Trends in sea-ice variability on the way to an ice-free Arctic
It has been widely debated whether Arctic sea-ice loss can reach a tipping point beyond which a large sea-ice area disappears abruptly. The theory of dynamical systems predicts a slowing down when a system destabilises towards a tipping point. In simple stochastic systems this can result in increasi...
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ftdatacite:10.48550/arxiv.1601.06286 2023-05-15T14:53:11+02:00 Trends in sea-ice variability on the way to an ice-free Arctic Bathiany, Sebastian van der Bolt, Bregje Williamson, Mark S. Lenton, Timothy M. Scheffer, Marten van Nes, Egbert Notz, Dirk 2016 https://dx.doi.org/10.48550/arxiv.1601.06286 https://arxiv.org/abs/1601.06286 unknown arXiv https://dx.doi.org/10.5194/tc-2015-209 arXiv.org perpetual, non-exclusive license http://arxiv.org/licenses/nonexclusive-distrib/1.0/ Atmospheric and Oceanic Physics physics.ao-ph Data Analysis, Statistics and Probability physics.data-an FOS Physical sciences article-journal Article ScholarlyArticle Text 2016 ftdatacite https://doi.org/10.48550/arxiv.1601.06286 https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-2015-209 2022-04-01T11:40:58Z It has been widely debated whether Arctic sea-ice loss can reach a tipping point beyond which a large sea-ice area disappears abruptly. The theory of dynamical systems predicts a slowing down when a system destabilises towards a tipping point. In simple stochastic systems this can result in increasing variance and autocorrelation, potentially yielding an early warning of an abrupt change. Here we aim to establish whether the loss of Arctic sea ice would follow these conceptual predictions, and which trends in sea ice variability can be expected from pre-industrial conditions toward an Arctic that is ice-free during the whole year. To this end, we apply a model hierarchy consisting of two box models and one comprehensive Earth system model. We find a consistent and robust decrease of the ice volume's annual relaxation time before summer ice is lost because thinner ice can adjust more quickly to perturbations. Thereafter, the relaxation time increases, mainly because the system becomes dominated by the ocean water's large heat capacity when the ice-free season becomes longer. Both trends carry over to the autocorrelation of sea ice thickness in time series. These changes are robust to the nature and origin of climate variability in the models and hardly depend on the balance of feedbacks. Therefore, characteristic trends can be expected in the future. As these trends are not specific to the existence of abrupt ice loss, the prospects for early warnings seem very limited. This result also has implications for statistical indicators in other systems whose effective mass changes over time, affecting the trend of their relaxation time. However, the robust relation between state and variability would allow an estimate of sea-ice variability from only short observations. This could help one to estimate the likelihood and persistence of extreme events in the future. : Discussion Paper, currently (Jan. 2016) under review in The Cryosphere Text Arctic Sea ice DataCite Metadata Store (German National Library of Science and Technology) Arctic |
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DataCite Metadata Store (German National Library of Science and Technology) |
op_collection_id |
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language |
unknown |
topic |
Atmospheric and Oceanic Physics physics.ao-ph Data Analysis, Statistics and Probability physics.data-an FOS Physical sciences |
spellingShingle |
Atmospheric and Oceanic Physics physics.ao-ph Data Analysis, Statistics and Probability physics.data-an FOS Physical sciences Bathiany, Sebastian van der Bolt, Bregje Williamson, Mark S. Lenton, Timothy M. Scheffer, Marten van Nes, Egbert Notz, Dirk Trends in sea-ice variability on the way to an ice-free Arctic |
topic_facet |
Atmospheric and Oceanic Physics physics.ao-ph Data Analysis, Statistics and Probability physics.data-an FOS Physical sciences |
description |
It has been widely debated whether Arctic sea-ice loss can reach a tipping point beyond which a large sea-ice area disappears abruptly. The theory of dynamical systems predicts a slowing down when a system destabilises towards a tipping point. In simple stochastic systems this can result in increasing variance and autocorrelation, potentially yielding an early warning of an abrupt change. Here we aim to establish whether the loss of Arctic sea ice would follow these conceptual predictions, and which trends in sea ice variability can be expected from pre-industrial conditions toward an Arctic that is ice-free during the whole year. To this end, we apply a model hierarchy consisting of two box models and one comprehensive Earth system model. We find a consistent and robust decrease of the ice volume's annual relaxation time before summer ice is lost because thinner ice can adjust more quickly to perturbations. Thereafter, the relaxation time increases, mainly because the system becomes dominated by the ocean water's large heat capacity when the ice-free season becomes longer. Both trends carry over to the autocorrelation of sea ice thickness in time series. These changes are robust to the nature and origin of climate variability in the models and hardly depend on the balance of feedbacks. Therefore, characteristic trends can be expected in the future. As these trends are not specific to the existence of abrupt ice loss, the prospects for early warnings seem very limited. This result also has implications for statistical indicators in other systems whose effective mass changes over time, affecting the trend of their relaxation time. However, the robust relation between state and variability would allow an estimate of sea-ice variability from only short observations. This could help one to estimate the likelihood and persistence of extreme events in the future. : Discussion Paper, currently (Jan. 2016) under review in The Cryosphere |
format |
Text |
author |
Bathiany, Sebastian van der Bolt, Bregje Williamson, Mark S. Lenton, Timothy M. Scheffer, Marten van Nes, Egbert Notz, Dirk |
author_facet |
Bathiany, Sebastian van der Bolt, Bregje Williamson, Mark S. Lenton, Timothy M. Scheffer, Marten van Nes, Egbert Notz, Dirk |
author_sort |
Bathiany, Sebastian |
title |
Trends in sea-ice variability on the way to an ice-free Arctic |
title_short |
Trends in sea-ice variability on the way to an ice-free Arctic |
title_full |
Trends in sea-ice variability on the way to an ice-free Arctic |
title_fullStr |
Trends in sea-ice variability on the way to an ice-free Arctic |
title_full_unstemmed |
Trends in sea-ice variability on the way to an ice-free Arctic |
title_sort |
trends in sea-ice variability on the way to an ice-free arctic |
publisher |
arXiv |
publishDate |
2016 |
url |
https://dx.doi.org/10.48550/arxiv.1601.06286 https://arxiv.org/abs/1601.06286 |
geographic |
Arctic |
geographic_facet |
Arctic |
genre |
Arctic Sea ice |
genre_facet |
Arctic Sea ice |
op_relation |
https://dx.doi.org/10.5194/tc-2015-209 |
op_rights |
arXiv.org perpetual, non-exclusive license http://arxiv.org/licenses/nonexclusive-distrib/1.0/ |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.48550/arxiv.1601.06286 https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-2015-209 |
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1766324593858969600 |