Towards an ice-free Arctic?

• Main Authors: Lars H. Smedsrud, Tore Furevik, H. Smedsrud
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Subjects: Arctic; Global warming; Sea ice
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.459.6253; http://www.cicero.uio.no/cicerone/00/2/en/smedsrud.pdf

If the rapid melting of the ice in the Arctic continues, the perennial ice will disappear by the end of this century. The consequences of an ice-free Arctic will be particularly dramatic for its biodiversity. The thickness and extent of the sea ice in the Arctic depends on a fine balance between major energy sources and sinks, both in the sea and the atmosphere. This is why it has long been argued that the effect of a global warming will be seen first in the earth’s polar regions. Monitoring of sea ice has been carried out for a number of years by using submarines, ice breakers, and satellites. For more than a decade, researchers have reported a gradual shrinking of the ice cover, and over the last year reports have come in showing that the changes are occurring far more rapidly and dramatically than most had envisioned. This raises the question of whether the changes in the ice are a result of global, human-induced warming, or whether they can be seen as natural variability. Observations of ice thickness and area The first measurements to indicate that the ice was thinning were made by English researchers who measured the ice thickness by using sonar (echosounder directed upwards)