Arctic sea ice 'vanishing at faster rate than expected'

Scientists may have seriously underestimated the speed at which Arctic sea ice will melt in the coming decades, caused by global warming, according to a study published today.

All of the computer models used by the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) appear to have erred on the side of extreme caution when estimating the time it will take for sea ice to disappear during summer.

Researchers have found that the sea ice, which is essential for polar bears to hunt seals, is melting far more quickly than the IPCC has predicted, largely because of accelerated warming caused by man-made emissions of greenhouse gases. The IPCC models predict that summer sea ice in the Arctic could disappear completely around 2080 but scientists from the US National Snow and Ice Data Centre in Boulder, Colorado, suggest that the loss could occur 30 years earlier if current melting rates are maintained.

Julienne Stroeve, the lead researcher, said: "Current model projections may in fact provide a conservative estimate of future Arctic change, and that the summer Arctic sea ice may disappear considerably earlier than IPCC projections."

The scientists used computer models to make predictions about the loss of sea ice between 1953 to 2006 and compared the projections with what actually happened based on early measurements made by aircraft and ships as well as more recent satellite data.

According to the models, the average sea ice loss in September - when summer sea ice is at its seasonal minimum - should have been 2.5 per cent per decade, with a maximum loss of 5.4 per cent per decade. However, the actual loss based on real measurements for September amounted to 7.8 per cent per decade for the same period between 1953 and 2006.

One of the reasons why the Arctic sea ice is disappearing so quickly is because the loss of reflective ice causes the open ocean to absorb heat more easily.

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