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Photo of wind-sculpted snow surface
Spotlight
A new study focuses on improving global temperature data sets in light of uneven warming across the globe. To fill gaps in historical climate records, the study relies in part on sea ice data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration program at the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NOAA@NSIDC).
The sun sets over Arctic sea ice
News Release
A new review paper, led by NSIDC senior research scientist Julienne Stroeve and published in Science on February 6, 2025, highlights the changes that will occur in the Arctic by 2100 because of global warming, and their far-reaching implications.
Figure 1a. Arctic sea ice extent for January 2025 was 13.13 million square kilometers (5.07 million square miles). The magenta line shows the 1981 to 2010 average extent for that month. Sea Ice Index data. About the data — Credit: National Snow and Ice Data Center
Analysis - Sea Ice Today
Arctic daily sea ice extent continued to hover near record daily lows in January, with the ice edge well northward of its long-term average position in most areas. In contrast to the cold conditions dominating the contiguous United States, much of the Arctic experienced above-average January temperatures. In the Antarctic, daily sea ice extent fell below the long-term average after a brief period of above-average daily extents, ending the month just above the lowest 25 percent of ice extents for the day.
Figure 1. The top left map shows the total melt days for the Antarctic Ice Sheet from November 1, 2024, to January 20, 2025 with a close-up map of the Antarctic Peninsula to its right. The bottom left and center maps show the total melt days as a difference from average relative to the 1991 to 2020 reference period. The top right graph shows daily melt extent as a percentage of the ice sheet for the 2024 melt season up to January 20, 2025, with the average values and ranges for the same reference period. Th
Analysis - Ice Sheets Today
Surface melting for the Antarctic ice sheet appears to have set a record for the 46-year satellite observation period on January 2, 2025. All areas of the Antarctic coast that generally see significant summertime melting continue to accumulate melt days at a faster-than-average pace, except along the northern West Antarctic ice shelves, which are now near-average.