Climate warming shortens ice durations and alters freeze and break-up patterns in Swedish water bodies
Increasing air temperatures reduce the duration of ice cover on lakes and rivers, threatening to alter their water quality, ecology, biodiversity, and physical, economical and recreational function. Using a unique in situ record of freeze and break-up dates, including records dating back to the begi...
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ftcopernicus:oai:publications.copernicus.org:tc98001 2023-05-15T17:45:01+02:00 Climate warming shortens ice durations and alters freeze and break-up patterns in Swedish water bodies Hallerbäck, Sofia Huning, Laurie S. Love, Charlotte Persson, Magnus Stensen, Katarina Gustafsson, David AghaKouchak, Amir 2022-06-24 application/pdf https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-16-2493-2022 https://tc.copernicus.org/articles/16/2493/2022/ eng eng doi:10.5194/tc-16-2493-2022 https://tc.copernicus.org/articles/16/2493/2022/ eISSN: 1994-0424 Text 2022 ftcopernicus https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-16-2493-2022 2022-06-27T16:22:42Z Increasing air temperatures reduce the duration of ice cover on lakes and rivers, threatening to alter their water quality, ecology, biodiversity, and physical, economical and recreational function. Using a unique in situ record of freeze and break-up dates, including records dating back to the beginning of the 18th century, we analyze changes in ice duration (i.e., first freeze to last break-up), freeze and break-up patterns across Sweden. Results indicate a significant trend in shorter ice duration (62 %), later freeze (36 %) and earlier break-up (58 %) dates from 1913–2014. In the latter 3 decades (1985–2014), the mean observed ice durations have decreased by about 11 d in northern (above 60 ∘ N) and 28 d in southern Sweden relative to the earlier three decades. In the same period, the average freeze date occurred about 10 d later and break-up date about 17 d earlier in southern Sweden. The rate of change is roughly twice as large in southern Sweden as in the northern part. Sweden has experienced an increase in occurrence of years with an extremely short ice cover duration (i.e., less than 50 d), which occurred about 8 times more often in southern Sweden than previously observed. Our analysis indicates that even a 1 ∘ C increase in air temperatures in southern (northern) Sweden results in a mean decrease of ice duration of 22.5 ( ±7.6 ) d. Given that warming is expected to continue across Sweden during the 21st century, we expect increasingly significant impacts on ice cover duration and hence, ecology, water quality, transportation, and recreational activities in the region. Text Northern Sweden Copernicus Publications: E-Journals The Cryosphere 16 6 2493 2503 |
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Copernicus Publications: E-Journals |
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English |
description |
Increasing air temperatures reduce the duration of ice cover on lakes and rivers, threatening to alter their water quality, ecology, biodiversity, and physical, economical and recreational function. Using a unique in situ record of freeze and break-up dates, including records dating back to the beginning of the 18th century, we analyze changes in ice duration (i.e., first freeze to last break-up), freeze and break-up patterns across Sweden. Results indicate a significant trend in shorter ice duration (62 %), later freeze (36 %) and earlier break-up (58 %) dates from 1913–2014. In the latter 3 decades (1985–2014), the mean observed ice durations have decreased by about 11 d in northern (above 60 ∘ N) and 28 d in southern Sweden relative to the earlier three decades. In the same period, the average freeze date occurred about 10 d later and break-up date about 17 d earlier in southern Sweden. The rate of change is roughly twice as large in southern Sweden as in the northern part. Sweden has experienced an increase in occurrence of years with an extremely short ice cover duration (i.e., less than 50 d), which occurred about 8 times more often in southern Sweden than previously observed. Our analysis indicates that even a 1 ∘ C increase in air temperatures in southern (northern) Sweden results in a mean decrease of ice duration of 22.5 ( ±7.6 ) d. Given that warming is expected to continue across Sweden during the 21st century, we expect increasingly significant impacts on ice cover duration and hence, ecology, water quality, transportation, and recreational activities in the region. |
format |
Text |
author |
Hallerbäck, Sofia Huning, Laurie S. Love, Charlotte Persson, Magnus Stensen, Katarina Gustafsson, David AghaKouchak, Amir |
spellingShingle |
Hallerbäck, Sofia Huning, Laurie S. Love, Charlotte Persson, Magnus Stensen, Katarina Gustafsson, David AghaKouchak, Amir Climate warming shortens ice durations and alters freeze and break-up patterns in Swedish water bodies |
author_facet |
Hallerbäck, Sofia Huning, Laurie S. Love, Charlotte Persson, Magnus Stensen, Katarina Gustafsson, David AghaKouchak, Amir |
author_sort |
Hallerbäck, Sofia |
title |
Climate warming shortens ice durations and alters freeze and break-up patterns in Swedish water bodies |
title_short |
Climate warming shortens ice durations and alters freeze and break-up patterns in Swedish water bodies |
title_full |
Climate warming shortens ice durations and alters freeze and break-up patterns in Swedish water bodies |
title_fullStr |
Climate warming shortens ice durations and alters freeze and break-up patterns in Swedish water bodies |
title_full_unstemmed |
Climate warming shortens ice durations and alters freeze and break-up patterns in Swedish water bodies |
title_sort |
climate warming shortens ice durations and alters freeze and break-up patterns in swedish water bodies |
publishDate |
2022 |
url |
https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-16-2493-2022 https://tc.copernicus.org/articles/16/2493/2022/ |
genre |
Northern Sweden |
genre_facet |
Northern Sweden |
op_source |
eISSN: 1994-0424 |
op_relation |
doi:10.5194/tc-16-2493-2022 https://tc.copernicus.org/articles/16/2493/2022/ |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-16-2493-2022 |
container_title |
The Cryosphere |
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16 |
container_issue |
6 |
container_start_page |
2493 |
op_container_end_page |
2503 |
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1766147733740060672 |