Hi, this was really great. One question and one comment on a change of emphasis that I might employ. "Arctic sea ice acts as a buffer, cooling our summers & warming our winters" -- Slide 33. Is it true that Arctic sea ice warms our winters? I recall that the effects on the jet stream in 2012/2013 tended to cool areas over land and added moisture contributed to greater snowfall (I think), but I don't remember hearing that our Canadian winters would be colder. I thought it was just more persistent blocking that could be predicted. My comment may just be for personal preference, but I think I would instead focus on September rather than minimums. But maybe that's just me.

From the post: "2) the thin ice that now grows to fill up the leads, will go first when the melting starts, potentially leading to more open water between floes to absorb solar energy and convert it to heat." Is the effect all solar? I wonder if the another deleterious effect of the cracking is to get more salt into/onto the ice and lowering its melting point.

But what about the negative feedback of loss of heat in the winter? Stoat has mentioned before that just losing the ice in summer isn't enough - the positive feedback is counteracted.... I've never tried to tally it up, so I'm just asking if you're considering it.

Looks like NSIDC has reverted to their earlier graph....

2008 looks more 'wiggly' than other years in this figure. It looks more 'wiggly' than in figures I've seen before. Is this an artifact of this measure of sea ice? Or is this reflecting something special about weather patterns in 2008? General question: is there anything to learn from how steadily or not the ice oscillates between max and min?