September 20, 2012

ENDING ITS SUMMER MELT, ARCTIC SEA ICE SETS A NEW LOW THAT LEADS TO WARNINGS

[Scientists said Wednesday that the Arctic has become a prime example of the built-in conservatism of their climate forecasts. As dire as their warnings about the long-term consequences of heat-trapping emissions have been, many of them fear they may still be underestimating the speed and severity of the impending changes.]
By 
 Andrew Testa for The New York Times
A view of the east coast of Greenland, where the ice sheet meets the sea.
The drastic melting of Arctic sea ice has finally ended for the year, scientists announced Wednesday, but not before demolishing the previous record — and setting off new warnings about the rapid pace of change in the region.
The apparent low point for 2012 was reached Sunday, according to the National Snow and Ice Data Center, which said that sea ice that day covered about 1.32 million square miles, or 24 percent, of the surface of the Arctic Ocean. The previous low, set in 2007, was 29 percent.
When satellite tracking began in the late 1970s, sea ice at its lowest point in the summer typically covered about half the Arctic Ocean, but it has been declining in fits and starts over the decades.
“The Arctic is the earth’s air-conditioner,” said Walt Meier, a research scientist at the snow and ice center, an agency sponsored by the government. “We’re losing that. It’s not just that polar bears might go extinct, or that native communities might have to adapt, which we’re already seeing — there are larger climate effects.”
His agency waited a few days before announcing the low to be sure sea ice had started to refreeze, as it usually does at this time of year, when winter closes in rapidly in the high Arctic. A shell of ice will cover much of the Arctic Ocean in coming months, but it is likely to be thin and prone to melting when summer returns.
Scientists consider the rapid warming of the region to be a consequence of the human release of greenhouse gases, and they see the melting as an early warning of big changes to come in the rest of the world.
Some of them also think the collapse of Arctic sea ice has already started to alter atmospheric patterns in the Northern Hemisphere, contributing to greater extremes of weather in the United States and other countries, but that case is not considered proven.
The sea ice is declining much faster than had been predicted in the last big United Nations report on the state of the climate, published in 2007. The most sophisticated computer analyses for that report suggested that the ice would not disappear before the middle of this century, if then.
Now, some scientists think the Arctic Ocean could be largely free of summer ice as soon as 2020. But governments have not responded to the change with any greater urgency about limiting greenhouse emissions. To the contrary, their main response has been to plan for exploitation of newly accessible minerals in the Arctic, including drilling for more oil.
Scientists said Wednesday that the Arctic has become a prime example of the built-in conservatism of their climate forecasts. As dire as their warnings about the long-term consequences of heat-trapping emissions have been, many of them fear they may still be underestimating the speed and severity of the impending changes.
In a panel discussion on Wednesday in New York sponsored by Greenpeace, the environmental group, James E. Hansen, a prominent NASA climate scientist, said the Arctic melting should serve as a warning to the public of the risks that society is running by failing to limit emissions.
“The scientific community realizes that we have a planetary emergency,” Dr. Hansen said. “It’s hard for the public to recognize this because they stick their head out the window and don’t see that much going on.”
ASA, via Reuters
A NASA image shows how the record-low Arctic sea ice extent 
compares with the average minimum extent over 
the past 30 years, in yellow.
A prime concern is the potential for a large rise in the level of the world’s oceans. The decline of Arctic sea ice does not contribute directly to that problem, since the ice is already floating and therefore displacing its weight in water.
But the disappearance of summer ice cover replaces a white, reflective surface with a much darker ocean surface, allowing the region to trap more of the sun’s heat, which in turn melts more ice. The extra heat in the ocean appears to be contributing to an accelerating melt of the nearby Greenland ice sheet, which does contribute to the rise in sea level.
At one point this summer, surface melt was occurring across 97 percent of the Greenland ice sheet, a development not seen before in the era of satellite measurements, although geological research suggests that it has happened in the past.
The sea is now rising at a rate of about a foot per century, but scientists like Dr. Hansen expect this rate to increase as the planet warms, putting coastal settlements at risk.
A scientist at the snow and ice center, Julienne C. Stroeve, took a ride on a Greenpeace ship recently to inspect the Arctic Ocean for herself. Interviewed this week after pulling into port at the island of Spitsbergen, she said one of her goals had been to debark on ice floes and measure them, but that it had been difficult to find any large enough to support her weight.
Ice floes were numerous in spots, she said, but “when we got further into the ice pack, there were just large expanses of open water.”

NEW CRACKS ARE FORMING INCOALITION LEADING INDIA

[After the announcement by Mamata Banerjee, the populist chief minister of the state of West Bengal, that her party would formally leave the government on Friday, another member of the government, Muthuvel Karunanidhi, said his party would support a nationwide strike on Thursday called by opposition parties to protest economic policy changes announced last week by the governing coalition, the United Progressive Alliance. Mr. Karunanidhi controls 18 votes in Parliament, just one fewer than the total controlled by Ms. Banerjee.] 

By  And 
NEW DELHIThe turmoil surrounding India’s national government intensified Wednesday, with a growing number of regional partners threatening to withdraw their support from the government and a former ally calling for the prime minister to seek a new electoral mandate.
After the announcement by Mamata Banerjee, the populist chief minister of the state of West Bengal, that her party would formally leave the government on Friday, another member of the government, Muthuvel Karunanidhi, said his party would support a nationwide strike on Thursday called by opposition parties to protest economic policy changes announced last week by the governing coalition, the United Progressive Alliance. Mr. Karunanidhi controls 18 votes in Parliament, just one fewer than the total controlled by Ms. Banerjee.
Meanwhile, Ram Gopal Yadav, a major leader of the Samajwadi Party, which controls 22 votes in Parliament, said his continued support of the governing coalition was no longer assured. “This government has lost credibility and can’t take our support for granted,” he said, according to news media reports.
Ms. Banerjee has given the government has until Friday to reverse new economic measures, including those that would allow multinational giants like Walmart and Ikea to build major retail outlets in India, or else her 19 lawmakers will withdraw from the coalition. Since Parliament is not in session, there is little risk that the government would collapse immediately. But if Ms. Banerjee follows through on her threat, the governing coalition must rely on Mr. Karunanidhi, Mr. Yadav and others to avoid early elections.
The battle of words between the national government and Ms. Banerjee intensified Wednesday as Kunal Ghosh, a member of Parliament from Ms. Banerjee’s party, demanded that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh seek a new electoral mandate, suggesting he should resign. Each side in the dispute between Ms. Banerjee and the government insisted in interviews that the other had rejected overtures for discussions in recent days.
Ms. Banerjee, in a fiery address on Tuesday night, accused the government of “selling the country” as a result of the policy changes it announced last week, which raised the price of diesel fuel and allowed greater foreign investment in retailing and aviation. Ms. Banerjee contends that these steps will hurt the poor and destroy small retailers, though many economists and business leaders say the measures are critical to attracting investment, helping address the country’s fiscal deficit, and, over the longer run, reviving growth in the faltering Indian economy.
Hari Kumar contributed reporting.