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Data on Arctic
Warming?
by Andrew Bridges, .c The Associated Press |
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SAN FRANCISCO (Dec. 8) - The northernmost reaches of the Earth are warming,
reducing the sea ice across the Arctic Ocean, melting the ice sheet in Greenland
and spreading shrubs into the Alaskan tundra, scientists said Saturday.
Taken individually, the changes only suggest the region's climate is undergoing
a warming trend. Together, they provide dramatic evidence the change is real, a
panel of scientists said during at a meeting of the American Geophysical Union.
``If you look at all the data sets together, they do provide compelling evidence
something is changing over a great area,'' said Larry Hinzman, of the University
of Alaska, Fairbanks.
Natural variability may be behind the changes, but human activity might also be
to blame, scientists said.
A new five-year research plan presented this week by scientists and government
officials meeting in Washington, D.C., asserts that people clearly are agents of
environmental change, though it is still unclear how much human activity
contributes.
President Bush wants industry to voluntarily cut smokestack and tailpipe
emissions of carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping gases that scientists
believe are leading to a global rise in temperatures.
Evidence of the rise can be seen across the Arctic already, scientists said
Saturday.
Greenland is experiencing a warm spell unseen since the 1930s. Satellite data
show the greatest area of melt across its mammoth ice sheet in 24 years of
measurements occurred this year.
Since 1979, the melt area has grown by 16 percent and is affecting higher and
higher elevations.
Across the Arctic Ocean, the floating mantle of ice that covers it throughout
much of the year shrank to record levels this summer, said Mark Serreze, also of
the University of Colorado. In September, sea ice extent was 4 percent lower
that that seen in any previous September since monitoring began in 1978.
Changes in Arctic atmospheric and marine circulation patterns are partly
responsible, but depletion of the ozone layer due to pollution may also play a
role, Serreze said.
On land, too, scientists note changes that suggest temperatures are rising.
Shrubs are pushing farther northward, growing in areas of tundra that were void
of trees as little as 50 years ago, said F. Stuart Chapin III of the University
of Alaska, Fairbanks.
``The real question is, is this recent trend unusual, is this recent trend cause
for concern that we are having an effect? The answer seems to be yes,'' Serreze
said.
12/08/02 09:02 EST
Copyright 2002 The Associated Press. The
information contained in the AP news report may not be published, broadcast,
rewritten or otherwise distributed without the prior written authority of The
Associated Press. All active hyperlinks have been inserted by AOL.
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