The National Snow and Ice Data Center has just announced that the 2023 minimum Arctic sea ice extent occurred on 19 September and is the 6th lowest on record. With 2023’s peak in the books, we are adding another stripe to our Arctic sea ice stripes! 

 Why does Arctic sea ice matter? 

Planetary warming will exacerbate by 25-40% if we lose Arctic ice and snow cover. With another year of record emissions, this is the path we are currently taking. However, the loss of Arctic sea ice is directly related to global CO2 emissions (Stroeve & Notz, 2018), which means the sooner we cut emissions, the more ice we can save. 

On our current trajectory, we can no longer expect a future with summer sea ice in the north. In fact, it could melt nearly completely by the 2030s—roughly a decade earlier than previously projected. 

Our Chief Science Officer, Professor Julienne Stroeve, captures this trajectory: “While record high temperatures were occurring across large parts of the planet, the Arctic Ocean had a relatively average to slightly cooler-than-average summer. However, despite a late start to the melt season over the central Arctic Ocean, the overall ice extent reached 6th lowest. This reflects the fact that even if summer weather patterns are not extremely favourable for large amounts of ice loss, the thinner ice pack today compared to the 1980s is too thin for much of it to survive summer.” 

 Find out more about Arctic sea ice here –  Arctic Sea Ice

Global temperatures have slightly decreased after a  summer with 36 consecutive days above any previous record, a phenomenon not seen in at least 125,000 years. However, the two consecutive months above 1.5C provided a glimpse into future warming  that will soon be commonplace if we do not cut emissions urgently. The Paris Accords were designed to safeguard the conditions for human survival—that is, to keep us within life-sustaining planetary boundaries, including the key warming threshold of 1.5C above preindustrial levels.  

However, just two months above +1.5C has unleashed a cascade of global disasters, highlighting that even the widely accepted limit set in the Paris Agreement is not a universally safe space for hundreds of millions of people around the world.  

In early September, Storm Daniel struck Libya, triggering the deadliest flooding event in Africa since 1900. According to the WHO, 3,958 people are confirmed dead with as many as 9,000 still missing. The torrential rains that struck Libya were only one facet of the deadly impact of the climate crisis  and highlight the cascading consequences of extreme weather. A year’s worth of rain within 24 hours caused two already weakened dams to collapse, precipitating the flooding. The country’s low-lying coast makes it vulnerable to flooding, but its weak infrastructure and fragmented disaster preparation and response systems heighten community risk.  

Libya is just one area in the world that saw catastrophic flooding recently. Ten regions saw devastating flooding in just 12 days. Before hitting Libya, Storm Daniel became one of the strongest systems to touch down in Greece, according to Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis. Streets turned into rivers; cars were washed into the sea. Nearby, people died in flooding in Türkiye, Bulgaria and Spain. In Asia, typhoons Haikui and Saola washed through southern China, Taiwan and Hong Kong, flooding metro systems and trapping drivers in their vehicles.  

In the United States, a hyperactive Atlantic cyclone season and jet stream blocks have brought flooding to parts of the East Coast, including New England and New York. In the west, Nevada’s Burning Man festival was turned into a giant mud pit. In South America, flooding in the Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul earlier in September was the state’s worst natural disaster in 40 years.  

These global parallels are not random. We know that for each degree (centigrade) that the atmosphere warms, it can hold seven percent more moisture. We know that unprecedented ocean temperatures are driving storms. Many of these global weather patterns are influenced by the warming Arctic, which can alter precipitation and jet stream patterns. Like the flooding in Libya, which swept so many people away whilst asleep, those who bear the brunt of the climate crisis have often contributed the least to the global emissions responsible for it. Learn more about how global risks are associated with Arctic climate change here. 

The Arctic Ocean will soon be ice-free during the summers, even with significant cuts in global carbon emissions. There are major implications that arise from this: amplification of global warming by 25-40%; increase in climate-related disasters worldwide – especially in climate vulnerable regions; increase in risks to local wildlife and Indigenous communities; and rise in shipping-related environmental risks.

This week, the Polar Tipping Points Hub was launched in the Global Collaboration Village, a metaverse built by the World Economic Forum in partnership with Accenture and Microsoft, with scientific support from Arctic Basecamp. The Hub aims to help drive leaders to take collective urgent action in the real world.  

Read more on how metaverse technology is catalysing action on polar ice tipping points and/or see the promo VIDEO.