Eurasian permafrost instability constrained by reduced sea-ice cover

• Published in: Quaternary Science Reviews
• Main Authors: Vandenberghe, J., Renssen, H., Roche, D.M.V.A.P., Goosse, H.J.M., Velichko, A.A., Gorbunov, A., Levavasseur, G.
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: 2012
• Subjects: /dk/atira/pure/sustainabledevelopmentgoals/climate_action; name=SDG 13 - Climate Action; /dk/atira/pure/sustainabledevelopmentgoals/life_below_water; name=SDG 14 - Life Below Water; Arctic; Global warming; Ice; North Atlantic; permafrost; Sea ice
• Online Access: https://research.vu.nl/en/publications/ebf3b7d6-777e-4454-a188-a5430be1243c; https://doi.org/10.1016/j.quascirev.2011.12.001

In order to specify potentially causal relationships between climate, permafrost extent and sea-ice cover we apply a twofold research strategy: (1) we cover a large range of climate conditions varying from full glacial to the relatively warm climate projected for the end of the 21st Century, (2) we combine new proxy-based reconstructions of Eurasian permafrost extent during the LGM and climate model simulations. We find that that there is a linear relationship between the winter sea-ice extent in the North Atlantic and Arctic Oceans and the latitude of the southernmost permafrost limit in Eurasia. During the LGM, extensive sea-ice cover caused a zonal permafrost distribution with the southern margin extending W-E and reaching 47°N, contrasting with the present-day NW-SE trending margin (66°-52°N). We infer that under global warming scenarios projected by climate models for the 21st Century the Arctic sea-ice cover decline will cause widespread instability of, mainly discontinuous, permafrost in Eurasian lowlands. © 2011 Elsevier Ltd.