How Arctic Feedback Loops Impact Earth’s Climate

Here’s how Arctic feedback loops could trigger climate catastrophe around the world.

A warming Arctic can catapult the world into climate disaster through feedback loops that impact the entire planet. Julienne Stroeve is an Arctic ice expert and a Canada-150 Research Chair in Climate Forcing of Sea Ice at the University of Manitoba. She studies Arctic snow and ice feedback loops. Stroeve says it’s not just snow and ice melt that we need to worry about. As the Arctic warms, permafrost, a layer of soil that typically remains frozen for a period of 2+ years, melts and causes another type of feedback loop. She says these Arctic feedback loops have a detrimental effect on the planet as a whole. Stroeve says this doesn’t mean that climatic trends in the Arctic are more important than those elsewhere, but people need to realize that they are intricately connected.