Antarctic/Arctic

Lorde urges climate action ahead of new book on Antarctica trip

27 Nov 20 - Kiwi singer Lorde has written an impassioned entreaty for the world to face the climate emergency head-on after visiting Antarctica.

Greenland’s ice loss likely to hit 12,000-year high

6 Oct 20 - By the end of this century Greenland’s ice loss will probably be higher than in any century during the last 12,000 years.

Melting Arctic needs new name to match reality

17 Sep 20 - Change in the far north is happening so fast that soon the Arctic won’t be arctic any more.

ANTARCTICA: 60% of ice shelves at risk

28 Aug 20 - Approximately 60% of Antarctica’s ice shelves could be vulnerable to fracture, accelerating the loss of the Antarctic ice sheet and increasing sea-level rise, according to a paper.

Greenland's ice sheet at 'point of no return'

18 Aug 20 - Greenland's ice sheet has reached the point of no return and would continue to melt even if the climate crisis were halted, scientists are warning.

Earth's biggest ice sheet more vulnerable than thought

28 Jul 20 - Shocking evidence suggests that the last time the East Antarctic ice sheet collapsed, it added more than three metres to sea level rise, and that it’s likely to happen again.

Human climate change causes record Arctic heat

27 Jul 20 - AN INTERNATIONAL team of scientists has pinned the strange weather and record heat in the Siberian Arctic firmly on human-induced climate change.

How many polar bears will be left in 2100?

23 Jul 20 - Researchers have long known that polar bear populations will almost certainly suffer as a result of climate change. But a new study projects that by the end of the century, the bears may exist only...

Australia has a bad idea in Antarctica

22 Jul 20 - Australia wants to build a 2.7km concrete runway in Antarctica, the world’s biggest natural reserve. The plan, if approved, would have the largest footprint of any project in the continent’s history.

We're encroaching on Antarctica’s last wild places

17 Jul 20 - Since Western explorers discovered Antarctica 200 years ago, human activity has been increasing. Now, more than 30 countries operate scientific stations in Antarctica and more than 50,000 tourists...

Nature doesn't trust us any more

13 Jul 20 - Frozen ground in the Arctic is thawing, harming indigenous people’s hunting livelihoods and destabilising buildings and roads across the rapidly warming region.

What an ocean hidden under Antarctica reveals about our future climate

6 Jul 20 - Jules Verne sent his fictional submarine, the Nautilus, to the South Pole through a hidden ocean beneath a thick ice cap. Written 40 years before any explorer had reached the pole, his story was...

Beavers new threat as Arctic lakes thaw

1 Jul 20 - Beavers are creating lakes that accelerate the thawing of frozen soils and potentially increase greenhouse gas emissions, a study finds.

Trump plan would open huge area of Alaska to drilling

29 Jun 20 - Some of most ecologically sensitive lands in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska, a few hundred miles west of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, might soon be open for business to the oil...

The iciest Antarctic waters are now less icy

19 Jun 20 - An unusual combination of events has caused the Weddell Sea to lose more sea ice than in recent years.

'Zombie fires’ are erupting in Alaska

2 Jun 20 - The bitterly cold Arctic winter typically snuffs out the seasonal wildfires that erupt in this region. But every once in a while, a wildfire comes along that refuses to die.

Climate change turning Antarctica's snow green

21 May 20 - Warming temperatures in Antarctica are helping the formation and spread of “green snow” that in places can be seen from space.

Largest Arctic science expedition finds itself on thin ice

19 May 20 - Covid-19 is just one of many setbacks for hundreds of scientists pursuing critical climate questions in the world’s most remote and inhospitable environment.

Plastic waste now litters Antarctic shore

13 May 20 - British and German scientists have identified "sickening" levels of plastic waste in the Southern Ocean that washes around Antarctica.