December 11, 2024
4 Pain read
The Arctic was warming faster than it did 20 years ago
Rising temperatures, increasing precipitation, melting permafrost and leaving ice are pushing the Arctic beyond its historical norms.
An aerial view of Baffik Bafberg and the ice sheet in Pituffik, Greenland, on July 19, 2022, as captured by a NASA Gulfstream V aircraft, sea ice melts during the aerial mission.
Kerem Yücel/AFP/Getty Images
Climatewire | The Arctic continued its transformation in 2024, with a cold summer, its second warmest temperatures and its second warmest year overall.
It’s a continuation of a long-term pattern and serves as the latest evidence of a shift to a new Arctic state, according to NOAA’s latest figures for the year. Arctic Report Card. Temperatures, precipitation patterns, melting ice, permafrost and other factors have moved beyond the region’s historical norms. Change is constant.
“The Arctic is now in a new regime, for years some years are no different than a couple of decades,” Twila Moon, National Snow and Ice Data Center and lead editor of the report, said at a press conference on Tuesday announcing the findings. “However, climate change will not lead to a new normal. Instead, climate change is leading to ongoing and rapid change.”
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The Arctic Report Card, issued annually since 2006, provides regular documentation of Arctic developments. The first part warned of melting sea ice and the destruction of permafrost and pointed to “hot spots” in the region. It also raised concerns about the stability of the Greenland ice sheet, with the exact rate of melting at the time not yet in doubt.
Nearly two decades later, studies show that the Arctic is warming three times faster than the global average. Sea ice has continued to decline, and permafrost has disappeared in large stretches of Alaska, Canada, and Siberia. The firemen are on their way up. And scientists have confirmed that the Greenland ice sheet is losing tens of millions of tons of ice every year.
“An important takeaway from the Arctic report card is that the warming of our planet is amplified in the Arctic,” Moon said. “The Arctic continues to warm faster than the rest of the world, and the last nine years in the Arctic are the ninth on record.”
Every year is not a record. Last year sea ice hit the sixth lowest extent. The summer was the second hottest on record behind 2023. Permafrost temperatures were also the second warmest.
Meanwhile, Greenland saw its lowest mass loss since 2013. And snow accumulation was above average between Eurasia and the North American Arctic.
But all these factors are still consistent with the pattern of long-term changes the Arctic has seen in recent decades. Temperatures rise quickly, even bringing in all-time records every year. Sea ice is constantly decreasing. And the Greenland ice sheet has contributed to global sea level rise for 27 years in a row.
Meanwhile, 2024 still broke some records.
August A heat wave broke daily temperature records in some communities in Alaska and Canada. Summer rainfall was the highest on record. Even with above-average snowfall in many places, the snow season was at least 26 years old in central and eastern parts of Centric Canada. This is largely due to the combination of early thaws in the fall and early thaws, resulting in higher temperatures.
Wildlife populations are also affected, the new report notes – though not always in the same ways.
Much of the Arctic is home to large populations of ice seals. However, although arctic cod, historically their preferred food source, has declined as temperatures rise. Instead, research suggests that ice seals have caught on to saffron cod, which prefer warm water and are expected to increase in size in the coming years.
That’s a good sign for ice seals, said Lori Quakenbush, a scientist and marine mammal expert with the Alaska Department of Fish and Game.
“Although ice seals are highly adapted to sea ice, which is declining, we have yet to see that their adaptive abilities are limited by current ecological changes,” he said.
The caribou, on the other hand, is not either. Migratory tundra caribou have declined by 65 percent in the past 20 to 30 years, from 1.8 million to a peak of 5.5 million in the 1990s and 2000s. While some small coastal herds have shown signs of recovery over the past decade, larger inland herds have declined rapidly.
This is also a result of rising temperatures, the report notes. Warmer winter weather increases freezing rain events, which can cover plants that Caribou depend on for food.
These declines are of great concern to indigenous communities in the Arctic.
“Caribou declines are a critical concern for local people when food security has depended on these animals,” Quakenbush said.
The new report’s scorecard highlights the need for rapid global reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, scientists say.
“While we hope that many plants and animals will find ways to adapt, as ice seals have so far, hope is not the path to preparedness or risk reduction,” Moon said. “With nearly all human-caused warming outside the Arctic, only the strongest actions to reduce these emissions will allow us to minimize risk and damage as much as possible. This is true in the Arctic and for Globes.”
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