Climate change is a growing concern this year. Records of global temperature were set almost every month, and August was called the hottest on record. Arctic sea ice has also reached its bottom, decreasing over several months.
Observational data
America's National Snow and Ice Data Center in Colorado has released its latest numbers, the exact opposite of the good news. On September 10, Arctic sea ice reached its summer minimum, the second critical level based on satellite data. In fact, ice loss this year is 2,560,000 square kilometers, up from the 1979-2000 average. This area is equal to Alaska and Texas combined.
While Arctic sea ice is 10,000 square kilometers below 2007 levels this year, they are so close that, in fact, 2007 and 2016 rank second in the anti-ranking list after 2012. It may sound like good news that this year has not taken the infamous first place, but as always with climate change data, you need to pay attention to trends in general, not individual indicators.
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The overall downward trend in sea ice has intensified. So far, there is no evidence of its recovery. Scientists have always known that the Arctic will be an early warning system for climate change. What they saw this year only reinforced this belief.
Unusual time
The past few decades have become quite unusual for the Arctic. NASA notes that since 1986 there have been no months with record high sea ice levels. Over the past 37 years, scientists have recorded 75 monthly lows.
Even this year has gotten pretty weird. The extent of the sea ice was steadily decreasing, despite the fact that there were many thunderstorm fronts covering it, making the local climate cloudy and cold. Sea ice was melting anyway, and not just seasonal. Transitional ice - one of the oldest in the region - has also begun to dissolve as sea surface temperatures continue to rise steadily.
When the sea ice disappears
Scientists at the National Snow and Ice Data Center are convinced that all summer Arctic sea ice will disappear by 2030. When you look at the most recent data up to date, it's not hard to see why researchers are making such grandiose predictions.
The world is now warming 10 times faster than would be expected after the glacial maximum. If the oceans could not absorb carbon dioxide emissions, then warming would occur 360 times faster. But this carbon sink will soon overflow. However, the Arctic is warming up twice as fast as the rest of the planet due to a phenomenon called Arctic amplification.
Global Earth Shield
At the moment, the Arctic acts as a reflective global shield for the Earth, which reflects large amounts of incoming solar radiation back into space. As the Arctic sea ice disappears, it is able to reflect less radiation and is more absorbed by the seawater, which stores thermal energy over a long period of time. This warm water melts more ice, allowing the sea to absorb more of the incoming radiation. As you can see, we are caught in a vicious circle.
This cycle is strengthening, which means that the Arctic ice is disappearing at an accelerated rate from year to year, and as a result, the region is warming up faster. In the absence of summer sea ice, which will disappear by 2030, we will lose our shield from climate change. It is clear that everyone will suffer from this, not just the polar bears that live in the Arctic.
Anna Pismenna