A shocking increase in temperatures observed in the Arctic over the past two months has some scientists concerned that the increasing heat could result in record-low amounts of ice coverage by the summer of 2017, the New York Times and Daily Mail reported this week.
In fact, some parts of the Arctic were more than 35 degrees Fahrenheit warmer than observed averages in mid-November, and the North Pole was 23 degrees hotter than usual, according to the Times. While temperatures cooled off again afterwards, the heat was expected to return on Thursday, with forecasts calling for temperatures as much as 27 degrees above normal.
Furthermore, a new study released Wednesday revealed that the North Pole and the surrounding areas were experiencing both record-high temperatures and record-low ice extent for the months of November and December. While fall typically is a time of sea ice growth in the area, that has not been the case this year, the authors said: last month actually saw a short-lived decline.
That has climate scientists, including Jeremy Mathis, director of the Arctic Research Program of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), concerned that the warmth may result in record-low ice coverage starting next spring. Furthermore, the absence of ice (which can reflect the sun’s rays) and the increased amount of darker ocean water (which absorbs them) may in turn lead to even warmer temperatures during the year ahead.
“We’re going to be watching the summer of 2017 very closely,” Mathis told the Times.
Impact of climate change on the area will be felt globally
According to a Washington Post story published earlier this week, some computer models are showing 40 to 50 degree hotter-than-usual temperatures at the North Pole just before the holiday weekend, which would bring it dangerously close to the 32 degree melting point.
This is the second straight year that the region has experienced abnormally high temperatures in late December, and the second time in as many months, the newspaper added. The cause of these conditions, researchers explain, is a powerful storm east of Greenland with an estimated pressure of about 945 millibars, which the Post said is “comparable to many category 3 hurricanes.”
“A warm episode like the one we are currently observing is still a rare event in today’s climate,” Friederike E.L. Otto, a senior scientist at the Environmental Change Institute at the University of Oxford and one of the authors of the aforementioned study, said to the Times. “But it would have been an extremely unlikely event without anthropogenic climate change.”
Should climate change continue at its current rate, Otto added, events such as this could become commonplace in the Arctic region, possibly occurring up to once every two years. She added that “it’s quite impressive how much the risk of these kinds of events is changing” and that the North Pole and its surrounding area is “one region where we see the impacts of climate change very strongly.”
“We’ve seen a year in 2016 in the Arctic like we’ve never seen before,” Dr. Mathis told the Times, adding that this year has been the warmest in the region’s history. That, he explained, should concern people all over the world. “We need people to know and understand that the Arctic is going to have an impact on their lives no matter where they live.”
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