Arctic Is Losing South Carolina-Sized Ice Sheets Every Year

Photo By: National Snow and Ice Data Center

Nowhere on the globe are the effects of climate change as clear as in the Arctic, where ice has been disappearing at an accelerated rate for years. The seasonal summer melt this year ranked second next to 2007, and the downward trend is clear from this chart. Unlike in 2007, when a "perfect storm" of weather accelerated melting, 2011 was a more typical winter, weather-wise, making the extreme melting that much more concerning, according to the end-of-season report from the National Snow and Ice Data Center.

Overall, the Arctic at the height of its summer in September has had an average of 12% less ice every decade. Each year, on average, there are 32,7000 square miles less of ice in September. That's bigger than the state of South Carolina.

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