Climate Scientists Predict Exact Day When the Arctic Will Go Ice-Free and It’s Sooner Than We Think
The European Space Agency revealed that the earth is now 1.5 degrees Celsius warmer than before, and recent assessments have deduced that this change risks crossing delicate climate tipping points. Even minor fluctuations in the planet’s temperature are felt at Earth's extreme poles—the North and South poles. While the drastic implications of global warming in Greenland and the Arctic are not new information, a new study predicted that the latter will be ice-free in three years’ time.
By summer 2027, the Arctic Ocean will witness its first ice-free day at the current pace of greenhouse gas emissions. According to the study published in the journal Nature Communications in December 2024, this “ominous milestone for the planet” will inevitably occur between a period of nine to 20 years after 2023 even if humans decide to modulate greenhouse gas emissions to ideal concentrations. Co-author Alexandra Jahn said, "The first ice-free day in the Arctic won't change things dramatically.” She is a climatologist at the University of Colorado Boulder and an associate professor at the Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences at the institution.
Considering the worst-case scenario, the snow-clad Arctic Ocean will go ice-free within three years. Jahn indicated that while the ice-free Arctic may not be the end of the world, it is evidence that “we've fundamentally altered one of the defining characteristics of the natural environment in the Arctic Ocean, which is that it is covered by sea ice and snow year-round, through greenhouse gas emissions,” per Science Daily. She teamed up with Celine Heuze from the University of Gothenburg in Sweden and an international research team to predict the first ice-free day in the northernmost ocean of the North Pole using climate models simulating the environmental impacts on Arctic ice.
The Arctic Ocean is known to be the home of polar bears and plays a crucial role in maintaining the balance in the world’s climate, per WWF. The Arctic ice reflects most of the sunlight it receives back into space, thus, imparting a cooling effect for the rest of the planet. However, the Arctic sea ice has been melting at an alarming rate of 12% each decade inching closer to a day when all of its ice will disappear from the face of Earth, though, temporarily. The National Snow and Ice Data Center reported that September 2024 hit an all-time low in Arctic sea ice with the least frozen seawater record since 1978. The criteria for the Arctic Ocean to be ruled as ice-free would require the sea ice levels to fall below 1 million square kilometers, per the study.
The scientists also predicted based on their projections that while the ice-free day in the Arctic might occur as soon as 2027, the first ice-free month in the polar region will inevitably happen by the 2030s. "Because the first ice-free day is likely to happen earlier than the first ice-free month, we want to be prepared. It's also important to know what events could lead to the melting of all sea ice in the Arctic Ocean," Heuze explained. The ice-free Arctic will only add to the drastic impacts of global warming as less ice will reflect sunlight in minimal amounts. The darker ocean will, in turn, absorb and trap heat from the Sun facilitating warmer climates that could potentially alter wind and ocean current patterns.