LOS ANGELES: Human-caused climate change is on track to make the
Arctic Ocean
functionally ice-free for part of each year starting sometime between 2044 and 2067, according to a study. Researchers at the University of
California
,
Los Angeles
in the US noted that as long as humans have been on Earth, the planet has had a large cap of sea ice at the
Arctic Circle
that expands each winter and contracts each summer.
Satellite observations show that since 1979, the amount of sea ice in the
Arctic
in September — the month when there is the least sea ice, before water starts freezing again — has declined by 13% per decade, the researchers said.
Scientists have been attempting to predict the future of Arctic sea ice for several decades, relying on an array of global climate models that simulate how the climate system will react to all of the
carbon dioxide entering the atmosphere.
However, the models’ predictions have disagreed widely, according to the study published in the journal Nature Climate Change.
Among the current generation of models, some show ice-free Septembers as early as 2026, while others suggest the phenomenon will begin as late as 2132. “Arctic sea ice is a key component of the earth system because of its highly reflective nature, which keeps the global climate relatively cool,” said the study’s lead author,
Chad
Thackeray.