining ice is going to be so thin and so relatively fresh, that late one summer in say, August of 2014 to 17, scientists are going to look at their satellite data, and see essentially zero ice. Anybody that's watched a large lake or bay melt understands how they go. First, the edges fray. Some chunks break off, but the main slab grows thinner, wetter, darker, and more "rotten." Then one day in the spring the whole thing, say like 75% of the surface, just breaks up to slush in a matter of hours and it's gone.

I grabbed the ice volume data from Piomas, computed the minimum volume each year, and plotted the result above.  Note that 2012 is not final as there's still several weeks of the normal melt season left.

The purple line is a linear trend - explaining 82% of the variance.  It clearly has systematic problems - the ice collapse is accelerating, not just proceeding linearly.

A quadratic (red) is a visibly much better fit and explains 92% of the variance.  The quadratic hits zero in 2017.

It doesn't seem crazy to think that the Arctic will be ice free in September sometime this decade.

Strange that explorers competed for years to travel by sled to a place that will no longer exist.  Maybe I'm naive, but it seems this will change the debate about climate change - the complete absence of a polar ice cap seems much easier for an ordinary person to understand, versus complex arguments about data-analysis on global temperature statistics, requiring that you trust scientists and their computer models.  Arguing that climate change isn't happening will become akin to arguing that the earth is flat.

Thursday Links

• "If you believe we can do this to the planet without consequences, you’re a fool."
• Average fuel economy for new US cars of 54mpg by 2025 - that will help.
• Peak Nuclear Power?  Gail might well be right about this.
• Future of Chinese steel demand.
• Largest rainstorm of the year getting larger.
• And finally, Who wears the Pants in This Economy? puts some interesting human stories on this trend:

PIIGS Unemployment Chart

Every picture tells a story, they say.  This one tells a story of unrelenting misery and hardship, dreams crushed and hopes fading, year after year after year.  Still no sign of any relief for the real economy in these countries.

The data run through June 2012, except for the Greeks who are only up to May.

Tuesday Links

• More on the Saudi Aramco cyberattack.
• Soy prices following corn prices sharply upward.
• Wheat too.
• Potential impact of Hurricane Isaac on GoM oil production.
• Future demand for lithium.

Feel free to add anything interesting and related to the themes of the blog...

Global Lithium Production 1950-2011

Weekend Links

• Romney plan for energy US independence (hoping to join a fine Presidential tradition, I guess).
• Iranian regime speeding up nuclear fuel refining.  This was a predictable consequence of trying to negotiate with them.  It's perfectly clear that Iran is betting the farm on developing nuclear weapons.  The choices are major military action real soon, or acceptance and deterrence/containment.
• Also more on Fordow - the deep underground Iranian enrichment site and what the bombing option looks like.
• Who benefits from a weak euro?
• Global groundwater depletion map.
• Onion: Lower Class Grateful not to be Middle. (h/t Big Gav)
• 46% of Americans say they are creationists.  58% amongst Republicans, and 2/3 amongst weekly church goers.

Iranian Oil Production Falls Further

Interesting Thursday Links

• The chart above is new electricity generation by fuel source over time in the US.
• The challenges ahead in battery research.  (I would be somewhat more optimistic - making some allowance that researchers emphasize problems as motivation for their research - and also that commercialization is not about solving the whole problem at once but rather finding a series of increasingly large niches that eventually scale to the whole market - but much of the post is very informative).
• Climate is Really Changing - nothing new but a nice concise summary from Tamino.
• Progression of obesity in OECD countries.
• What the US needs to do to balance the budget.
• Chinese PMIs continue to look weak.  This is consistent with the weak global trade data and oil supply that is not expanding.
• Build your own stonehenge.
• Balkans in drought too.

Fire and Drought in the United States

Interesting Links: Tuesday Edition

• The above is the global temperature anomaly map for July 2012 - the hottest month in recorded history for the lower 48 states of the US - from NASA GISS (h/t Desdemona Despair).
• New CAFE rules should be finalized this month.
• The price of hay in the midwest has doubled due to the drought.  If there was a cellulosic ethanol industry there, it'd be hurting.
• Making soft robots that can move and camouflage themselves.  Words fail.
• Record low sea ice area in the Arctic already - and still several weeks to go to the minimum.
• United States on track for worst fire year since records began.
• It's also challenging to keep the Mississipi open for boat traffic.
• Economists discover in 2012 that loan-to-income rules would have been a good idea during the housing bubble.  We're glad you finally figured that one out...
• Inflation is more cyclical than has been measured, due to store switching (going to Walmart during recessions).

Feel free to link to - and discuss - other interesting news related to the themes of the blog.

Trend in Global Crude and Condensate Production

Interesting Links

• Whatever you think about Julian Assange, he is at least leading a very interesting and unique life.
• Iraq may be helping Iran to avoid western sanctions and export oil.
• Here in New York State, governor Cuomo signed into law new tax incentives for solar power.
• Robots continue to get better at displacing people.
• Bridging rivers with living bridges made from tree roots.  H/t Big Gav and Long Now.

Feel free to use this thread for links to or discussion of anything relevant to the themes of the blog.

Bleg: Thin Film Solar Modules on Aging Barn Roof

A quick question: I'm starting to research installing solar at our place near Ithaca (always my intention from when we bought it, but other projects had to happen first).

It seems to me appealing to put the solar power on the barn rather than the house:

• It has a much larger area (ie more power)
• The cosmetic impact from the road will be lower

Since the barn roof structure is not that heavy, it probably makes a lot more sense to apply flexible CIGs modules (eg like these Global Solar modules) than to use conventional modules.  These flexible modules are generally glued to a metal roof (eg with mastic).  So one question is whether folks have experience with these modules and prefer one brand to another?

Secondly - the sheet metal on the barn roof is a few decades old.  While the roof isn't in imminent danger of failing, about 50% of the roof area now looks rusty and about 50% still has the galvanized surface.  I've already had a contractor offer to cover the roof with an aluminized asphalt product to extend the life of the metal.  Clearly, it's not desirable to attach solar modules to metal with a noticeably shorter life than the modules.

One idea that occurs to me is to use an aluminized asphalt product to adhere the modules to the metal, and cover the whole roof at the same time in the interests of preserving it.

Does anyone have any experience with a similar situation?

Saudi Aramco Network Hit With Cyber-Attack

Apparently they shut down the network:

Saudi Aramco, Saudi Arabia’s national oil company and the largest in the world, has confirmed that is has been hit by a cyber attack that resulted in malware infecting user workstations, but did not affect other parts of its network.

“On Wednesday, Aug. 15, 2012, an official at Saudi Aramco confirmed that the company has isolated all its electronic systems from outside access as an early precautionary measure that was taken following a sudden disruption that affected some of the sectors of its electronic network,” the company wrote in a statement.

“The disruption was suspected to be the result of a virus that had infected personal workstations without affecting the primary components of the network.”

The company did not comment on the vector of attack or who may behind it, but insists its core operations have not been impacted as a result of the security breach.

Word is that this was due to the Disttrack malware that was only discovered yesterday:

Malware being used in a new series of targeted attacks has bucked the trend, choosing to destroy the computers it infects rather than just stealing sensitive information, security researchers said.

Called "Disttrack", the malware corrupts files, overwrites the infected machine's master boot record, and destroys the data so that it can't be recovered, according to reports from Symantec Security Response, Kaspersky Lab's Global Research and Analysis Team, and McAfee on Thursday. Disttrack has been observed in the Shamoon attacks, which has already affected at least one organization in the energy sector, Symantec said, but the company declined to provide any other details about the affected organization(s).

Given the unusual destructiveness of the malware, one can't help suspecting an Iranian or Syrian revenge operation - but no evidence one way or another at present.  Anyway, pretty interesting to have the world's largest oil company victim of a major cyberterrorism incident.

Global Oil Production Fell 1mbd in June/July

A Few Interesting Links

• Are we getting better at predicting when AI will arrive?
• Heating cold climate houses with two minisplits (new, super-insulated ones, anyway).
• New Hansen paper on increasing extremes in temperature.
• Interesting Kickstarter project that some might find worthwhile (global environmnental simulation by an early computer game pioneer).
• Water conservation ideas for responding to the current US drought.
• Israeli sabre rattling over Iran is getting louder again.
• Brent-WTI spread growing again.
• Modest progress on US carbon emissions in 2011.

You're welcome to use this post to link to anything else interesting and consistent with the themes of the blog.

Thinking About Yields under Future Drought

Estimated 2012 US Corn Yield

Latest Drought Science Alarming for US

Update on June Global Trade

Total Available Renewable Resource

Several commenters questioned Friday's post on the grounds that the total amount of solar and wind power potentially available is insufficient to power modern civilization

This is incorrect.

Total available wind power available on land and near shore has been estimated at 72TW.   This is close to five times current total primary energy consumption, and still more than twice as large as energy consumption in 2040 (extrapolating at the 2.7% growth rate of the last decade).

Of course, not all technically and economically feasible wind sites are politically feasible.  Thus it's important that total incoming solar radiation is also very large.  Top of the atmosphere incoming solar radiation is 174000TW.  If we just look at the world's desert areas, they represent about a third of the global land area, itself about 30% of the total surface.  Allowing 30% losses in the atmosphere over deserts, and throwing out something for Antarctica (a desert, but not a very useful one for solar power), we end up with something in the ballpark of 7000TW of available solar energy from deserts alone.  This is hundreds of times larger than current civilizational energy consumption.

Therefore, constraints on our ability to utilize renewables are political and economic, not ultimate physical ones; there is plenty of renewable energy out there.

Climate Change Action is Not Hopeless

Eurozone Unemployment

The numbers came out yesterday and are as above - a slight stall, but no real evidence of a reversal.  Also, every one of the PIIGS countries saw their unemployment rate get worse in the latest month.

So there is still no sign of stabilization in the real economy in Europe.