IS GLACIAL RETREAT ANOMALOUS?
THE SCARE STORY is that global warming from human emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) is going to melt the glaciers of the world causing widespread ecological disasters. The unverifiable junk science claim is that they will continue to melt at an increasing rate and eventually vanish. For example in the paper “Climate Change in Relation to the Himalayas” by S.P.Singh [1], the author typifies an alarmist position and says…
“…rivers and adjoining grassland and forest ecosystems would be severely affected by the phase of rapid snow melt and subsequent phase of the absence of the snow melt water forever with the loss of glaciers.”
THE TRUTH is that glaciers will never melt back above the SNOWLINE due to that being the height at which atmospheric temperature becomes zero and thereby where water vapour freezes. According to a well-respected 1980’s paper (before the current fad for global warming alarmism) a well-respected peer-reviewed paper ‘Holocene Glacier Fluctuations’ by Gerald Osborn and P Thompson Davis portrays a completely different secenario (image right). Osborn and Thompson Davis found that glaciers reached their maximum extent about 400 years ago. They say that since then there has been ” General retreat of most glaciers continuing to the present day.”
This line varies but as a rule of thumb a glacier forms above the snowline and then advances down into above zero temperatures, the region where it can actually melt. How much could supposed human-caused CO2 global warming push this line up? The answer is it cannot to any measurable amount. Therefore there will be no “loss of glaciers” as alleged by “climate scientists.”
THE ASSUMPTION is that glacial retreat is unusual, unprecedented and occurring at a rate faster than has ever been seen before because of human factors. Research into the history of glaciers reveals a different picture. Glaciers have been advancing and retreating constantly for thousands of years. The most recent peak in length of glaciers being with the peak of the little ice age. A short three-page paper here to verify this: http://www.episodes.co.in/www/backissues/101/ARTICLES–26.pdf
Naturally after reaching a MAXIMUM size with the peak of the Little Ice Age the glaciers started retreating. The glacial retreat of some areas started well before human industrialization even began and carries on to the present day. NO human fingerprint is thus proven.
Just as the planet has warmed up since the unusually cold Little Ice Age (LIA) so the glaciers retreat as well. So really the question is to what extent should they be melting back to? What is the normal size of a glacier? What mass were the glaciers before the LIA?
Well the paper points out that there have been many phases of growth and retraction in the past few thousand years prior to which the glaciers were more “recessed.” That means the “natural” or normative extent of a glacier is somewhere between “recessed and maximum extension.”
In short, there is nothing unusual about glaciers worldwide melting back. Their melting wasn’t started by mankind’s emission of a trace atmospheric gas (CO2) so any modern warming can only be a negligible contributor to the natural process, not the cause. Also, the melt can only terminate at the snowline after which the build-up of snow and ice will start the next advance. No crisis, no anomalies, just normal “Holocene Glacier Fluctuations.” (Myles)
[1] Professor S.P. Singh, Former Vice Chancellor, H.N.B. Garhwal University Weldrof Compound, Mallital, Nainital
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