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North Pole Ice Sheet Could Disappear By 2040
Washington (AFP) Dec 11, 2006 The ice sheet covering the North Pole and Arctic Ocean could recede and disappear completely in the summer months by 2040, researchers said Tuesday in the Geophysical Research Letters magazine. If greenhouse gas emissions continue at the current rate, the Arctic's future ice cover will undergo periods of relative stability followed by abrupt retreat, said a team of scientists of the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) and Canada's McGill University. Only a small portion of the permanent ice pack would cling in the summer season around the northern coastline of Greenland and Canada, the researchers said. "We have already witnessed major losses in sea ice, but our research suggests that the decrease over the next few decades could be far more dramatic than anything that has happened so far," said NCAR scientist and lead author of the study Marika Holland. The melting ice pack is expected to have a devastating effect on global warming, warned the scientists. "Open water absorbs more sunlight than does ice, meaning that the growing regions of ice-free water will accelerate the warming trend," they report said. The loss of the ice pack in the summer would also hold dire consequences for the environmental balance of the polar region and for the survival of some species like the polar bear, who need the ice pack for hunting.
Source: Agence France-Presse
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Arctic Ice Field Could Melt By 2080
Berlin (AFP) Dec 05, 2006The Arctic Ocean's ice field could melt entirely by 2080 due to global warming, a group of European scientists meeting in the northern Germany city of Bremen announced on Tuesday. "If the situation evolves as physics predicts, the Arctic Ocean's summertime ice fields will completely disappear by 2080," said Eberhard Fahrbach of the Alfred Wegner Institute (AWI), a member of the European Arctic research body DAMOCLES. |
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