Arctic Class of '08: less ice, but not the least

The Arctic ice cap is relatively small this year, but it ranks as only second smallest. The Ice Class of '07 still reigns. That's the latest word from the National Snow and Ice Data Center which has records going back to the beginning of the satellite era. For youngsters that was back in the late 20th Century when we began taking photos of earth from space. A more complete report is expected from the snow and ice folks in October.

Most global wamring models call for continued shrinkage of the planet's ice caps in Arctic, Greenland and Antarctic. The Antarctic is number for amount of ice it supports, Greenland is second, the Arctic third. A recent American study found that Greenland's smaller glaciers are melting faster than the larger ones. The study says it's from global warming. I recently blogged about Europe losing most of its alpine glaciers as well. Melting glaciers on land will tend to affect sea level more than floating glaciers which already displace water volume with their own mass.

So far i have found no brilliant geoengineering schemes that could prevent ice melt beyond those that purport to reflect the sun's radiation away from earth.