Winter Arctic sea ice loss may be underestimated, study finds
Researchers from Cambridge and CIMAT compiled the largest database of a biomarker produced by algae in sea ice, using ocean sediment cores from the mid-Holocene period to estimate ancient sea ice cover. By comparing these measurements to 27 climate models of the same period using Bayesian weighting, the researchers found that models over-predicted winter sea ice extent. When the model weights were applied to future projections, the researchers report that winter sea ice loss estimates were about a million square kilometres lower than previous estimates. The study, published in Nature Geoscience, also suggests that snowfall over southeast Greenland and rainfall in the Mediterranean may be underestimated, with potential implications for Greenland ice sheet stability and flood risk in southern Europe.
