Quickly melting ice in the Arctic with no effort to stop it may someday bring a stage where critical ecological change is uncontrollable, a team of international scientists said in a "groundbreaking" new report Friday.
In the Arctic Resilience Report, released Friday, the team of scientists said Arctic ice is melting faster than ever before and it will probably only get worse. In fact, the ecological change currently happening in the Arctic region is unprecedented, they say, and could one day become irreversible.
"The signs of change are everywhere in the Arctic: Temperatures nearly 20°C above the seasonal average are being registered over the Arctic Ocean. Summer sea-ice cover has hit new record lows several times in the past decade. Infrastructure built on permafrost is sinking as the ground thaws underneath," the SEI said in a news release accompanying the report.
"[The report] identifies 19 tipping points that can and have occurred in Arctic marine, freshwater and terrestrial ecosystems. These regime shifts affect the stability of the climate and landscape, plant and animal species' ability to survive, and Indigenous Peoples' subsistence and ways of life."