Saturday, December 12, 2009

Are the Polar Caps Really Melting Due To Global Warming?

No. We came out of a 'little ice age' around 1850 and the temperature has increased slightly due to this, but nothing abnormal is happening. Global warming alarmists will tell you the polar caps are melting. This isn't exactly true. The University of Illinois keeps the sea ice data. As you can see from the chart below, Arctic ice is decreasing.

However, Antarctic ice is currently increasing.

When you combine the two charts into a global sea ice chart, you can see sea ice has been very stable for the last 150 years.

(Click charts for larger view)

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

The reference you posted is for Northern Hemisphere only. UIUC doesn't track the Antarctic ice pack - what did you just make it up?

wpear said...

Check the website - it shows data for both the north and south hemispheres.

geekwife said...

If anonymous had bothered to do a little research, such as taking the difficult step of clicking the "sea ice data" link above and scolling down the page, he could have seen for himself that the data came from the National Center for Environmental Prediction/NOAA.

Instead, he chose to be snarky and insulting. Is everyone impressed with his intellectualism and diligent search for the truth? Not to mention his manners?