According to report by the American Meteorological Society
According to the2012 State of the Climate report released online by the American Meteorological Society (AMS), last year war one of the ten warmest years on record globally.
The peer-reviewed report, with scientists from NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, NC serving as lead editors, was compiled by 384 scientists from 52 countries. It provides a detailed update on global climate indicators, notable weather events, and other data collected by environmental monitoring stations and instruments on land, sea, ice, and sky.
Conditions in the Arctic were a major story of 2012, with the region experiencing unprecedented change and breaking several records. Sea ice shrank to itssmallest “summer minimum” extent since satellite records began 34 years ago. In addition, more than 97 percent of theGreenland ice sheetshowed some form of melt during the summer, four times greater than the 1981-2010 average melt extent.
The report used dozens of climate indicators to track and identify changes and overall trends to the global climate system. These indicators include greenhouse gas concentrations, temperature of the lower and upper atmosphere, cloud cover, sea surface temperature, sea-level rise, ocean salinity, sea ice extent and snow cover. Each indicator includes thousands of measurements from multiple independent datasets.
The Arctic continues to warm; sea ice extent reaches record low
The Arctic continued towarm at about twice the rate compared with lower latitudes. Minimum Arctic sea ice extent in September and Northern Hemisphere snow cover extent in June eachreached new record lows.
Arctic sea ice minimum extent (1.32 million square miles, September 16) was the lowest of the satellite era. This is 18 percent lower than the previous record low extent of 1.61 million square miles that occurred in 2007 and 54 percent lower than the record high minimum ice extent of 2.90 million square miles that occurred in 1980.
Sea level reaches record high
Following sharp decreases in global sea level in the first half of 2011 that were linked to the effects of La Niña, sea levels rebounded toreach record highs in 2012. Globally, sea level has been increasing at an average rate of 3.2 0.4 mm per year over the past two decades.
Find more information at articles below
NOAA Climate News-State of the Climate in 2012: Highlights
Huffington Post – Records for Arctic Ice Melt, Greenhouse Gas Emissions in 2012 as World Continues to Warm: Report