Massive amounts of fresh water, glacial melt pouring into Gulf of Alaska – Melt adds 57 cubic kilometers of water per year

CORVALLIS, Oregon, 19 March 2015 (OSU) – Incessant mountain rain, snow and melting glaciers in a comparatively small region of land that hugs the southern Alaska coast and empties fresh water into the Gulf of Alaska would create the sixth largest coastal river in the world if it emerged as a single stream, a recent […]

Graph of the Day: Observed surface radiative forcing by CO2, 2000-2010

25 February 2015 (Nature) – a, Time series of observed spectrally integrated (520–1,800 cm−1) CO2 surface radiative forcing at SGP (in red) with overlaid CT2011 estimate of CO2 concentration from the surface to an altitude of 2 km (grey), and a least-squares trend of the forcing and its uncertainty (blue). b, Power spectral density of […]

Iditarod show goes on despite lack of snow – City crews overnight delivered up to 350 dump truck loads of snow and spread it out over city blocks so the show could go on

By MARK THIESSEN8 March 2015 ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) – If there is one day when mushers in the Iditarod sled dog race don’t have to worry about trail conditions, it should be Saturday during the ceremonial start. A lack of snow south of the Alaska Range created treacherous trail conditions, forcing race officials to move […]

Video: Decline of Arctic sea ice, 1987-2014

20 January 2015 (NOAA) – Each winter, sea ice expands to fill nearly the entire Arctic Ocean basin, reaching its maximum extent in March. Each summer, the ice pack shrinks, reaching its smallest extent in September. The ice that survives at least one summer melt season tends to be thicker and more likely to survive […]

Combined Arctic ice observations show decades of loss – ‘The ice is thinning dramatically’

By Hannah Hickey3 March 2015 (UW Today) – It’s no surprise that Arctic sea ice is thinning. What is new is just how long, how steadily, and how much it has declined. University of Washington researchers compiled modern and historic measurements to get a full picture of how Arctic sea ice thickness has changed. The […]

Polar ice loss worries photographer Camille Seaman – ‘It’s painful to see the devastation. It’s painful to know what is being lost’

By Duncan McCue 2 March 2015 (CBC News) – It was by chance that Camille Seaman first travelled north — a bumped flight on Alaska Airlines led to a free trip to Kotzebue on the Bering Strait. Little did the San Francisco-based photographer know it was the beginning of a decade-long quest, an unshakable compulsion […]

The front line of climate change: Alaska village must relocate as Arctic sea ice thins

By Michael Walsh 25 February 2015 (Yahoo News) – Climate change is forcing an isolated Alaskan village, roughly 80 miles above the Arctic Circle, to relocate. The very existence of Kivalina, a town with about 400 residents on a tiny barrier island off Alaska’s northwest coast, is under threat as Arctic sea ice continues to […]

Greenhouse effect observed directly over 10-year span – ‘We’re actually measuring the fact that rising carbon dioxide concentrations are leading to the greenhouse effect’

By Becky Oskin   25 February 2015 (LiveScience) – The climate-changing greenhouse effect exists and has been directly measured in the United States, a new study reports. The results confirm what scientists had already proved through models and laboratory experiments: Pumping carbon dioxide gas into the atmosphere is warming the Earth’s surface. “We’re actually measuring the […]

Huge new holes in Siberia have scientists calling for urgent investigation of the mysterious craters

By Macrina Cooper-White   23 February 2015 (The Huffington Post) – Scientists were baffled last July when they discovered three giant holes in the ground in the Yamal Peninsula in northern Siberia. Now, with the help of satellite imagery, researchers have located four additional craters–and they believe there may be dozens more in the region. That […]

Leave fossil fuels buried to prevent climate change, study urges – ‘We’ve binged to the edge of our own destruction’

By Damian Carrington7 January 2015 (The Guardian) – Vast amounts of oil in the Middle East, coal in the US, Australia, and China and many other fossil fuel reserves will have to be left in the ground to prevent dangerous climate change, according to the first analysis to identify which existing reserves cannot be burned. […]

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