Arctic Sea Ice Data Sets in the Context of Climate Change During the 20th Century

Abstract Climate Change is a widely debated scientific subject and Anthropogenic Global Warming is its main cause. Nevertheless, several authors have indicated solar activity and Atlantic Multi-decadal Oscillation variations may also influence Climate Change. This article considers the amplification of solar radiation’s and Atlantic Multi-decadal Oscillation’s variations, via sea ice cover albedo feedbacks in the Arctic regions, providing a conceptual advance in the application of Arctic Amplification for modelling historical climate change. A 1-dimensional physical model, using sunspot number count and Atlantic Multi-decadal Oscillation index as inputs, can simulate the average global temperature’s anomaly and the Arctic Sea Ice Extension for the past eight centuries. This model represents an innovative progress in understanding how existing studies on Arctic sea ice’s albedo feedbacks can help complementing the Anthropogenic Global Warming models, thus helping to define more precise models for future climate change.

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Shifting surface

Novos Olhares ◽

10.11606/issn.2238-7714.no.2020.171993 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 9 (1) ◽

pp. 98-113

Author(s):

Ansgar Fellendorf

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Sea Ice ◽

Policy Research ◽

Arctic Sea Ice ◽

Spatial Reference ◽

Visual Discourse ◽

Change Effect ◽

Arctic Sea ◽

Climate Change Effect ◽

Policy Measures

This research explores how satellite images of Arctic sea ice contribute to climate change discourse. Different discourses require distinct responses. Policy measures are contingent upon representation, be it i.e. a threat or opportunity. The representations discussed are by the NSIDC and NASA, which hold a visual hegemony. First, the introduction discusses visual studies in policy research and identifies a simplified dichotomy of a threat discourse and environmental citizenship. Moreover, the methodology of visual discourse analysis based on poststructuralism is described. The delineated images portray a vertical, planar view allowing for spatial reference. Arctic sea ice is a visible climate change effect and the absence of boundaries, intervisuality with the Earthrise icon and focus on environmental effects support a discourse of citizenship.

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Arctic sea ice cover in connection with climate change

Izvestiya Atmospheric and Oceanic Physics ◽

10.1134/s0001433815090029 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 51 (9) ◽

pp. 889-902 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

G. V. Alekseev ◽

E. I. Aleksandrov ◽

N. I. Glok ◽

N. E. Ivanov ◽

V. M. Smolyanitsky ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Sea Ice ◽

Ice Cover ◽

Arctic Sea Ice ◽

Arctic Sea

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Evaluating Impacts of Recent Arctic Sea Ice Loss on the Northern Hemisphere Winter Climate Change

Geophysical Research Letters ◽

10.1002/2017gl076502 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 45 (7) ◽

pp. 3255-3263 ◽

Cited By ~ 56

Author(s):

Fumiaki Ogawa ◽

Noel Keenlyside ◽

Yongqi Gao ◽

Torben Koenigk ◽

Shuting Yang ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Sea Ice ◽

Northern Hemisphere ◽

Arctic Sea Ice ◽

Winter Climate ◽

Winter Climate Change ◽

Arctic Sea ◽

Hemisphere Winter ◽

Arctic Sea Ice Loss ◽

Northern Hemisphere Winter

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Gridded Arctic sea ice concentration reconstruction for the first half of the 20th century based on different proxy data

10.5194/egusphere-egu21-3106 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Vladimir Semenov ◽

Tatiana Matveeva

Keyword(s):

Sea Ice ◽

20Th Century ◽

Climate Model ◽

Surface Air Temperature ◽

Arctic Sea Ice ◽

The Arctic ◽

Sea Ice Concentration ◽

The North ◽

Arctic Sea ◽

Ice Concentration

Global warming in the recent decades has been accompanied by a rapid recline of the Arctic sea ice area most pronounced in summer (10% per decade). To understand the relative contribution of external forcing and natural variability to the modern and future sea ice area changes, it is necessary to evaluate a range of long-term variations of the Arctic sea ice area in the period before a significant increase in anthropogenic emissions of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. Available observational data on the spatiotemporal dynamics of Arctic sea ice until 1950s are characterized by significant gaps and uncertainties. In the recent years, there have appeared several reconstructions of the early 20th century Arctic sea ice area that filled the gaps by analogue methods or utilized combined empirical data and climate model&#8217;s output. All of them resulted in a stronger that earlier believed negative sea ice area anomaly in the 1940s concurrent with the early 20th century warming (ETCW) peak. In this study, we reconstruct the monthly average gridded sea ice concentration (SIC) in the first half of the 20th century using the relationship between the spatiotemporal features of SIC variability, surface air temperature over the Northern Hemisphere extratropical continents, sea surface temperature in the North Atlantic and North Pacific, and sea level pressure. In agreement with a few previous results, our reconstructed data also show a significant negative anomaly of the Arctic sea ice area in the middle of the 20th century, however with some 15% to 30% stronger amplitude, about 1.5 million km2 in September and 0.7 million km2 in March. The reconstruction demonstrates a good agreement with regional Arctic sea ice area data when available and suggests that ETWC in the Arctic has been accompanied by a concurrent sea ice area decline of a magnitude that have been exceeded only in the beginning of the 21st century.

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Early start of 20th-century Arctic sea-ice decline recorded in Svalbard coralline algae

Geology ◽

10.1130/g46507.1 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 47 (10) ◽

pp. 963-967 ◽

Cited By ~ 4

Author(s):

Steffen Hetzinger ◽

Jochen Halfar ◽

Zoltán Zajacz ◽

Max Wisshak

Keyword(s):

Sea Ice ◽

20Th Century ◽

Global Climate ◽

Ice Cover ◽

Arctic Sea Ice ◽

Coralline Algae ◽

Sea Ice Extent ◽

Early 19Th Century ◽

Arctic Sea ◽

Annual Resolution

Abstract The fast decline of Arctic sea ice is a leading indicator of ongoing global climate change and is receiving substantial public and scientific attention. Projections suggest that Arctic summer sea ice may virtually disappear within the course of the next 50 or even 30 yr with rapid Arctic warming. However, limited observational records and lack of annual-resolution marine sea-ice proxies hamper the assessment of long-term changes in sea ice, leading to large uncertainties in predictions of its future evolution under global warming. Here, we use long-lived encrusting coralline algae that strongly depend on light availability as a new in situ proxy to reconstruct past variability in the duration of seasonal sea-ice cover. Our data represent the northernmost annual-resolution marine sea-ice reconstruction to date, extending to the early 19th century off Svalbard. Algal records show that the decreasing trend in sea-ice cover in the high Arctic had already started at the beginning of the 20th century, earlier than previously reported from sea-ice reconstructions based on terrestrial archives. Our data further suggest that, although sea-ice extent varies on multidecadal time scales, the lowest sea-ice values within the past 200 yr occurred at the end of the 20th century.

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Arctic Sea Ice in the First Half of the 20th Century: Temperature-Based Spatiotemporal Reconstruction

Izvestiya Atmospheric and Oceanic Physics ◽

10.1134/s0001433820050102 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 56 (5) ◽

pp. 534-538

Author(s):

V. A. Semenov ◽

T. A. Matveeva

Keyword(s):

Sea Ice ◽

20Th Century ◽

Arctic Sea Ice ◽

Arctic Sea

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Early Holocene history of the Zachariae Ice Stream, NE Greenland: Evidence from geochemistry, grain size and sedimentary parameters

10.5194/egusphere-egu2020-169 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Joanna Davies ◽

Anders Møller Mathiase ◽

Christof Pearce ◽

Marit-Solveig Seidenkrantz

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Grain Size ◽

Sea Ice ◽

Surface Waters ◽

Arctic Sea Ice ◽

Early Holocene ◽

The Arctic ◽

Cold Surface ◽

Sea Ice Extent ◽

Arctic Sea

The Arctic region exhibits some of the most visible signs of climate change globally. Arctic sea ice extent and volume has been declining sharply in recent decades; observations indicate a mean annual decrease of 3.2% since 1980. However, no extensive network of sea ice observations extends back further than the mid-18th century and satellite data since the late 1970s; this limits perspectives of sea ice variability on longer time scales. Thus, to understand the processes governing sea-ice cover and variability, predict how sea ice and ocean conditions will respond to anthropogenic climate change and to understand if the shrinking of Arctic sea ice is a unique and irreversible process, longer records of sea ice variability and oceanic conditions are required.A multi-proxy approach, involving grain size, geochemical, foraminifera and sedimentary analysis, was applied to a marine sediment core from North East Greenland to reconstruct changes in sea ice extent and palaeoceanographic conditions throughout the early Holocene (ca. 12,400-7,800 cal. yrs. BP). The study aimed to improve the understanding of the interaction between ocean circulation, sea ice and fluctuations of the Zachariae Isstr&#248;m (ZI), one of the main glacier outlets of NE Greenland. Four distinct zones have been identified: Zone 1 (12,400-11,600 cal. yrs. BP) covering the transition from the Younger Dryas into the Holocene which evidences a gradually warming climate, resulting in a retreat of the ZI; Zone 2 (11,600 &#8211; 10,300 cal. yrs. BP) which encapsulates two distinct cooling events as a result of cooler surface waters, rapid release of freshwater and local feedback mechanisms. This coincides with sudden re-advances of the ZI followed by gradual retreats; 3) Zone 3 (10,300 &#8211; 8,600 cal. yrs. BP) shows warm and stable conditions, with warm surface waters that resulted in the retreat of the ZI; 4) Zone 4 (8,600 &#8211; 7,800 cal. yrs. BP) which shows a rapid return to cooler conditions, with cold surface waters and rapid freshwater outbursts resulting in the re-advance of the ZI, forced by decreasing solar insolation and cold surface waters. Our investigation thus indicated that changes in oceanic conditions at the NE Greenland shelf had a significant impact on the extent and melting rate of the ZI glacier.

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Arctic sea ice-free season projected to extend into fall

10.5194/tc-2018-69 ◽

2018 ◽

Author(s):

Marion Lebrun ◽

Martin Vancoppenolle ◽

Gurvan Madec ◽

François Massonnet

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Solar Energy ◽

Sea Ice ◽

Climate Models ◽

Arctic Sea Ice ◽

Arctic Ecosystems ◽

Simple Mechanism ◽

Arctic Sea ◽

Ice Retreat ◽

Sea Ice Reduction

Abstract. The recent Arctic sea-ice reduction is associated with an increase in the ice-free season duration, with comparable contributions of earlier retreat and later freeze-up. Here we show that within the next decades, the trends towards later freeze-up should progressively exceed and ultimately double the trend towards an earlier ice retreat date. This feature is robustly found in a hierarchy of climate models and is consistent with a simple mechanism: solar energy is absorbed more efficiently than it can be released in non-solar form until freeze-up. Based on climate change simulations, we envision an increase and a shift of the ice-free season towards fall, which will affect Arctic ecosystems and navigation.

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