Tag Archives: research

Climate change or variability: What rules Arctic sea ice?

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This photo, taken during the NASA ICESCAPE mission in summer 2011, shows melt ponds on the surface of Arctic sea ice. Weather patterns in the Arctic this summer have favored ice loss, leading to near-record low ice extent over most of the summer. New research is explaining how much ice loss is caused by variable conditions, and how much can be pinned on human-caused climate change. Credit: NASA/Kathryn Hansen

Arctic sea ice is near its annual low extent for the year. Will it reach a new record low? While many people are watching this year’s ice extent closely, the effect of climate change on ice extent in a single year is different than its effect in the long term. Arctic sea ice has declined more than 30 percent in summer since satellite measurements started in 1979. But from year to year, ice extent jumps up and down quite a lot. Continue reading →

Getting beneath the ice

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Researchers can measure ice thickness by drilling holes in the sea ice. But the method is not a practical way to measure thickness over the millions of square miles of Arctic sea ice. Image courtesy of Martin Hartley

NSIDC reports ice extent, a two-dimensional measure of the Arctic Ocean’s ice cover. But sea ice extent tells only part of the story: sea ice is not all flat like a sheet of paper. While freshly formed ice might not be much thicker than a few sheets of paper, the oldest, thickest ice in the Arctic can be more than 15 feet thick—as thick as a one-story house. Scientists want to know not just how far the ice extends, but also how deep and thick it is, because thinner ice is more vulnerable to summer melt. Continue reading →

Arctic sea ice and U.S. weather

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People sometimes wonder if the weather they are experiencing locally, such as the heavy snow that fell in February 2011 over the Northeastern U.S., is connected to decreasing Arctic sea ice. Scientists are exploring a possible connection. Credit: NASA Earth Observatory.

Over the 2010 to 2011 winter, news stories suggested a potential connection between a warming climate, low Arctic sea ice extent, and unusually cold weather this winter in the U.S. and Europe. What do scientists know about how sea ice affects the weather?

Scientists have been exploring a possible link, but the question is far from settled. It makes sense that changing sea ice conditions could affect weather in the Arctic and other parts of the world. During the colder months, sea ice insulates the relatively warm ocean from the colder atmosphere. As sea ice declines, more heat can escape to the atmosphere in the fall and winter, affecting wind patterns, temperature, and precipitation. Continue reading →