96,126,250,000 Megajoules of HEAT melted the Arctic Sea Ice. PART 1
Al Beato His Meato@Exxon.Stoodge.com http://snipurl.com/wozg
http://timesunion.com/AspStories/story.asp?storyID=519469&category=NATIONAL&BCCode=HOME&newsdat
e=9/23/2006
http://snipurl.com/x2fa
Ice cap 'lake' raises concern
Melted section in Arctic seen as bellwether for effects of global warming
... 38,000 square miles ...
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/tm_objectid=17750782&method=full&siteid=94762&headline=hole-in-the-pole--
name_page.
html http://snipurl.com/x2ft
HOLE IN THE POLE
Huge ice melt in 12 months
THE North Pole ice cap shrank by an area the size of England and France in
just 12 months.
Satellite pictures reveal a huge melt in the Arctic Ocean north of Europe
and Russia between December 21, 2004 and a year later.
In all, 280,000 square miles or 14 per cent of the permanent ice mass (the
white area, above) was lost - 20 times the yearly average. It was replaced
by thinner seasonal ice (blue area).
Scientists are urgently trying to establish if this is a new trend.
They are concerned because the three-metre thick ice would not normally
melt in summer. Unusual wind patterns pushing the ice out of the Arctic
may be a cause but temperatures in the region are rising twice as fast of
the global average.
Nasa's Dr Son Nghiem called the changes "rapid, dramatic and enormous".
The 7ft-thick seasonal ice is more likely to melt in summer with serious
environmental implications.
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Assuming two facts...
(1) 38,000 square miles.
(2) 3-meter thick ice permanent ice.
... as givens, then a 1st approximation calculation of heat energy input
can be computed.
Converting 38,000 miles^2 to kilometers^2 = 98,420 square kilometers.
We might as well round up to 100,000 kilometers^2 for easier math.
100,000 kilometers^2 = 100,000,000 square meters surface area
100,000,000 m^2 x 3 meters deep = 300,000,000 cubic meters = 3e8 m^3.
3e8 m^3 = 3e14 CC = 300,000,000,000,000 cubic centimeters.
Each CC requires 79.72 calories per gram of heat energy to melt ice.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_enthalpy_change_of_fusion
Reference Values
The heat of fusion of water is
79.72 calories per gram
Ice is 4% less dense than water, so the volume of ice is
288,000,000,000,000 grams or 2.88e14 grams.
The heat energy required to melt the ice is 2.295936e16 calories.
2.295936e16 calories = 26701.74 gigawatt-hours of heat energy
2.295936e16 calories = 9.11101e+013 BTUs = 91,110,100,000,000 BTU
2.295936e16 calories = 9.612625e+010 megajoules = 96,126,250,000 MJ