New Finnish-Norwegian research published Thursday shows Arctic global warming is happening nearly four times as fast as the entire globe. This is known as Arctic amplification.
“We show that during 1979-2021, the Arctic has warmed nearly four times faster than the globe, and provide evidence that climate models struggle to simulate this four-fold Arctic amplification ratio,” the researchers wrote.
The study scientists said their research cautions that referring to Arctic warming as being twice as fast as the global warming rate is “a clear underestimation of the situation during the last 43 years since the start of satellite observations.”
“It’s a really vulnerable environment in the Arctic, and seeing these numbers, it’s worrying,” said Antti Lipponen, a scientist with the Finnish Meteorological Institute who contributed to the study.
The study said those high warming rates are consistent with recent research. The primary reason for such high Arctic Amplification values, the study said, “is the reduction of cold-season ice cover, which has ben most pronounced in the Bering Sea.”