PIOMAS February 2016

Another month has passed and so here is the updated Arctic sea ice volume graph as calculated by the Pan-Arctic Ice Ocean Modeling and Assimilation System (PIOMAS) at the Polar Science Center:

Big, big changes this month, and not for the good. Due to extremely high, or maybe I should say non-low temperatures in the Arctic the past month, this new year opens with the smallest monthly volume increase for January in the 2006-2016 record. 2007 saw an increase of 2848 km3, but 2016 goes one better with 2794 km3, in all other years volume went up by more than 3000 km3.

This means that, yet again, current volume has crept closer to the post-2010 years and widened the gap with pre-2010 years. Below the change in difference between January 1st and 31st is shown:

On January 31st 2016 the Arctic has just 104 km3 of sea ice volume than the same date in 2012, the year of the record melting season. The difference with 2013, the year that followed the big melting season, is still 803 km3, but it has gone down by 920 km3 in just the past month. The difference with last year (when two rebound years caused a marked increase in volume) has changed to a whopping 1692 km3. 2016 is still in 4th position, just like last month, but the gap with the top 3 has diminished radically. I could go on. Really big changes.

On Wipneus' version of the volume graph we can clearly see how differently the 2016 trend line moves from other trend lines around it:

This all means that the trend line on the PIOMAS sea ice volume anomaly graph has moved down, away from the linear trend's 2 STD territory:

Last month I wondered how much higher it would get, now I'm wondering whether it will cross the blue linear trend line before the melting season starts.

To my surprise there's also something of an effect on the PICT graph (my crude average sea ice thickness calculation, derived by dividing PIOMAS volume numbers with Cryosphere Today sea ice area numbers), although not large:

Cryosphere Today sea ice area growth stalled quite a bit during January, going lowest a couple of times, but it seems volume growth was relatively lower still.

The same can more or less be seen on the PSC's thickness graph:

Not that average thickness tells us all that much. There could be 1 km2 of ice left in the Arctic Ocean, but if it were 3 metres thick, it would be off this chart. It's more interesting to look at the thickness distribution. Luckily we have Wipneus who produces all kinds of wonderful maps for us. This one compares current sea ice thickness distribution (as modelled by PIOMAS) to previous years, red means more ice now, blue means less ice now:

I'm kicking myself for not posting an analysis of the first half of the 2015/2016 freezing season as I promised I would do, if only to be able to more or less predict this slow volume growth. I'll do that later this week, as we absolutely need to know what the winter has meant for the Arctic's sea ice so that we can assess initial conditions as accurately as possible.

But winter is far from over. The past week or so weather conditions in the Arctic have been more conducive to ice growth, and there are plenty of weeks left to come to thicken that ice pack before the Sun comes out again.

Comments

[D]

There seems to be something wrong with the top graph. 2016 (red X) goes to December, and is identical to 2015.

[Neven]

Indeed, the crosses are wrong, but the red trend line is correct.

[Andy Lee Robinson]

Arctic Death Spiral shows January quite clearly. About the same as the minimum in 1979!

( http://haveland.com/share/arctic-death-spiral-1979-201601.jpg )

[Werther]

Thanks, Neven,
I know that you try to entertain us by pointing at the probability of rebounds…
But I’m not sure that the past week was really more conducive to ice growth:

Sunlight has reached a 100 miles N of Nordkapp, Norway. It has revealed the soon to pop up Mackenzie Polynia in the Beaufort Sea.
Winter has had its best time. Its ‘power’ hasn’t been what it once used to be…

[crandles]

>"Winter has had its best time."

Per a few sources like http://cires1.colorado.edu/~aslater/ARCTIC_TAIR/index_80_t2m.html
coldest time is mid Feb to mid March when ice extent is high and winds have to travel a long way over ice and snow if they are to bring warmth to Arctic. Doesn't this mean winter hasn't had its best time yet this year?

More unusually mild weather in next month would really eat into the remaining potential recovery time.

[stan]

Crandles:

that chart only plots 1980-2010. One can look at the 'monthly data ranks' on that website and see how years 2011-2015 fared.

for instance, take March. the year that represented the 75th percentile for temperature was the year 2002, with a mean temperature of -25 C and change, compared to a median value of -27.5 C comparing the 1979-2015. Not only are the years 2011-2015 all above 75th percentile, but they represent 4 of the top 6 amongst the 37 years. eyeballing just those 4 reveals a mean of about -24.5 degrees compared to an overall mean of -27.5. Eyeballing this new mean of -24.5 for 2011-2015 puts it more in line with Mid April for the data set 1980-2010.

results are similar for Feb, with some variance.

So while its possible the coldest time of the year is late Feb-Early March which makes sense to me intuitively as a yeoman, albedo could become a factor when the sun rises in earnest in the periphery N of 80 degrees. I'm not sure if the resultant temperature increase would offset what would otherwise be gained by cooling vis a vis climatology. That's why other people make the big bucks.

[stan]

apologies, the 2nd 'overall mean' I used in the post above is actually supposed to be Median. I don't know if someone could clean the first comment up and delete this one.

[John Christensen]

Hi stan,

I agree with crandles: If you look at ROOS data (http://arctic-roos.org/observations/ice-area-and-extent-in-arctic), you will notice that both area and extent average peak date over the past 10 years compared to the 1979-2006 average, will occur 1-2 weeks later.

The reason for the delay in the winter area and extent peaks, as most have speculated, is probably that it takes longer to cool down the Arctic top water layers caused by the increased water/atmosphere energy exchange resulting from reduced summer time ice cover.

As crandles also points out, the NH has cooled down, so even as the sun returns north bound moisture transport will cool down somewhat, before reaching the Arctic.

[AbbottisGone]

@ Werther,
I don't think Neven is trying to entertain us: he is trying to be conservative in his sum estimation of all events,... just like the IPCC.

It's simply called dotting your i's and crossing your t's. I'm sure you know this of course. (Words and communication are fun.)

Of course, Neven is entertaining however! (What did I just say?)

[stan]

John--

the link appeared to be broken for me, though it took me to arctic roos website. I tried poking around a bit, but I don't think I was quite able to find the dataset you wanted to show me.

A later than normal peak also makes sense to me intuitively, for the reasons you have given. But if temperatures above normal north of 80 degrees are still well below freezing point, are these mutually exclusive conditions?

[crandles]

Stan, re broken link:
To get to the page intended by John Christensen delete the ), that has been added to link by mistake.

[wayne]

I am still skeptical about PIOMAS being well adjusted with other sources of ice thickness or volume.

If you look at their graph:

http://neven1.typepad.com/.a/6a0133f03a1e37970b01bb08b87da1970d-pi

2013 January had less sea ice than 2016 early February.

now compare with US Navy sea ice thickness:

http://eh2r.blogspot.ca/2016/02/2016-arctic-sea-ice-thickness-may-be.html

February 8,2016 appears to have significantly less over all sea ice thickness than same date 2013.

and yes winter 15-16 is finally growing after many interruptions, But it will not be so big and fierce by the greatest interruptor of them all, the sun.

[viddaloo]

No clear trend yet for earlier winter maximums for volume:

"We may have already passed the winter max ice for extent, record early, as usual, but premature to call it just yet, before March 2nd, when we will know for sure. Extent has never come back to an earlier high after 22 days have passed, not getting back up there. For volume, the winter max happens in early March at the earliest, but with no clear trend, yet, towards earlier dates. Expect such a trend to materialise in the near future, but maybe not as early as this year?"

http://www.wunderground.com/blog/viddaloo/annual-average-volume-19-january11-february

[Al Rodger]

I've not been monitoring it so I don't know how long PIOMAS has been showing February's value - possibly not long.
What I find mystifying is the monthly data has been updated to March. And more, it is giving a March figure 800k below the March record set in 2011. (As I lost the link to the daily data which doesn't appear for me on the PIOMAS site, I can't see what has happened there.)

[Neven]

It has just been updated, Al. I've never seen that file you link to before, but if you want the spreadsheet you need to scroll down all the way to the bottom of the page.

February saw the second lowest February increase in the 2007-2016 record, meaning 2016 is now lower than 2012 and every other year, just behind 2011. I'll have an ASIB post on this later today.

Here's a sneak preview:

[Jim Hunt]

Al - The daily data shows 20.660 for 2016 day 60, compared to 20.546 for 2011 day 60.

I parted with my email address to get it, although it looks like just pressing the "Send" button would work.

Maybe the March number you quote is an average for the month so far?

[Al Rodger]

Looking at the PIOMAS year-on-year graph, the 20,621k sq km figure posted on the monthly data page is almost certainly the last-day-of-February figure (which scales to 20,613k) posted by mistake.

Jim, thanks for that. Pressing SEND worked. I do wonder if my problem was that when I first encountered that page it wasn't up & running properly. This was a long time ago now, but having tried repeatedly submitting my e-mail, name, shoe size, etc & pressing SEND I never once got a link come up. So I haven't bothered pressing SEND since, not until just now.

[Lawrence Martin]

I am only a humble learner at ASIB & ASIF and have a sincere question.

Given what we know of past pauses in the decline of ice volume, is it safe to say that volume could be decimated if the Arctic is subjected to another “perfect storm summer” similar to 2012?

[Jim Hunt]

How do you define "decimated" Lawrence?

If it's "less than September 2012" that is certainly feasible given that all the sea ice metrics are currently lower than on the same day of 2012. Not by a lot though. What with one thing and another I have to admit that I haven't had a chance to compare snow cover yet though.

In addition the Beaufort Sea is lacking the thick ice of last year, currently at least. Nonetheless there's still lots of that north of Greenland and the CAA, which will take lots of energy to melt.

Why don't you try posing your question again in 3 months time?

[AbbottisGone]

Given what we know of past pauses in the decline of ice volume,

Dear Lawrence, what do you mean by this?