Warmer winters due to climate change are causing lakes in the Northern Hemisphere to experience more ice-free years, according to a new study.
Warmer winters due to climate change are causing lakes in the Northern Hemisphere to experience more ice-free years, according to a new study.
Researchers recently analyzed nearly 80 years of lake ice data, stretching from 1939 to 2016, for 122 lakes that typically freeze every winter. They found ice-free years have become more than three times more frequent since 1978 and 11% of lakes studied experienced at least one completely ice-free year since 1939. This trend is linked to abnormally warm winter temperatures, and the study authors project it will continue with increasing frequency due to climate change. Such ice-free years could have significant ecological, cultural and economic impacts.
“Lake ice is becoming increasingly absent,” said Alessandro Filazzola, a community ecologist at York University and the University of Alberta in Canada and lead author of the new study in AGU’s journal Geophysical Research Letters. “Even under low carbon emissions scenarios, we’re going to have continued ice-free events.”
Read more at: American Geophysical Union
