Changes in Arctic Melt Season and Implications for Sea Ice Loss

• Main Authors: Boisvert, L., Miller, J., Stroeve, J. C., Barrett, A., Markus, T.
• Format: Other/Unknown Material
• Language: unknown
• Published: 2014
• Subjects: Oceanography; Meteorology and Climatology; Arctic; Chukchi; Kara-Laptev; laptev; Sea ice
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/2060/20140010778

The Arctic-wide melt season has lengthened at a rate of 5 days dec-1 from 1979 to 2013, dominated by later autumn freeze-up within the Kara, Laptev, East Siberian, Chukchi and Beaufort seas between 6 and 11 days dec(exp -1). While melt onset trends are generally smaller, the timing of melt onset has a large influence on the total amount of solar energy absorbed during summer. The additional heat stored in the upper ocean of approximately 752MJ m(exp -2) during the last decade, increases sea surface temperatures by 0.5 to 1.5 C and largely explains the observed delays in autumn freeze-up within the Arctic Ocean's adjacent seas. Cumulative anomalies in total absorbed solar radiation from May through September for the most recent pentad locally exceed 300-400 MJ m(exp -2) in the Beaufort, Chukchi and East Siberian seas. This extra solar energy is equivalent to melting 0.97 to 1.3 m of ice during the summer.