Remember all that alarmist guff about Antarctica sea ice recording lower levels in winter a couple of years ago? Georgina Rannard of the BBC wrote a story headed ‘Antarctic sea ice at “mind-blowing” low alarms experts‘, while Clive Cookson at the Financial Times gave us his suggestion that the area “faces a catastrophic cascade of extreme environmental events… that will affect the climate around the world”. The scare story caravan has moved on to pastures new these days, not unrelated to the fact that at the end of 2024 the extent of sea ice in Antarctica was roughly the same as the 1981 to 2010 average. According to the U.S.-based National Snow and Ice Data Centre (NSIDC), “this provides a sharp illustration of the high variability of Antarctica sea ice extent”. It does indeed, and it also provides us with a classic case study of how a short-term natural variation, well understood by many scientists, is weaponised by activists in science, politics and journalism to induce mass climate psychosis with the aim of promoting the political Net Zero lunacy.
The less hysterical NSIDC would appear to be the same NSIDC that published a paper updated as recently as last July asking, “has Antarctic sea ice hit a breaking point?”. As the Daily Sceptic has reported in the past, Antarctica has been a bit of a disappointment to the climate cry-baby crowd since it has shown little warming for at least 70 years. “Now scientists are eager to know if climate change has finally caught up with Antarctica sea ice,” notes the NSIDC paper. Helpful as ever in the mission of preaching climate Armageddon, Rannard of the BBC provides us with an “experts say” quote: “Without its ice cooling the planet, Antarctica could transform from Earth’s refrigerator to a radiator.”
Interestingly, the second author on the Rannard story was ‘data’ specialist Becky Dale who subsequently enrolled for the six-month sabbatical run by the Green Blob-funded Oxford Climate Journalism Network. This is a crash course in climate catastrophisation reporting. Previous participants have been asked to write about how fruits such as mangos are less tasty than in the past due to climate change. A recent speaker has called for “fines and imprisonment” for those expressing scepticism about “well supported” science.
The ’mind-blowing’ quote that made headlines around the world has been attributed to Dr. Walter Meier of the NSIDC. Dr Meier, reported Rannard and Dale, “is not optimistic that the sea ice will recover to a significant degree”. At the height of the scare, Meier claimed the 2023 winter dip was far outside anything we’ve seen. Again as we have reported in the Daily Sceptic, Dr. Meier seems a tad forgetful of the past work he has done on the obvious cyclical nature of Antarctica sea ice. Ten years earlier, Meier was part of a science team that unlocked the secrets of early Nimbus satellite photographs. These revealed significant Antarctica sea ice variability in the 1960s including a high in 1964, not seen again until 2014, and a low in 1966, similar to the recent dip. At the time, Meier commented that extreme ice highs and lows “are not that unusual”.
During November and December 2024, mid to late spring in the Southern Hemisphere, the daily Antarctica sea ice loss was 140,000 square kilometres compared to 165,000 sq kms for the 1981-2010 average. By the end of December the sea ice extent was roughly around the average recorded in the 30 years to 2010. Now it seems the NSIDC is a re-convert to stressing long-term trends, noting that the 2016-2024 timeline “is too short to definitely determine that a regime shift has occurred”.
Perhaps the NSIDC ought to mark the card of the British Antarctica Survey (BAS) team, who as late as May last year issued a press release claiming that the 2023 lows would be a one in 2,000 year event without climate change. Needless to say, this scaremongering twaddle was the product of a computer model. The model told the BAS that such “evidence” adds to existing observational evidence “that the last few years’ low sea ice could signal a lasting regime shift in the Southern Ocean”. More BS than BAS, the uncharitable might conclude.
Needless to say, the recent cyclical recovery in Antarctica sea ice has been ignored by mainstream media. It’s been a bad period for alarmists, coming so soon after years of record growth of coral on the Great Barrier Reef put an end to yet another profitable supply of constant alarums. Thankfully the BBC finds ever more obscure ways to keep the fast-fading Net Zero fantasy alive. Perhaps not as headline-grabbing as ice and coral, but it appears that a bumble bee has been sighted recently in Scotland. It was claimed that critters were “nest building” and this was due to climate change. Britannica does not find such a sighting very surprising, noting that in winter when the temperature outside rises above 10°C, bees will leave the hive momentarily to relieve themselves of waste. Possibly with a cheery wave and a “back in three, going for a wee”.
All of the confusion – designed to constantly promote Net Zero – arises because narrative-driven commentators assign most weather and climate changes to humans adding trace amounts of a trace gas into the atmosphere. It leaves little room for explaining the role of natural variation in the changing climate. Antarctica has not warmed for at least 70 years and a recent paper found that the summer temperature had shown a dramatic 1°C fall from 1977-1999, followed by a pause since the turn of the century. Another paper found that Antarctica sea ice extent had slowly increased since the start of continuous satellite recordings in 1979.
This case study of the recent hyped sea ice alarm in Antarctica shows how the scientific process is torn up and ridiculous claims, often produced by computer models, are made on the flimsiest of short-term evidence and observation. Lectures on disregarding short-term variations only resume when normal, and often cyclical, trends reappear and follow inconvenient directions.
Chris Morrison is the Daily Sceptic’s Environment Editor.
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“Nick Dixon and Toby Young Talk About Whether Klaus Schwab is Pulling the Strings”
Can we stop with this straw man stuff please?
Yes, it’s clear that, through funding by related parties, he very much is pulling the strings of the mainstream media, who won’t cover what in other times would have been a topic of immense public interest. I remember decades ago seeing heavy media coverage of the influence of freemasonry, but on the far more influential activities of the WEF, in particular their promotion of digital ID and CDBCs, both instruments of tyranny, there’s a deafening silence. This is not normal behaviour, and it can’t be explained away as political incompetence.
It is explained away by WEF stooges within the MSM. The MSM has been captured to ensure compliance on the messaging.
I take issue with Toby’s comments about those supporting Andrew Bridgen’s actions. Toby said something to the effect that those people view Andrew Bridgen in an idealistic way and can’t tolerate any criticism of him. Since when were politicians idolised by covid sceptics, especially an MP who voted for vaccine mandates for care home workers? No, it’s what he is doing that we support. And as Toby said, even a respectable professional like Dr Asseem Malhotra is getting smeared by the covid regime. They will always find something to use against the non-compliant so it’s not worth fretting over whether or not they’ll get triggered.
The story of the covid jabs is a massive crime that has resulted in at least hundreds of thousands of deaths and millions of injuries worldwide, while governments are in wilful denial. The Nuremburg Code has been ignored and vax refuseniks have been persecuted. Worrying about the use of the h-word is simply playing into the hands of those who want to avoid these crimes being exposed.
/tin-foil hat on/
My personal view is that Schwab et al are just a think tank – and tank that has morphed over the years from something to Globalism to now something truly tyrannical out of 1984 and BNW etc..
The genesis of this I believe stems from our banking systems and fractional banking with interest.
The World financial system has become too big, too complex and like all currencies will eventually go to zero. We are now in the exponential portion of currency creation and I suspect in the next few weeks or months, the whole system will collapse.
For the first time in human history, a very high proportion of civilisation will no longer be able to feed itself, grow its own food, use its own stock and trade to survive and rebuild.
The Bankers have known that mathematically this is inevitable. Wars and devastation have been a good way to reset and stave-off mathematical collapse in the past. The world is too interconnected now for that model on a wider scale. Too destructive to infrastructure.
I believe that the C19 episode fulfilled a number of key markers. Control, possible ill-health and death with the treatment, possibly some sort of “marking” system but also more importantly, reducing the velocity of money world-wide while the finances are re-arranged to stave-off the collapse a little longer. The resources going into Ukraine is another marker. I don’t see why the G-7 would really give a damn about UKr unless for an ulterior reason (money laundering or positioning for break-up of RUS for resources – followed quickly by China to stave-off mathematical collapse further) when it itself has been breaking middle-east countries apart for a quarter of a century with immunity?
The Bankers need a solution and to usher in a new control currency without it being their fault. A collapse now would be seen as their fault and never be given control again. A black swan (as Schwab tells us now – a cyber attack) could collapse the system relatively easily and usher in CBDC’s.
CBCD’s need to be seen as the saviour (along with the digital control and personal digital ID) and hence the WEF, I believe rather than directly control, have had well-placed wealthy (made wealthy) see where their bread is buttered and if they don’t see the downside, they are all rummaging in the shit and detritus like the rest of us.
The WEF, Global Elites etc…rely on us plebs all wanting a saviour when the financial SHTF and they have the solution to the problem they caused. We will receive with applause the false prophet and for the first time in history, control and monitor expansion to suit them and not us.
We are the carbon they want to reduce.
/tin-foil-hat off/