As rising global temperatures alter the landscape of the Arctic, scientists are observing a new record in Antarctica.
Preliminary data from the National Snow and Ice Data Center indicates Antarctica will likely set a record this year for the lowest sea ice extent.
Unlike the Arctic, where scientists say climate change is accelerating, Antarctica’s sea ice extent is highly variable.
“There’s a link between what’s going on in Antarctica and the general warming trend around the rest of the world, but it’s different from what we see in mountain glaciers and what we see in the Arctic,” said Ted Scambos, a glaciologist at the University of Colorado Boulder.
The rate of sea ice loss in the Arctic and the Antarctic differs partly due to their location and proximity to other continents. In the Arctic, which is surrounded by land, sea ice forms and extends throughout Europe, Asia, North America and Greenland. In contrast, the Antarctic is a large continent surrounded by a vast ocean where sea ice can stretch across the Southern Ocean.
Scambos said that because continents are warming rapidly, snow cover is melting earlier than usual and exposing the dark ground surface, which absorbs more heat, causing the Arctic to melt faster. However, the Antarctic stays covered in ice, which reflects sunlight and keeps the surrounding air cooler.
“Polar regions really have a way of making these small changes a bigger deal,” said Scambos, “either through sea-level rise, which is the main cause for concern from Antarctica, or through warmer climate generally, because the Arctic is sort of the air conditioner for the places where most of us live in the Northern Hemisphere.”
He adds that it would take more than a decade of a continuous downward trend in order to link the dwindling sea ice in the Antarctic to climate change, even though temperature conditions in many parts of Antarctica are already exhibiting a warming trend.
https://www.cnn.com/2022/02/18/world/antarctica-sea-ice-low-extent-record-climate/index.html