2022 Arctic Report Card

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) presented the 2022 Arctic Report Card, highlighting that the warming Arctic reveals shifting seasons, widespread disturbances, and the value of diverse observations.

Issued annually since 2006, the Arctic Report Card is a timely and peer-reviewed source for clear, reliable and concise environmental information on the current state of different components of the Arctic environmental system relative to historical records.

This year’s Arctic Report Card also features the most comprehensive chapter in the annual report’s 17-year history about how these dramatic environmental changes are felt by Arctic Indigenous people, and how their communities are addressing the changes.

The 15th chapter of the report card, authored by a team that includes Native Alaskan scientists, describes how warming air temperatures, shrinking sea ice, shorter periods of snow cover, increased wildfire, rising levels of precipitation and changes in animal migration patterns and their abundance profoundly affect the safety, food security, health, economic wellbeing and cultural traditions of Indigenous people.

The 2022 Report headlines findings that shifting seasons and climate-driven disturbances, such as wildfires, extreme weather, and unusual wildlife mortality events, are becoming increasingly difficult to assess within the context of what has been previously considered normal.

• The average surface air temperature over the Arctic for this past year (October 2021-September 2022) was the 6th warmest since 1900. The last seven years are collectively the warmest seven years on record.
• Low pressure across the Alaska Arctic and northern Canada sustained warm summer temperatures over the Beaufort Sea and Canadian Archipelago.
• The Arctic continues to warm more than twice as fast as the rest of the globe, with even greater warming in some locations and times of year.

 

The 2022 Report Card consists of 15 peer-reviewed studies on multiple aspects of changing conditions in the Arctic region, from surface air temperature, the Greenland Ice sheet, and Arctic Ocean Productivity to Pan-Arctic Ship Traffic, Lake Ice, and Arctic Pollinators.

"While summer 2022 appeared near normal in terms of melt and ice loss, Greenland saw record breaking warmth in September that led to record melt for that month," said Tom Mote, associate dean in the Franklin College and co-author on the Greenland Ice Sheet study. "In recent years, we have seen more instances of ice sheet melt occur in spring and fall, outside of the normal melt season."

Read the full report.

Image: US Coast Guard Cutter Healy (WAGB-20) breaks ice near 81°N, 179°W during the 2022 US Synoptic Arctic Survey* on October 10, 2022 – Sarah Kaye, US Coast Guard, USA & National Science Foundation, Alexandria, VA, USA.