I had almost forgotten about this and the previous poll has ended. But there's a new poll in the right hand bar. Please, cast your vote again and in about ten days I will write a post discussing the results (like I did here a while back).
It might be interesting to see how differently we vote from last time, and how these results compare with submissions to the SEARCH Sea Ice Outlook, especially as one of the submissions is the WUWT poll.
For what it's worth, I'm voting minimum extent will be between 4.5 and 5 million km2. I'm still expecting it to come below the 2010 minimum extent.
ATTENTION: You are voting on IJIS minimum daily sea ice extent, whereas the Sea Ice Outlook uses the monthly September average as reported by NSIDC. The difference is between 150-200K I believe.
Still voting for between 4 and 4.5, but now I'm right at the top of the range instead of right at the bottom.
Posted by: Peter Ellis | August 02, 2011 at 20:33
I initially weighed in with a WAG of 4.0, +/- 0.3. I'm still thinking it will be in that range, but like Peter, in the upper end of it.
Weather is a fickle wench, leaving us in fine fettle.
Posted by: Daniel Bailey | August 02, 2011 at 23:23
Shakespeare... Nice! ;-)
After almost 38 votes, we have 60% of the votes opting for 'between 4 and 4.5 million km2'.
Posted by: Neven | August 02, 2011 at 23:55
SIE down by only 18k for August 1 but I am sticking with my initial minimum prediction of between 5 and 5.5 million. 2011 looks more and more like 2009 and 2006: a roaring start followed by a fizzle. We are now past the hey days of summer in the Arctic, so I am expecting a minimum within the same ball park.
Tamino (who got it almost right last year) had a recent prediction of 4.66 million +- 0.66 million. He may wish to revise his forecast, but 5.3 million would still be within the 95% confidence interval.
Posted by: Phil263 | August 03, 2011 at 01:13
Phil263: Tamino recently published the most recent forecast from his simple model based on the ice extent and ice area at the end of July and the June area, which his analysis show the "best model" of the commonly followed metrics.
His model's new prediction: 4.22 million with 0.62 error bars. This means his highest point in his band of uncertainty is 4.84, below your lowest forecast band.
One thing for sure: one of these forecasts will be wrong.
Posted by: Paul Klemencic | August 03, 2011 at 01:31
I'm thinking (somewhat sadly) 4.8 or 4.9-ish. I haven't been tracking this as long as you guys have, and I'm not a climate scientist, but I have a good sense of how trends work. And it wouldn't shock me if 2011 came in above 5.0.
As "bad" as a level well below 4.5 may portend, I'd like to see it because it might help wake people up.
I think we have to be thinking about thickness of the MY ice. I have a suspicion that it may be something we're just not paying enough attention to and it may show itself to be more important in a summer or two.
But I'm just an amateur, trying to reason this all out. And convince skeptics and deniers I run into that we really have to think about this stuff.
Posted by: Noel Ward | August 03, 2011 at 04:01