Blue Arctic Summer Possible Within Next Decade, Study Says

A study indicated that emissions from burning fossil fuels might cause summer days with almost no sea ice in the Arctic within the next decade.

This would shift the unique environment, which is home to polar bears, seals, and walruses, from a "white Arctic" to a "blue Arctic" during the summer months, according to scientists.

The computation for "ice free" is less than 1 million square kilometers, in which case the Arctic would be predominantly water.

Ice Free Summer

The findings, published in the journal Nature Reviews Earth & Environment, show that the first ice-free day in the Arctic could come more than ten years earlier than previously predicted.

According to the authors, continuously ice-free Septembers could be expected between 2035 and 2067. The exact year within that era is determined by how quickly the world reduces the amount of fossil fuels burned.

By the end of the century, ice-free conditions are possible between May and January in a high-emission scenario and August to October in a low-emission scenario.

"This would transform the Arctic into a completely different environment, from a white summer Arctic to a blue Arctic. So even if ice-free conditions are unavoidable, we still need to keep our emissions as low as possible to avoid prolonged ice-free conditions," said Alexandra Jahn, an associate professor of atmospheric and oceanic sciences at the University of Colorado Boulder and a lead author of the research.

Sea ice is frozen ocean water that melts in the summer and then freezes again in the winter. Sea ice in the Arctic has been shrinking for years, notably in September, when it reaches its lowest point of the year.

Earlier research predicted that if greenhouse gas emissions continued at their current rate, it would be nearly ice-free by the end of the century.

Impact Of Lose Sea Ice

Sea ice has an impact on Arctic communities and species like polar bears and walruses.

It also helps regulate the planet's temperature by regulating the circulation of the atmosphere and ocean. It decreases the impact of ocean waves on the coast, therefore, if it is lost, the waves would be stronger and larger, causing more erosion.

"A decreasing sea ice cover threatens the survival of ice-adapted species like polar bears, who depend on sea ice to hunt. So the longer ice-free conditions last, the more the survival of polar bears is threatened," said Jahn.

Scientists have stated that what occurs in the Arctic does not remain there.

Other research has demonstrated that the disappearance of summer sea ice in the Arctic has the potential to alter weather in the United States and raise wildfire hazards in the western United States.

An ice-free Arctic Ocean during the summer would also make the Arctic considerably more accessible for shipping, mining, and tourism.

However, Jahn stated that there is hope for resolving this situation.

She said that unlike the Greenland ice sheet, which took thousands of years to construct, even if all of the Arctic sea ice melts, if scientists can then discover how to take carbon dioxide back out of the atmosphere in the future to counteract warming, sea ice will come back within a decade.