To what extent does what's happening in the stratosphere, tens of kilometers above Earth, influence the weather in the troposphere, the layer of atmosphere that touches Earth?
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Internal tides, waves below the ocean's surface that propagate at tidal frequencies, play an important role in ocean mixing but can be difficult to detect and study.
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The Arctic Council Emergency Prevention, Preparedness and Response Working Group plans to hold its next meeting in the town of Vorkuta, Republic of Komi, in June. Included in the plans for the meeting is a trip to Novaya Zemlya.
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In an article published recently in EOS (Volume 91, Number 2, 12 January 2010), David Bromwich and co-authors described plans for an Arctic System Reanalysis. This activity, part of the IPY Climate of the Arctic Project, and a component of the USA SEARCH (Study of Environmental Arctic Change) program, represents an ambitious plan to draw in many IPY partners and many of the IPY observations from the Arctic. Bromwich et al. describe a low-resolution (30 km) prototype, with an inner domain shown in the image above, focused on 2007 and 2008. Eventually they intend to complete a decade-long reanalysis (2000 to 2010) at 10 km spacing and 3 hour resolution.
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After a few extra days to catch some late-arriving abstracts, the abstract submission process for the IPY Oslo Science Conference has now closed. We count approximately 2600 abstracts received, presenting us with the opportunity and the challenge of organizing and conducting one of the largest and most diverse conferences in the history of polar science.
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Internationally coordinated research and field-testing on 'geoengineering' the planet's atmosphere to limit risk of climate change should begin soon along with building international governance of the technology, say scientists from the University of Calgary and the United States.
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Public concern about global warming has dropped sharply since the fall of 2008, according to the results of a national survey released January 27 by researchers at Yale and George Mason universities.
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The U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) screwed up.
The IPCC describes itself as "the leading body for the assessment of climate change, established ... to provide the world with a clear scientific view on the current state of climate change and its potential environmental and socio-economic consequences."
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The Arctic Council is an important player on the international scene. It was one of the key messages from the Arctic Frontiers conference.
Arctic Council was one of the main topics on the Arctic Frontiers Conference which started Monday in Tromsø, Norway.
In one of the opening speeches the Norwegian State Secretary Eric Lahnstein, Ministry of Foreign Affairs underlined the importance of the Arctic Council as the only regional body that includes all Arctic states, indigenous peoples and relevant observers.
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* PALAOA - Livestream
* PALAOA - Webcam
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The hole in the ozone layer is now steadily closing, but its repair could actually increase warming in the southern hemisphere, according to scientists at the University of Leeds.
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A major increase in maximum ocean wave heights off the Pacific Northwest in recent decades has forced scientists to re-evaluate how high a "100-year event" might be, and the new findings raise special concerns for flooding, coastal erosion and structural damage.
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University of Tromso – Teorifagbygget
Policy section: 25–26 January 2010
The policy section of Arctic Frontiers 2010 will focus on the need for dynamic and adaptive strategies to ensure the sustainability of arctic communities in a changing environment.
Science section: 27–29 January 2010
The science section is divided into four parallel sessions:
* Part I: Ice and climate, including paleo climate
* Part II: Sustainable communities in the High North; economy, well-being including health issues, and self-governance
* Part III: Marine Biodiversity under change
* Part IV: Frontiers in E-learning of the High North
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The ecosystems in the north are more vulnerable to oil spill than the marine- and coastal nature in southern areas, a new scientific report shows.
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If there is a meteorological station, it means that a polar research station should also exist. Actually, everything begins from there. The main scientific function of a polar station is observing weather from day to day.
Since we were the first who settled on King George Island ( the station dates back to February 22, 1968), our meteorological observation covers the longest period in comparison with observations of our neighbors.
We have different tasks. The meteorological observations from the Bellinsgausen research station are used for weather forecasts on the island and global climate research. Antarctica influences the climate of the whole planet. The air heated at the equator moves to the poles, where it becomes cool and then it goes back – like in a heating machine.
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Recent observations show that Beaufort Sea ice was not as it appeared in the summer of 2009. Sea ice cover serves as an indication of climate and has implications for marine and terrestrial ecosystems.
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A new analysis of global surface temperatures by NASA scientists finds the past year was tied for the second warmest since 1880. In the Southern Hemisphere, 2009 was the warmest year on record.
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One of the most extraordinary finds in Svalbard was made during a geology student excursion to Prins Karls Forland in 2004. The jawbone found then is now announced to be the oldest remnant of a polar bear ever discovered.
There are not many fossils of a polar bear in the museums worldwide. They are rarely found and the evoltion of polar bear is poorly known. The bears spend most of their lives on sea ice and only occasionally their bones are preserved in terrestrial sediments.
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To what extent does what's happening in the stratosphere, tens of kilometers above Earth, influence the weather in the troposphere, the layer of atmosphere that touches Earth?
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Rising temperatures are not just a sign of climate change but are also a cause of it, a new study has suggested.
Higher temperatures on the surface of the earth are fuelling a further increase in emissions of methane, Edinburgh University experts found.
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The Arctic Portals Climate Change Portal is intended to give individuals access to material according to each ones need in connection to climate change. This will consist of recent news articles, scientific reports and other relevant material.
Climate Change or Global Warming refers to the increase in the average temperature of the Earth’s near surface air and oceans since the mid 20th century. The International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has concluded that increasing greenhouse gas concentration resulting from human activity such as fossil fuel burning and deforestation are the biggest contributors to global warming.
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Planet Earth has warmed much less than expected during the industrial era based on current best estimates of Earth's "climate sensitivity" -- the amount of global temperature increase expected in response to a given rise in atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide (CO2). In a study to be published in the Journal of Climate, a publication of the American Meteorological Society, Stephen Schwartz, of Brookhaven National Laboratory, and colleagues examine the reasons for this discrepancy.
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The Swedish Committee for IPY have produced a report entitled 'Polar Shifts:Sweden and the International Polar Year 2007-2008 ' to inform all interested parties, including the wider public, politicians, Arctic residents, financiers and researchers, about the International Polar Year, with an emphasis on the Swedish efforts. This report, containing some wonderful images, can be downloaded in both Swedish and English. For more information about IPY activities in Sweden.
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Reliable measurements of the air-sea flux of carbon dioxide -- an important greenhouse gas -- are needed for a better understanding of the impact of ocean-atmosphere interactions on climate. A new method developed by researchers at the National Oceanography Centre, Southampton (NOCS) working in collaboration with colleagues at the Bjerknes Center for Climate Research (Bergen, Norway) promises to make this task considerably easier.
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A new study examines how ice sheets, such as the West Antarctic Ice Sheet, could become unstable as the world warms.
The team from Oxford University and Cambridge University developed a model to explore how changes in the 'grounding line' -- where an ice sheet floats free from its base of rock or sediment -- could lead to the disintegration of ice sheets and result in a significant rise in global sea level.
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ARCTIC emissions of a powerful greenhouse gas jumped 30 per cent in recent years in a worrying hint that global warming might unlock vast stores frozen in permafrost, scientists say.
"It's too early to call it a trend but if it continues this way there will be serious implications," said Paul Palmer, a scientist at Edinburgh University in Scotland who was among authors of the study of methane emissions from wetlands.
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The surprising increase in methane concentrations millennia ago, identified in continental glacier studies, has puzzled researchers for a long time. According to a strong theory, this would have resulted from the commencement of rice cultivation in East Asia. However, a study conducted at the University of Helsinki's Department of Environmental Sciences and the Department of Geosciences and Geography shows that the massive expanse of the northern peatlands occurred around 5000 years ago, coincident with rising atmospheric methane levels.
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There is increased evidence that the Arctic could face seasonally ice-free conditions and much warmer temperatures in the future.
Scientists documented evidence that the Arctic Ocean and Nordic Seas were too warm to support summer sea ice during the mid-Pliocene warm period (3.3 to 3 million years ago).
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Both German and French scientists say they want to build new science stations for increased activity in the science community Ny-Ålesund on Svalbard. Also Japanese researchers say they may build a new science station in Ny-Ålesund to replace the building they currently rent.
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Climate change is a phenomenon that extends far beyond science, with fundamental implications for economics, politics, sociology and environmental ethics. It is a phenomenon that changes how people understand the world around them and their own futures. This understanding epitomises the multi-disciplinary approach of WIREs Climate Change, the latest interdisciplinary review project from Wiley-Blackwell.
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The increase in temperature in the Arctic has already caused the sea-ice there to melt. According to research conducted by the University of Gothenburg, if the Arctic tundra also melts, vast amounts of organic material will be carried by the rivers straight into the Arctic Ocean, resulting in additional emissions of carbon dioxide.
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Content:
1) Oslo!
2) Changes in IPO
Report no.33, January 2010
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SSF has received a report from the Czech research team working in Petuniabukta. Work has been conducted in the fields of botany, zoology and climatology.
Research was conducted under the auspices of the project “Biological and climate diversity of the central part of the Svalbard Arctic archipelago” - the Czech contribution to the Network for ARCtic Climate and Biological DIVersity Studies (ARCDIV), an international multidisciplinary IPY initiative.
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In a vivid example of how a small geographic feature can have far-reaching impacts on climate, new research shows that water levels in the Bering Strait helped drive global climate patterns during ice age episodes dating back more than 100,000 years.
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If you would travel to the end of the world, where would you go? For some world ends in south, but if you would head north you would most likely end up in Svalbard, a group of islands between 74° - 81° N in the Arctic Sea.
The islands were first discovered in the 16th century by a Dutch explorer Willem Barents and visited by many other nationalities during the next 300 years. Russian trappers were first to winter on the islands between 1715-1850. Norwegians on the other hand did not start regular hunting on the islands before the mid 19th century.
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Scientists have uncovered what appears to be a further dramatic increase in the leakage of the powerful greenhouse gas methane that is seeping from the Arctic seabed.
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China's 26th Antarctic expedition team reached the peak of the continent's inland ice cap, the 4,093-meter-high Dome A, on Wednesday after a 20-day journey.
It was the second time that Chinese explorers have climbed to the top of the ice-covered continent since the opening of China's Kunlun Station in January last year.
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The nation’s top scientists and spies are collaborating on an effort to use the federal government’s intelligence assets — including spy satellites and other classified sensors — to assess the hidden complexities of environmental change. They seek insights from natural phenomena like clouds and glaciers, deserts and tropical forests.
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With climate change making the Arctic gradually more accessible, some observers have suggested that interest in Arctic natural resources and disputed marine borders could take on a military aspect. A new study by researchers of the Fridtjof Nansens Institute (FNI) in Norway refutes this view, finding that dispassionate diplomacy is a more likely and rational way of dispute resolution than military confrontation.
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The Arctic Ocean is generally considered a remarkably quiet ocean, with very little mixing, because a cover of sea ice prevents wind from driving the formation of internal waves. To study this effect and investigate how melting sea ice might affect ocean mixing in the Arctic, Rainville and Woodgate analyze data from moorings in the northern Chukchi Sea.
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