Arctic sea ice, a key component of Earth’s natural thermostat, has thinned sharply in recent years, with the northern polar ice cap shrinking steadily in surface area, government scientists said on Monday.
Thinner seasonal sea ice, which melts in the summer and freezes in the fall, now accounts for about 70 percent of the total in the Arctic, up from 40 percent to 50 percent in the 1980s and 1990s, the researchers said, citing new satellite data.
At the same time, thicker ice, which lasts two summers or more without melting, now comprises less than 10 percent of the northern polar ice cap in winter, down from 30 to 40 percent. Just two years ago, the thicker, so-called perennial sea ice made up 20 percent or more of the winter cap.
Scientists have voiced concerns for years about an alarming decline in the size of the Arctic ice cap, which functions as a giant air conditioner for the planet’s climate system by reflecting sunlight into space.
As a greater portion of the ice melts, it is replaced by darker sea water that absorbs much more sunlight, thus adding to the warming of the planet attributed to rising levels of greenhouse gases emitted into the atmosphere by human activity.
“The ice cover plays a key role in the climate,” Thomas Wagner, chief snow and ice scientist for NASA, said in a conference call with reporters. “The thicker ice particularly is very important, because it’s the thicker ice that survives the summer to stay around and reflect that summer sunlight.”
Walter Meir of the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colorado, said: “We’re getting an ice cover as we finish the winter and head into summer that’s much more vulnerable to the summer melt and much more likely to melt completely and expose that dark ocean.”
The decade-long trend of a contracting ice cap around the North Pole is continuing as well.
The maximum extent of Arctic sea ice this winter was measured at 15.2 million square kilometers, the fifth-lowest winter peak on record. That tally represents a loss of some 720,000km² — about the size of Texas — from the winter peak average between 1979 and 2000.
The six lowest measurements since satellite monitoring began in 1979 have all occurred in the past six years.
Meir said a strong consensus has emerged among climate scientists that the Arctic is headed for its first largely ice-free summer in the relatively near future, with forecasts running as early as 2013, though he sees that as too soon.
The government is aiming to recruit 1,096 foreign English teachers and teaching assistants this year, the Ministry of Education said yesterday. The foreign teachers would work closely with elementary and junior-high instructors to create and teach courses, ministry official Tsai Yi-ching (蔡宜靜) said. Together, they would create an immersive language environment, helping to motivate students while enhancing the skills of local teachers, she said. The ministry has since 2021 been recruiting foreign teachers through the Taiwan Foreign English Teacher Program, which offers placement, salary, housing and other benefits to eligible foreign teachers. Two centers serving northern and southern Taiwan assist in recruiting and training
WIDE NET: Health officials said they are considering all possibilities, such as bongkrekic acid, while the city mayor said they have not ruled out the possibility of a malicious act of poisoning Two people who dined at a restaurant in Taipei’s Far Eastern Department Store Xinyi A13 last week have died, while four are in intensive care, the Taipei Department of Health said yesterday. All of the outlets of Malaysian vegetarian restaurant franchise Polam Kopitiam have been ordered to close pending an investigation after 11 people became ill due to suspected food poisoning, city officials told a news conference in Taipei. The first fatality, a 39-year-old man who ate at the restaurant on Friday last week, died of kidney failure two days later at the city’s Mackay Memorial Hospital. A 66-year-old man who dined
EYE ON STRAIT: The US spending bill ‘doubles security cooperation funding for Taiwan,’ while also seeking to counter the influence of China US President Joe Biden on Saturday signed into law a US$1.2 trillion spending package that includes US$300 million in foreign military financing to Taiwan, as well as funding for Taipei-Washington cooperative projects. The US Congress early on Saturday overwhelmingly passed the Further Consolidated Appropriations Act 2024 to avoid a partial shutdown and fund the government through September for a fiscal year that began six months ago. Under the package, the Defense Appropriations Act would provide a US$27 billion increase from the previous fiscal year to fund “critical national defense efforts, including countering the PRC [People’s Republic of China],” according to a summary
‘CARRIER KILLERS’: The Tuo Chiang-class corvettes’ stealth capability means they have a radar cross-section as small as the size of a fishing boat, an analyst said President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday presided over a ceremony at Yilan County’s Suao Harbor (蘇澳港), where the navy took delivery of two indigenous Tuo Chiang-class corvettes. The corvettes, An Chiang (安江) and Wan Chiang (萬江), along with the introduction of the coast guard’s third and fourth 4,000-tonne cutters earlier this month, are a testament to Taiwan’s shipbuilding capability and signify the nation’s resolve to defend democracy and freedom, Tsai said. The vessels are also the last two of six Tuo Chiang-class corvettes ordered from Lungteh Shipbuilding Co (龍德造船) by the navy, Tsai said. The first Tuo Chiang-class vessel delivered was Ta Chiang (塔江)