I spent years at WATTS to expose the deferring stories in connection with climate science, in particular the obsession of Meereis as a supposedly “canaries in the coal mine” for global warming. The most recent Space.com article of July 10, 2025 entitled “Us Military Cuts Climate Scientists of Vital Satellite Seeis data” predicted the alarmist rhetoric about the loss of data from the special sensor microwave image/Sound (SSMIS) operated by the Department of Defense).
The article claims that this step amazes scientists to a critical climate indicator, but let us take a step back and examine why this may not be the catastrophe for which it can be – and why sea ice data in the large scheme is not the climate proxy for which he can free himself. The piece Space.com describes how the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) at the University of Colorado in Boulder lose access to SSMIS data that pursue the cover of sea ice. The article paints this as a devastating blow, which connects the loss of the sea ice with the melting of the catastrophic glacier and the increase in sea level with the sea ice and at the same time determines commercial advantages such as shorter shipping routes.
It mentions the Pivot of NSIDC for Japan's advanced microwave -scan -Radiometer 2 (AMSR2) data, but is annoyed by a temporary data gap. Their sound is predictably bad and demands the decision as part of a broader attack on science with references to budget cuts, NASA missions and evacuations of scientific institutions (such as GISS).
Now let's cut the exaggeration.
Meereis has a long flagship for climate alarmism, but as we discussed in detail at WuwT, it is a faulty and loud deputy for climate change. First of all, the Arctic sea ice, while it is lower than the average from 1979 to 2000, is not disappeared as predicted. Since the remarkable deep in 2007, Arctic sea ice has stabilized in a new, lower plateau from year to year, but despite endless model -based forecasts and Blovie by Al Gore, she did not show a consistent downward spiral compared to an “ice -free arctic” summer.
Figure 1: Shows from the satellites derived minimum minimum values of the Arctic sea ice from 1979 to 2023, with the dashed line showing the linear trend. The additional trend line in red has shown no change in the minimal size in summer since 2007. Image source: NSIDC. Red trend line from 2007 and trend line Examples under the title added by A. Watts
For example, we have covered how Arctic sea ice has remained stable for almost 20 years. In the meantime, Antarctic sea ice tells an still impractical story. In contrast to models that predict the loss of ice in a warming world, the Antarctic sea ice has shown particularly in recent years. In 2014 we reported that the Antarctic Sea ice cream reached a new record. This growth directly contradicts the narrative that a warmer planet melts the sea ice and the excessive simplification of the binding of the ice degree with the global temperature.
But even worse, as Willis Eschenbach has emphasized in the past, even the losses of the Antarctic ice cream are insignificant in the much larger picture of the entire ice in the Antarctic.
Figure 2: (Click to enlarge) Comparison of satellite data for the loss of the Antarctic ice mass. Cumulative ice mass loss on the left and the same data compared to the total mass of the ice cream on the right. Data source: http://imbie.org.
Diagrams originally by Willis Eschenbach, adapted and commented by Anthony Watts.
Why is Sea ice cream such a shaky climate proxy?
As we have argued for a long time, it is influenced much more than just the temperature. Wind patterns, sea currents and natural variability such as the arctic vibration play massive roles. For example, we have discussed how changes in wind patterns affect the Antarctic sea ice. In the Antarctic, changes in the atmospheric cycle change, not just the temperature, the ice variability. Add the results to be interspersed with measuring. The article of the Space.com article claims that the loss of SSMIS data blinds us for climate change ignores this complexity and assumes that sea ice is an uncomplicated thermometer, which it is not.
In addition, the panic of the article about a temporary data gap is exaggerated, especially in view of the history of NSIDC, to move data problems if they are suitable for you. As early as 2009, I wrote about a significant data loss on NSIDC due to a catastrophic sensor failure on your satellite, which led to faulty data and a gap in the records. Walt Meier's NSIDC released it in comments as “not worth it to blog it. Funny how a data gap was not a big deal at the time, but now a similar problem is apocalyptic.
This selective outrage undermines the credibility of NSIDC and underlines the politicized nature of its story. The loss of SSMIS data is not particularly crippled for climate sciences, since sea ice data I have described has only limited usefulness. It is a loud, multifaceted metric that does not correlate directly with global warming or the CO2 value. Other data records – such as global temperature records, octopus heating content or even alternative satellite sources such as AMSR2 – offer more robust knowledge. The claim of the article that sea ice is an “essential measure of climate change” exceeds its importance and ignores how the natural variability and the non-climatic factors of the signal muddy. If at all, the decision of the DOD to prioritize military needs before feeding an alarmistic narrative, forcing scientists to concentrate on more reliable metrics.
The article from Space.com also glosses out the practical realities. The DOD has its own priorities – the missions for the disc, national security – and is not obliged to subsidize NSIDC research. The pivot point for AMSR2 is a calibration, but is not insurmountable. Japan's data is already available and comparable. The fear of the article about a “blind spot” ignores that climate science has never only rely on a data set. Perhaps a break in data leads to a re -evaluation of these incorrect predictions. Also check our cover in which the models are displayed that fail with sea ice forecasts.
In short, the article from Space.com is another example of climate alarmism as science. Meereis is not the climate oracle for which it is, and the loss of SSMIS data is more inconvenience than disaster. The arctic ice has stabilized, the Antarctic ice cream has increased, and natural variability exceeds the simplified warming counts. As we have said at WUWT for years, climate history is far more complex than the headlines suggest. The past discharge of data gaps by NSIDC underlines, as I found in 2009 in 2009, only the selective hysteria that plays here. Time to go to better metrics and less dogma.
Charles' Addendum:
In the best case, the scientific value of obsessive persecution of the daily sea ice is the scientific value that pursues daily.
Let's start with the most practical question: What can actually be learned from daily sea ice measurements that are not already known from long -term oceanic and atmospheric data? Sea ice cream is basically a symptom-one end product that is influenced by wind, sea currents and short-term weather, so much or more than by global temperature trends. This means that daily changes are a mixed up mix of noise, short -term variability and local conditions. The pursuit of these fluctuations with a high frequency results in little -implementable knowledge of the climate system. If at all, it creates more confusion than clarity.
If someone wants to study polar ecosystems or seasonal animal migration, it may have a limited biological application to know when and where ice shapes or melt can have limited biological application. However, these are niche research interests and hardly justify the grandiose claims that daily sea ice monitoring is essential for understanding the global climate.
When it comes to navigation or resource management, Mariner and industry rely on real-time, localized data with high resolution, not to the global dimensions that are equipped for press releases. The aggregated data on “How much sea ice is present today” is neither granular enough nor promptly enough for practical shipping or drilling decisions.
As far as long-term climate science is concerned, the true value is not in any multi-decadal records, not in daily readings. Here, too, the correlation between sea ice and global temperature is weak. Important fluctuations can occur and appear regardless of temperature changes, as can be seen repeatedly in both arctic and antarctic records. In addition, the recording itself is spoiled by changes in measurement technology, algorithms and satellite development, which means that comparisons have been uncertainty over decades.
Conclusion: The persecution of the daily sea ice at best offers a rough indication of what is happening in the polar regions, which are strongly filtered by natural variability and technical restrictions. For the actual climate science, it is an extremely indirect, loud and unreliable metric – one that tells us less about the climate than the borders of our models and the continued urge to find a simple answer to a complex system. The scientific value is therefore minimal – especially compared to the breathless meaning that is often assigned to him.
Overall: sea ice measurements have niche supports, but they are not an oracle for climate or politics. Your scientific value outside of specialized polar research is overrated and often used as a proxy for arguments that have better evidence.
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