News
The Melting Glaciers of Svalbard Offer an Ominous Glimpse of More Warming to Come
New research reveals what one scientist called a “very stark image of climate change” as methane leaks from springs exposed by the glaciers’ retreat.
By Lydia Larsen
The remote arctic islands of Svalbard, Norway, the northernmost settlement in the world, have been called a canary in the coal mine of climate change, warming more than two times faster than other areas of the arctic and five to seven times faster than the rest of the planet.
Related Knowledge Center: Climate science
State of Play
What began as a theory in the 1890s — that industrial emissions of carbon dioxide could increase global temperatures — had progressed to a scientific fact a century later. Scientists across a range of disciplines are studying the impact of the still-growing concentration of carbon dioxide and other so-called “greenhouse gases” in the atmosphere as they call for industrial and governmental policies to slow, then halt, the warming of the planet.