Twenty-year-old models which have suggested serious ice loss in the eastern Antarctic have been compared with reality for the first time – and found to be wrong, so much so that it now appears that no ice is being lost at all.

“Previous ocean models … have predicted temperatures and melt rates that are too high, suggesting a significant mass loss in this region that is actually not taking place,” says Tore Hattermann of the Norwegian Polar Institute, member of a team which has obtained two years’ worth of direct measurements below the massive Fimbul Ice Shelf in eastern Antarctica – the first ever to be taken. (more…)

A paper published today in the Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Technologyfinds that temperature measurements on the Antarctic plateau “are shown to be significantly warm biased by solar radiation,” resulting in temperature measurements up to 10°C (18°F) warmer than actual temperatures. The authors find that the summer Sun heats the housing for the electronic thermometers causing the warming bias during summer, which is also exacerbated by low wind conditions. Surface temperature measurements are particularly important at the poles, because satellite measurements of temperature do not include data poleward of 82.5° North and 70° South and the only available measurements in these areas are from surface temperature stations. Considering the tiny change in global temperature over the past 161 years of only 0.7°C, this newly-discovered large warming bias of up to 10°C calls into question data from areas critical to the AGW debate.Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Technology 2011 ; e-View (more…)

Do some of you remember Steig et al 2009, a pre-Climategate Nature cover story? Like so many Team efforts, it applied a little-known statistical method, the properties of which were poorly known, to supposedly derive an important empirical result. In the case of Steig et al 2009, the key empirical claim was that strong Antarctic warming was not localized to the Antarctic Peninsula (a prominent antecedent position), but was also very pronounced in West Antarctic. Their claims are set out firmly in the opening sentences of their abstract as follows:

Assessments of Antarctic temperature change have emphasized the contrast between strong warming of the Antarctic Peninsula and slight cooling of the Antarctic continental interior in recent decades. This pattern of temperature change has been attributed to the increased strength of the circumpolar westerlies, largely in response to changes in stratospheric ozone. This picture, however, is substantially incomplete owing to the sparseness and short duration of the observations. Here we show that significant warming extends well beyond the Antarctic Peninsula to cover most of West Antarctica, an area of warming much larger than previously reported. West Antarctic warming exceeds 0.1 deg C per decade over the past 50 years, and is strongest in winter and spring. Although this is partly offset by autumn cooling in East Antarctica, the continent-wide average near-surface temperature trend is positive.

Their claims were illustrated on the cover of Nature as shown below:

Again, to be very clear about this, the “novelty” of Steig et al 2009 were their results for West Antarctica – the location of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet. Otherwise, there was nothing in their article that warranted an article in Nature, let alone a cover. (more…)