Scientific American has an article about the polar vortex that merits discussion. The vortex is the strong band of wind that surrounds the North Pole. According to SA, the wind has been moving in recent years away from North America and more towards Europe and Asia. This in turn allows cold air from the arctic to move southward into North America and cause colder winters while the winters in the Europe and Asia as warmer. SA also tells us that the change in the polar vortex is caused by climate change (what a surprise.) Here's how SA puts it:
The movement of the vortex has come as the Arctic steadily loses sea ice, a process that some scientists are worried could accelerate in the future as the Earth continues to warm at record levels.
There is, however, a basic problem with that analysis. The ice cap at the North Pole is not shrinking. There's a site that measures and reports monthly on ice at the poles. The recent low point for ice in the arctic came in 2012; since then we have seen more ice. If you go back five years earlier to 2007, the ice levels were almost exactly the same as they are at present. If we are really experiencing the predicted warming and the loss of the polar ice cap, we should not be seeing increases in ice over the last five years. Nor should we have the same amount of ice as we had a decade ago.
The polar vortex may be moving. That movement may be causing changes to the winters in different areas around the globe. But there's no way to blame these changes on global warming and the supposed loss of polar ice.
By the way, for what it is worth, the ice levels at the South Pole have been increasing at a rather rapid rate. So much water is going into ice at the South Pole, that sea levels should be falling.
The movement of the vortex has come as the Arctic steadily loses sea ice, a process that some scientists are worried could accelerate in the future as the Earth continues to warm at record levels.
There is, however, a basic problem with that analysis. The ice cap at the North Pole is not shrinking. There's a site that measures and reports monthly on ice at the poles. The recent low point for ice in the arctic came in 2012; since then we have seen more ice. If you go back five years earlier to 2007, the ice levels were almost exactly the same as they are at present. If we are really experiencing the predicted warming and the loss of the polar ice cap, we should not be seeing increases in ice over the last five years. Nor should we have the same amount of ice as we had a decade ago.
The polar vortex may be moving. That movement may be causing changes to the winters in different areas around the globe. But there's no way to blame these changes on global warming and the supposed loss of polar ice.
By the way, for what it is worth, the ice levels at the South Pole have been increasing at a rather rapid rate. So much water is going into ice at the South Pole, that sea levels should be falling.
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