Sea Ice Seasonal Cycle In Response To Global Warming

In order to provide context for the recent decline of ice in the sea, it is imperative to understand how the sea ice has varied over the past two centuries. Of particular interest, the period around 1920-1940 showed an “increase in almost twice the global average rate in past 100 years. [ ]” The warming during this time can be used to compare the decline of sea ice observed since 1979, but what will also be discussed is how this time period was also quite controversial due to its substantial variance between the official views and views held by other people. The reliability of the sea ice observations during the first half of the 20th century according to some people cannot provide certainty to estimating

Recently, arctic sea ice has been melting due to global warming. In 1984, there was 1.86 square kilometers of “old sea ice” and now there is only 110,000 square kilometers of the “old sea ice.” usually, as the atmosphere gets warmer, the new ice melts faster but the old ice is not melted away completely. Now, the old ice is getting weaker and melting faster due to global warming/climate change. This is an issue because as the earth gets hotter, the old ice will no longer get thicker, which helped keep ice on the sea. If there is no old ice, there is a chance that there will be no sea ice at all.

Most of the world’s population has little knowledge on how important the Arctic truly is. The ice in the Arctic is melting at one of the fastest rates in human history. During the summer season a certain amount of ice is estimated to melt, this wouldn’t have been a problem a few decades ago, the winter storms and cold would replenish the ice lost over the summer, keeping the total amount of ice in the arctic relatively stable. But now, the total amount of ice in the Arctic decreases all year long. The Arctic regulates the Earth’s temperature, acting like an air conditioner. The acceleration of the Arctic melting has played a role in the extreme weather events over the past few years, such as; unpredicted heat waves and droughts in the U.S.

Glaciers serve as an important indicator to the changes occurring on Earth. Global warming and climate change are definitely observable changes. For more than a century, Earth’s temperature has been increasing dramatically, thus contributing to the melting of Earth’s glaciers. Melting is observed in the ice sheets of Antarctica, Greenland and non-polar glaciers found around the world (Nat Geo). A small amount of ice is stored in non-polar glaciers in comparison to ice sheets. However non-polar glaciers have had a significant effect on sea-level rise. Non-polar glaciers have higher mass-balance sensitivity than the large ice sheets of Antarctica and Greenland. It is estimated about half of sea-level rise is attributable to the shrinkage of non-polar glaciers, according to glacier mass-balance data (Fujita). Some non-climatic factors that affect mass balances include oceanic circulation, sliding rates due to basal water supply and stability of ice shelves. Climatic factors include precipitation, temperature and sunlight. Recently, the spotlight has been placed on human impacts, particularly the

First of all, the Arctic sea ice is melting because of extra greenhouse gases that humans are adding to the earth’s atmosphere. The Arctic sea ice is important because it keeps the polar region cool and helps the moderate global climate. When the Arctic sea ice melts, not only do coastal

The Arctic and Antarctic sea ice is a necessity to the animals currently residing on the ice. It provides necessary nutrients for them to thrive off of, acts as a home for various amounts of species that are suitable to live there, and help keep the water’s heat from adding to the cause of global warming. In conclusion, sea ice is vital to keep the environment

Scientists have dedicated a significant amount of time and resources to establish the impacts of climate change on Arctic ecosystems. Markedly, the major concern of the study is the expectation that the Arctic region will face adverse effects of global warming than other biomes because the Arctic is more susceptible to these impacts of climate change. This explains the phenomenon of the vulnerability of the arctic zones to the climatic changes observed today. The effects of climatic changes have impacted on the arctic vegetation, arctic animal life, and life in the arctic seas.

Shiny ice and snow reflect a high proportion of the sun's energy into space. As the Arctic loses snow and ice, bare rock and water absorb more and more of the sun’s energy, making it ever warmer and sparking the ‘albedo effect’. This causes more melting of ice and more warming causing more melting.

If I have the honor to be accepted to attend the DIS Copenhagen program, I plan on studying the environment and organisms in the Arctic Sea through the Glaciers and Human Impact: Icelandic Climate Change Case Study, along with Biological Conservation and Biodiversity with Lab, and Biology of Marine Mammals with Lab. As I am hopefully moving to Denmark in the future, I plan on taking Danish I & II which will help me understand the culture and language more efficiently and cover my language requirements. Presently, I am an Environmental Science major with minors in Mathematics, Chemistry, and Biology. The biological and environmental courses relate well with my Environmental science major and my biology minor as well as covering earth space science and biology electives.

When considering the retreat of the Greenland and the Antarctic ice sheets it is important to understand how global warming is affecting the total mass and volume of the ice sheets. Global warming, put simply is affecting ice sheets in two main ways. Warmer temperatures cause higher levels of precipitation, which means more snowfall. On the contrary, warming temperatures cause ice sheets to thin and melt. Therefore we must deduce which has the greater effect. A variety of techniques, some which have been mentioned earlier have been employed over the years to measure Greenland and Antarctica’s mass balances. Various independent measurements have all agree upon a clear long-term trend showing a decline in ice mass. Confirmation has been acquired by the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment, which measured shifts in Earth’s gravity field. In the 1960s Greenland was losing 100 gigatonnes of ice per year, this rate slowed during the 1970s and 1980s in near mass balance. By 1996 the rate of ice mass loss had increased to 97 gigatonnes per year. As of 2007 a rapid increase of ice loss occurred, measured at 267 gigatonnes per year. In the larger scheme of things we see how the amount of precipitation vs. the amount of melting interact with each other. Earlier research suggested that the ice sheets

Global warming is a phenomenon whereby the earth's average temperature increases. Global warming has a devastating effect on the Earth's climate. Scientists are still studying global warming effects, and have not reached a consensus about what will happen in the future. The melting of the polar ice caps and global warming are getting more and more attention lately. If melting glaciers caused by global warming, or it is a natural process - at this moment opinion of scientists and experts is diverge. There are many causes of the melting of the polar ice caps and global warming, some of which are natural. However, the activities of man are responsible for much of the rapid change that

The fear of global warming has been looming over people, and baffling scientists for decades. Since it was recognised that climate change is becoming accelerated due to human resources, the knowledge around it has been slowly evolving. Fifty years ago, as will be discussed, thinking around the subject was quite different. Even now experts cannot come to a consensus as to what the result of climate change will be. It is observed, at present, that global warming has made a huge impact on the marine ecosystem as the sea temperature and amount of carbon continues to rise. One of the great concerns about global warming is its effect on the cryosphere and polar caps, of which the science will be later explored. In addition, it is predicted that if global warming continues to develop within the next ten years, the world will change drastically for the worse.

One of the effects of global warming is the polar ice caps’ melting. Scientists have been researching and examining the polar ice caps for a long time and they have come to the conclusion that the thin ice sheets are slowly wasting away. They have also found out that Greenland’s glaciers are getting smaller and smaller. Places around the globe that use to be covered in ice and snow are now showing more green terrain as the years go on and as the winter months grow warmer. The polar ice caps are melting more and more due to higher global temperatures. This is really bad because the ice caps “reflect and help regulate the Earth’s temperatures.”

The negative side of an unnatural weather change is that it prompts softening of ice. The world's icy masses, particularly Arctic ice sheets are liquefying speedier than new snow and ice can supplement them. Amid the liquefying of Arctic ice opens over the dim surface of the water or soil and adjust change reflects less and retain a more prominent measure of warmth, consequently,

If global warming keeps going unchecked, there will be dire consequences for the Arctic. There have been several prediction models that show what type of climate and environment that the Arctic will have in the future. Stephen Vavrus and his colleagues display this prediction through the National Center for Atmospheric Research’s Community Climate System Model, version four (CCSM4). The CCSM4 shows that the it is going to be “a much warmer, wetter, cloudier, and stormier