Arctic Report Card 2012

• Format: Book
• Language: English
• Published: NOAA 2012
• Subjects: Atmosphere; Oceans; Arctic; Greenland; Ice; Ice Sheet; permafrost; Sea ice
• Online Access: http://library.arcticportal.org/1738/; http://library.arcticportal.org/1738/1/report_Card_2012.pdf

The Arctic Report Card (www.arctic.noaa.gov/reportcard/) considers a wide range of environmental observations throughout the Arctic, and is updated annually. A major finding of the Report Card 2012 is that numerous record-setting melting events occurred, even though, with the exception of a few limited episodes, Arctic-wide it was an unremarkable year, relative to the previous decade, for a primary driver of melting - surface air temperatures. From October 2011 through August 2012, positive (warm) temperature anomalies were relatively small over the central Arctic compared to conditions in recent years (2003-2010). Yet, in spite of these moderate conditions, new records were set for sea ice extent, terrestrial snow extent, melting at the surface of the Greenland ice sheet, and permafrost temperature.