Abstract
When the Arctic Ocean ice cover reached a record low in the late summer of 2007, it provided images of the Arctic entering an era where human-induced climate change had started to create a new geography — the ultimate evidence of the ‘Anthropocene’ where human actions are a major driver of Earth as a system (Crutzen and Stoermer, 2000). Given that emissions of greenhouse gases continue to increase and that the connection between these emissions and increasing global temperatures is firmly established (IPCC, 2007a), a prominent assumption is that the ice will continue to retreat. In public discussions, the question is no longer whether the Arctic Ocean will be virtually ice-free in the summer, but when this will happen.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
ACIA (2003) ‘Summary Report on the Tenth Assessment Steering Committee (ASC) Meeting, 15–16 October 2003, London, U.K.’, Arctic Climate Impact Assessment (http://www.acia.uaf.edu/pages/background.html#ASC%20 Reports), date accessed 31 January 2012.
— (2004) Impacts of a Warming Arctic: Arctic Climate Impact Assessment (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).
— (2005) Arctic Climate Impact Assessment (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).
AMAP (2011a) Snow, Water, Ice and Permafrost in the Arctic (SWIPA) 2011: Climate Change and the Cryosphere (Oslo: Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Programme) (http://amap.no/swipa/), date accessed 31 January 2012.
— (2011b) Snow, Water, Ice and Permafrost in the Arctic (SWIPA) 2011 — Executive Summary (Oslo: Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Programme).
Anisimov, O., et al. (2001) ‘Polar Regions (Arctic and Antarctic)’, in J. J. McCarthy et al. (eds), Climate Change 2001: Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability. Contribution of Working Group II to the Third Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press), ch. 16, pp. 801–42.
— (2007) ‘Polar regions (Arctic and Antarctic)’, in M. L. Parry et al. (eds), Climate Change 2007: Working Group II: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability. Contribution of Working Group II to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, ch. 15, pp. 653–85.
Bengtsson, L., V. A. Semenov and O. M. Johannessen (2004) ‘The Early Twentieth-century Warming in the Arctic — A Possible Mechanism’, Journal of Climate, 17, 4045–57.
Bowden, S. (ed.) (2006) Second International Conference on Arctic Research Planning (ICARP II). The Arctic System in a Changing World. Conference Proceeding. Copenhagen Denmark, 1–2 November 2005 (Edmonton: Nisku Printing).
Bowden, S., R. W. Corell, S. Hassol and C. Symon (eds) (2006) Arctic Research: A Global Responsibility. ICARP II Second International Conference on Arctic Research Planning (Edmonton: McCallum Printing Group, Inc.) (http://aosb.arcticportal.org/icarp_ii/), date accessed 31 January 2012.
Boykoff, M. T., and S. R. Rajan (2007) ‘Signals and Noise’, EMBO reports, 8:3, 207–11.
Calder, J. (2011) ‘The Sea Ice Outlook’, in I. Krupnik et al. (eds), Understanding the Earth’s Polar Challenges: International Polar Year 2007–2008. Summary by the IPY Joint Committee (Edmonton: International Council for Science and World Meteorological Organization), ch. 3.6, pp. 405–10.
Crutzen, P. J., and E. F. Stoermer (2000) ‘The “Anthropocene”’, Global Change Newsletter, 41, 17–18.
Csonka, Y., and P. Schweitzer (2004) ‘Societies and Cultures: Change and Persistence’, in Arctic Human Development Report (Akureyri, Iceland: Stefansson Arctic Institute).
Edwards, P. A. (2010) A Vast Machine: Computer Models, Climate Data, and the Politics of Global Warming (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press).
Edwards, P. A. and S. H. Schneider (2001) ‘Self Governance and Peer Review in Science for Policy: The Case of the IPCC Second Assessment Report’, in C. A. Clark and P. N. Edwards (eds), Changing the Atmosphere. Expert Knowledge and Environmental Governance (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press), pp. 219–46.
Everett J. T and B.B. Fitzharris (1998) ‘The Arctic and the Antarctic,’ in IPCC, The Regional Impacts of Climate Change. An Assessment of Volnerability. pp. 85–104.
Gillett, N. P., et al. (2008) ‘Attribution of Polar Warming to Human Influence’, Nature Geoscience, 1, 750–4.
Hegerl, G. C., et al. (1996) ‘Detecting Greenhouse Gas Induced Climate Change with an Optimal Fingerprint Method’, Journal of Climate, 9, 2281–306.
— (2001) ‘Detection of Climate Change and Attribution of Causes’, in J. T. Houghton et al. (eds), Climate Change 2001: The Scientific Basis. Contribution of Working Group I to the Third Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press), ch. 12, pp. 695–738.
— (2007) ‘Understanding and Attributing Climate Change’, in S. Solomon et al. (eds), Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis. Contribution of Working Group I to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), ch. 9, pp. 663–745.
Houghton, J. T., et al. (2001) Climate Change 2001: The Scientific Basis. Contribution of Working Group I to the Third Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).
IPCC (2001) Climate Change 2001: Synthesis Report. A Contribution of Working Groups I, II, and III to the Third Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).
— (2007a) Climate Change 2007: Synthesis Report. Contribution of Working Groups I, II and III to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (Geneva: IPCC).
— (2007b) ‘Summary for Policymakers’, in S. Solomon, D. Qin et al. (eds), Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).
Jones, P. D., and M. E. Mann (2004) ‘Climate over Past Millennia’, Reviews of Geophysics, 42, doi:10.1029/2003RG000143.
Kattsov, V. M., and E. Källén (2005) ‘Future Climate Change: Modeling and Scenarios for the Arctic’, in Arctic Climate Impact Assessment (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), pp. 99–150.
König, T. (2006) Frame Analysis: A Primer (http://www.lboro.ac.uk/research/mmethods/resources/links/frames_primer.html), date accessed 3 October 2006.
McBean, G. (2005) ‘Arctic Climate: Past and Present’, in Arctic Climate Impact Assessment (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 21).
Miller, C. A., and P. N. Edwards (eds) (2001) Changing the Atmosphere: Expert Knowledge and Environmental Governance (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press).
Min, S-K., X. Zhang, F. W. Zwiers and T. Agnew (2008) ‘Human Influence on Arctic Sea Ice Detectable from Early 1990s Onwards’, Geophysical Research Letters, 35:L21701, doi:10.1029/2008GL035725.
Mitchell, R. B., W. C. Clark and D. W. Cash (2006) ‘Information and Influence’, in R. B. Mitchell, W. C. Clark, D. W. Cash and N. M. Dickson (eds), Global Environmental Assessments: Information and Influence (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press), pp. 307–38.
Murray, M. S., et al. (2010) International Study of Arctic Change: Science Plan (Stockholm: ISAC International Program Office).
Nilsson, A. E. (2003) ‘Observation notes: Assessment Steering Committee Meeting’, London, 15 October 2003. Unpublished.
— (2007) A Changing Arctic Climate: Science and Policy in the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment, PhD dissertation. Dep. of Water and Environmental Studies, Linköping University (Linköping, Sweden: Linköping University Press) (http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:liu:diva-8517).
Olausson, U. (2009) ‘Global Warming — Global Responsibility? Media Frames of Collective Action and Scientific Certainty’, Public Understanding of Science, 18, 421–36.
Overland, J. E., and M. Wang (2005) ‘The Arctic Climate Paradox: The Recent Decreases of the Arctic Oscillation’, Geophys. Res. Lett., 32.
Serreze, M. C., and J. A. Francis (2006) ‘The Arctic Amplification Debate’, Climatic Change, 76, 241–64.
Shackley, S., J. Risbey, P. Stone and B. Wynne (1999) ‘Adjusting to Policy Expectation in Climate Change Modeling’, Climatic Change, 43, 413–54.
Solomon, S., et al. (eds) (2007) Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis Contribution of Working Group I to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).
Stott, P. A., et al. (2010) ‘Detection and Attribution of Climate Change: A Regional Perspective’, Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Climate Change, 1, 192–211.
Von Storch, H., E. Zorita and F. Gonzalez-Rouco (2009) ‘Assessment of Three Temperature Reconstruction Methods in the Virtual Reality of a Climate Simulation’, International Journal of Earth Science, 98, 67–82.
Weller, G. (2005) ‘Summary and Synthesis of the ACIA’, in Arctic Climate Impact Assessment (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), pp. 989–1020.
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Copyright information
© 2013 Annika E. Nilsson and Ralf Döscher
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Nilsson, A.E., Döscher, R. (2013). Signals from a Noisy Region. In: Christensen, M., Nilsson, A.E., Wormbs, N. (eds) Media and the Politics of Arctic Climate Change. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137266231_5
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137266231_5
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-349-44315-4
Online ISBN: 978-1-137-26623-1
eBook Packages: Palgrave Media & Culture CollectionLiterature, Cultural and Media Studies (R0)