{"id":309991,"date":"2024-03-18T19:35:31","date_gmt":"2024-03-18T18:35:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=309991"},"modified":"2024-03-18T19:35:34","modified_gmt":"2024-03-18T18:35:34","slug":"the-insane-plan-to-save-the-arctics-sea-ice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=309991","title":{"rendered":"The \u201cInsane\u201d Plan to Save the Arctic\u2019s Sea Ice"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From The Daily Sceptic<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

BY\u00a0SALLUST<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Anyone who watched the movie Snowpiercer<\/em><\/a>, set in 2031, or the follow-up TV series will recall its premise: an experiment to arrest climate change with a stratospheric aerosol injection goes hopelessly wrong and ends up with the world condemned to a new ice age.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Perhaps that\u2019s what\u2019s inspired Cambridge University\u2019s Centre for Climate Repair. It has a team in the high Arctic busily experimenting with spraying seawater over a hole they\u2019ve cut in the ice. The BBC\u2019s Mark Poynting has the story<\/a>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

The ultimate goal of the Arctic experiment is to thicken enough sea ice to slow or even reverse the melting already seen, says Dr Shaun Fitzgerald, whose team at the University of Cambridge\u2019s Centre for Climate Repair is behind the project.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Will it work or is it, as one scientist put it, \u201cquite insane\u201d?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t actually know enough to determine whether this is a good idea or bad idea,\u201d admits Dr. Fitzgerald. They are drilling a hole in the sea ice that naturally forms in winter and pumping around 1,000 litres of seawater per minute across the surface.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Exposed to the cold winter air, this seawater quickly freezes, helping to thicken the ice on top. The water also compacts the snow. As fresh snow acts as a good insulating layer, now ice can also form more easily on the underside in contact with the ocean.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Like most self-respecting climate change panic projects, cranking this up to scale will have vast energy needs, to say nothing of manufacturing the pumps, quite apart from the possibility that the whole scheme might be insane:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

\u201cThe vast majority of polar scientists think this is never going to work out,\u201d cautions Martin Siegert, an experienced glaciologist at the University of Exeter, who is not involved in the project.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One issue is that the saltier ice may melt more quickly in the summer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And then there\u2019s the huge logistical challenge of scaling the project up to a meaningful level \u2013 one estimate suggests that you could need about 10 million wind-powered pumps to thicken sea-ice across just a tenth of the Arctic. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

A number of scientists \u2013 including the UN\u2019s climate and weather bodies \u2013 have warned that these approaches could pose grave risks, including disrupting global weather patterns. Many researchers want to see them banned altogether.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cGeoengineering technologies come with enormous uncertainties and create novel risks for ecosystems and people,\u201d explains Lili Fuhr, director of the Fossil Economy Programme at the Centre for International Environmental Law.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

But if that scepticism sounds reassuring, don\u2019t be fooled. Some of the critics remain dedicated to total decarbonisation. However, perhaps what we\u2019re seeing here is the climate change industry beginning to fragment into feuding factions?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Still, surely all we need to do is \u2018follow the science\u2019. What could possibly go wrong?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

The Arctic researchers are acutely aware of these concerns. They stress that they are simply testing the technology, and wouldn\u2019t unleash it more widely until the risks are better known.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Where have we heard that before?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Worth\u00a0reading in full<\/a>.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Anyone who watched the movie\u00a0Snowpiercer, set in 2031, or the follow-up TV series will recall its premise: an experiment to arrest climate change with a stratospheric aerosol injection goes hopelessly wrong and ends up with the world condemned to a new ice age.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":121246920,"featured_media":309995,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","_crdt_document":"","advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Anyone who watched the movie\u00a0Snowpiercer, set in 2031, or the follow-up TV series will recall its premise: an experiment to arrest climate change with a stratospheric aerosol injection goes hopelessly wrong and ends up with the world condemned to a new ic","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[691818605,691819671,691819134,691821466,691818895,691820151],"class_list":{"0":"post-309991","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","6":"hentry","7":"category-uncategorized","8":"tag-arctic","9":"tag-arctic-ice","10":"tag-climate-alarmism","11":"tag-collateral-damage","12":"tag-sea-ice","13":"tag-the-science","15":"fallback-thumbnail"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/0arcticseaice.jpg?fit=1280%2C731&ssl=1","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paxLW1-1iDR","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":288464,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=288464","url_meta":{"origin":309991,"position":0},"title":"Averaging Arctic Temperatures Perverts Climate Science and Manipulates Public Perceptions!","author":"uwe.roland.gross","date":"23\/11\/2023","format":false,"excerpt":"Greenland has been cooling By Jim Steele NASA\u2019s illustration in the top left, suggests the whole Arctic is warming by 8C above global average which they then blame on rising CO2 and a climate crisis. In contrast, National Weather Service data on January 29th, 2023, at 60 degrees latitude just\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Arctic\"","block_context":{"text":"Arctic","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?tag=arctic"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/F_PER7cawAEjqSr.jpeg?fit=1200%2C753&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/F_PER7cawAEjqSr.jpeg?fit=1200%2C753&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/F_PER7cawAEjqSr.jpeg?fit=1200%2C753&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/F_PER7cawAEjqSr.jpeg?fit=1200%2C753&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/F_PER7cawAEjqSr.jpeg?fit=1200%2C753&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":217185,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=217185","url_meta":{"origin":309991,"position":1},"title":"Canadian Arctic Archipelago Blocked by Thick Multi-Year Ice\u2026August Arctic Sea Ice Rebounds","author":"uwe.roland.gross","date":"03\/09\/2022","format":false,"excerpt":"In terms of Arctic Sea ice and hurricane activity this year, the climate ambulance chasers have been quiet.","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/image-188.png?fit=666%2C503&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/image-188.png?fit=666%2C503&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/image-188.png?fit=666%2C503&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":376738,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=376738","url_meta":{"origin":309991,"position":2},"title":"Now Scientists Claim Near 20-Year Stable Arctic Sea Ice is \u201cUnsurprising\u201d and Predicted by Models","author":"uwe.roland.gross","date":"29\/04\/2025","format":false,"excerpt":"Dramatic confirmation that the sea ice in the Arctic has been stable for nearly two decades is contained in a\u00a0recently published\u00a0science paper from a team led by Dr Mark England from the University of Exeter. The finding is of course obvious to anyone who studies the data, but it will\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Arctic Ice\"","block_context":{"text":"Arctic Ice","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?tag=arctic-ice"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/0Screenshot-2025-04-27-174602.jpeg?fit=1184%2C759&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/0Screenshot-2025-04-27-174602.jpeg?fit=1184%2C759&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/0Screenshot-2025-04-27-174602.jpeg?fit=1184%2C759&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/0Screenshot-2025-04-27-174602.jpeg?fit=1184%2C759&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/0Screenshot-2025-04-27-174602.jpeg?fit=1184%2C759&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":306686,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=306686","url_meta":{"origin":309991,"position":3},"title":"Arctic Sea Icecapades","author":"uwe.roland.gross","date":"09\/03\/2024","format":false,"excerpt":"I see that the usual gloomy hype about arctic sea ice continues unabated. 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