Climate change alarmists said melting of Greenland's glaciers was solely due to CO2-based global warming - scientists now say that "consensus" is wrong
(click to enlarge image)
Read here. It is a well established fact that tax-payer funded, professional alarmists blame any known worldly change/condition on anthropogenic global warming. This has certainly been true regarding the global retreat of glaciers since the Little Ice Age end.
Based on the latest research though, scientists are now concluding that natural oscillations and cycles play a much greater role in glacier retreat/melt and advancement. In fact, new research has determined that Greenland's Helheim Glacier had a similarly very high natural melt during the 1930's versus the more recent melt that alarmists solely (wrongly) blame human CO2 emissions for.
"...the researchers [Andresen et al] were able to construct a continuous history going back 120 years. By studying the debris and silt deposited in the fjord, estimations can be made about the rate of iceberg calving, and hence ice loss from the flowing ice of the glacier...the researchers were able to create a history of ice loss for Helheim [Glacier]...Two pronounced calving maxima are observed: one during the past 10 years, the other in the late 1930s/early 1940s. The long-term calving increase is probably due to a shift from the Little Ice Age conditions, which were characterized by low air temperatures and strong polar-water influence..."Our analysis indicates that the recent increase in calving activity observed at Helheim Glacier is not unique but that a similarly large event occurred in the late 1930s/early 1940s. These two episodes occurred at times when the temperature of the Atlantic-water source was high (positive/warm Atlantic Multi-decadal Oscillation phase) and the polar-water export was at a record low (even if fluctuating)."..."“Our study provides evidence that Helheim Glacier responds to changes in [natural] atmosphere–ocean variability on timescales as short as a few years.”" [Camilla S. Andresen, Fiammetta Straneo, Mads Hvid Ribergaard, Anders A. Bjørk, Thorbjørn J. Andersen, Antoon Kuijpers, Niels Nørgaard-Pedersen, Kurt H. Kjær, Frands Schjøth, Kaarina Weckström, Andreas P. Ahlstrøm 2012: Nature Geoscience]
Previous peer-reviewed and glacier/ice sheet postings. Above Mapquest and Google image sources.