By Alex Morales
Dec. 12 (Bloomberg) — Arctic sea-ice retreat is likely to accelerate so rapidly that the Arctic Ocean will be nearly ice- free in summer by 2040, atmospheric scientists said.
Here’s a few extracts:
This October, temperatures across much of the Canadian Arctic were as much as 9.3 degrees centigrade warmer than the 1951-1980 average for that month, according to graphics on the Web site of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies. Those temperatures are slowing the winter refreezing of the sea.
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NASA said in September that the Arctic’s perennial sea ice — or the frozen water that usually doesn’t melt during the summer — last winter shrank by about 720,000 square kilometers, an area the size of Texas. Overall ice coverage, which also includes thin seasonal ice, was stable over the winter. The proportion accounted for by perennial ice — 3 or more meters (10 or more feet) thick, decreased, it said.
