Report: Arctic heating nearly 4 times faster than rest of Earth
The Arctic is heating 3.8 times faster than the planet as a whole, according to a new study published in the journal Communications Earth & Environment and reported on by NPR.
Scientists previously calculated that the Arctic was warming about twice as fast as the rest of Earth, but the new research found that previous studies underestimated the impact of warming since 1979, when reliable satellite measurements first became available. "The Arctic is more sensitive to global warming than previously thought," said Mika Rantanen of the Finnish Meteorological Institute, one of the study's authors.
In recent years, heat waves in the far north, which have fueled wildfires and increased ice melt, suggest Arctic warming could be even more intense than the computer models show. Read more at NPR.
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Harold Maass is a contributing editor at The Week. He has been writing for The Week since the 2001 debut of the U.S. print edition and served as editor of TheWeek.com when it launched in 2008. Harold started his career as a newspaper reporter in South Florida and Haiti. He has previously worked for a variety of news outlets, including The Miami Herald, ABC News and Fox News, and for several years wrote a daily roundup of financial news for The Week and Yahoo Finance.
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