2025/03/29 by Mark England, Lorenzo M. Polvani, James A. Screen +1 · 1 voice
Earth and Planetary Sciences · #Arctic and Antarctic ice dynamics
paper · pdf · doi:10.22541/essoar.174329135.56312606/v1
openalex publication_date 2025/03/29 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/29
Over the past two decades, Arctic sea ice loss has slowed considerably, with no statistically significant decline in September sea ice area since 2005. This pause is robust across observational datasets, metrics, and seasons. Large-ensemble CMIP5 and CMIP6 simulations reveal that such periods with no sea ice decline under increasing greenhouse gas emissions are not unusual. Analysis of ensemble members that simulate analogues of the observed pause indicates that the current slowdown could plausibly persist another five to ten years. The modelling evidence suggests that internal variability has substantially offset anthropogenically forced sea ice loss in recent decades, although possible contributions from changes in the forced response remain uncertain. Overall, this observed pause in Arctic sea ice decline is consistent with simulated internal variability superimposed on the long term trend according to the bulk of the climate modelling evidence.