The Arctic has warmed four times faster than the rest of the world over the past 40 years, according to a study published Thursday, raising concerns that climate models for the poles are underestimating the pace of their warming that is significantly affecting sea level rise.
The United Nations’ Advisory Committee on Climate Sciences said in a 2019 special report that the Arctic is warming “more than twice the global average” due to a process known as “polar amplification”.
This phenomenon occurs when sea ice and snow, which naturally reflect the sun’s heat, melt into the sea water that absorbs it.
While there is a long-standing consensus among scientists that the Arctic is warming rapidly, estimates vary according to the study’s time frame and the definition of the geographic area of the North Pole.
In this new study, researchers from Norway and Finland analyzed four temperature data sets collected through satellite studies since 1979, the year this type of data became available across the entire Arctic Circle.
They found that, on average, the data showed a warming of the Arctic by 0.75 degrees Celsius per decade, about four times faster than the rest of the planet.
“The scientific literature considers the Arctic to be warming twice as fast than the rest of the planet. Therefore, I was surprised that our result was much higher than the usual figure,” explained Antti Lipponen, a member of the Finnish Meteorological Institute and co-author of the study.
The study, published in the journal Communications Earth and Environment, found significant differences in the rate of warming within the Arctic Circle.
For example, the Eurasian sector of the Arctic Ocean, near the archipelagos of Svalbard and Novaya Zemlya, has warmed 1.25°C per decade, seven times faster than the rest of the world.
“Humans are causing climate change. As the Arctic warms, the glaciers will melt and this will affect sea level globally,” Leponin said.
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