Antarctic climate: Short-term spikes, long-term warming linked to tropical Pacific

BOULDER--Dramatic year-to-year temperature swings and a century-long warming trend across West Antarctica are linked to conditions in the tropical Pacific Ocean, according to a new analysis of ice cores conducted by scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) and the University of Washington (UW). The findings show the connection of the world's coldest continent to global warming, as well as to periodic events such as El Niño.

"As the tropics warm, so too will West Antarctica," says NCAR's David Schneider, who conducted the research with UW's Eric Steig. "These ice cores reveal that West Antarctica's climate is influenced by atmospheric and oceanic changes thousands of miles to the north."

The research appears this week in the online Early Edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The work was supported by the National Science Foundation, NCAR's sponsor.

Scientists are keenly interested in whether warming will destabilize the West Antarctic ice sheet over a period of decades or centuries. The ice sheet covers an area the size of Mexico, averages about 6,500 feet deep, and, if melted, would raise global sea levels by about 8 to 16 feet (2.5-5 meters).

Antarctica's climate is difficult to study, partly because there are few observations of this vast and remote region and partly because the cold, dry atmosphere is unlike that of the other six continents. Scientists previously determined that Antarctica overall probably warmed by about 0.4 degrees Fahrenheit (0.2 degrees Celsius) in the last century. But it has not been apparent until now that low-lying West Antarctica is more responsive to global warming trends than East Antarctica, where wind patterns have largely kept out comparatively warm air.

Schneider and Steig estimate that West Antarctica warmed about 1.6 degrees F (0.9 degrees C) over the 20th century. That is slightly more than the global average of about 1.3 degrees F (0.7 degrees C). Because of the large swings in annual temperature during the 1930s and 1940s, there is a considerable margin of uncertainty in the century-long estimate, says Schneider. He notes that there is increased confidence that warming has occurred since 1950, averaging about 0.8 degree F (0.4 degrees C) per decade.