November 20, 2005
Last modified November 20, 2005 - 12:17 am
Climate change in Arctic studied for keys to Earth's warming
By MIKE STARK
Of The Gazette Staff
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TOOLIK LAKE, Alaska - Bruce Peterson, on his hands and knees, claws
through a thick pad of peat moss and into the brown muck beneath. "Put your hand in there and
feel that," he says over his shoulder.
The hole is an icebox chilled by a slab of frozen soil that starts about a foot below the surface
and, in places, extends deeper than the length of a football field.
The permafrost on Alaska's northern reaches froze thousands of years ago and has acted as a
year-round thermostat for the tundra's plants, animals and water systems.
But in recent decades, temperatures have warmed in the Arctic, and the top layers of the
permafrost have thawed. One longtime researcher predicts that half of interior Alaska's
permafrost could be gone by the end of the century.
In some places, the tundra is already crumbling into itself because of the thawing. In other
places, suddenly unstable trees are tilting over in "drunken forests" and coastal villages on
eroding land are being relocated.
They are just a few tangible signs of the Earth's warming, scientists say.
"We think the system is falling apart," says Peterson, a scientist who has been tracking the
effects of climate change in Alaska since 1976. "This is the canary in the mine. There's no other
latitude on Earth that's seen that kind of change."
In the Arctic, climate change - in the form of melting sea ice, shifting vegetation and thawing
permafrost - is arriving sooner and more intensely than anywhere else on the planet, scientists
say.
But it isn't just the Arctic that's apt to change.
An upward shift in global temperatures could have real effects in Montana, Wyoming and the
rest of North America, including less water for irrigation, more wildfires, more insect outbreaks,
warmer winters, poorer ski conditions, better growing conditions father north, disappearing
glaciers and more heat waves.
Although there is still intense debate among some
scientists, politicians and others, the international
scientific consensus is that the globe's temperatures
have risen dramatically in the past 100 years.
While the whole picture is unclear, most of the
warming can probably be attributed to human
activities, primarily from burning fossil fuels and
producing emissions from smokestacks and
tailpipes, most climatologists say.
"Our environment is changing faster than any other
time that we know of in the history of the Earth,"
Peterson says after wiping the tundra's dark soil
from his hands. "We've ratcheted up the change."
***
A change is already being seen in Montana, albeit on a smaller scale.
Winters are shorter, snow melts earlier, river basins are warmer, precipitation is dropping and
glaciers in Glacier National Park are disappearing.
"It's already happening," said Steve Running, a professor at the University of Montana and a
member of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), an international scientific
body known as a leading authority on the issue. "These are firm trends that we can see."
A change in the climate is nothing new. For most of the Earth's 4.6 billion years, the atmosphere
didn't support life. And since algae and other tiny organisms began springing up some 450
million years ago, the climate has swung wildly between hot and cold periods.
But what's happening now appears to be different, most climatologists say, especially in how
quickly changes are taking place.
2005 looks as if it'll be the hottest year on record, according to NASA's Goddard Institute for
Space Studies, which takes the planet's temperature with readings from 7,200 weather stations
across the globe.
Before this year, 1998 was the warmest. Also among the warmest years on record were 2002,
2003 and 2004.
"As I like to say, we've left the envelope of natural variability," Running said.
The IPCC predicts that global temperatures will increase 3 to 10 degrees Fahrenheit by the end
of the century.
In Montana - where paychecks and
lifestyles are closely tied to
snowpack and weather - the results
could benefit some and hurt others.
Future generations could see more
intense competition for irrigation
water, drier soil, non-native bugs
and plants thriving, hotter summers,
more wildfires and shorter ski
seasons, according to a federally
sponsored assessment.
It could also allow more big elk and
deer to survive winter, lengthen
growing seasons and increase
productivity for some crops and
grasses. Wheat yields, according to
one study's estimate, could jump by
more than a third in a warmer
climate. Barley and hay yields are
more uncertain.
"The consequences are going to be
real," said the University of North
Dakota's George Seielstad, who coauthored a chapter in a federal report
in 2000 that examined the potential effects of climate change in the Great Plains. "I think it's
serious. I think we should be worried."
A changing climate would disproportionately affect family farmers and ranchers in rural
communities, according to the report that Seielstad helped to produce. But people tend to be
focused on more immediate threats such as drought, shifting markets and strained economies.
And uncertainty about large, long-term climate changes leaves many skeptical.
"I've read articles on global warming just like everybody has," said John Stevens, a Billings-area
farmer. "I've got mixed reviews on it. I'll leave it at that."
***
There will always be uncertainty about the climate because the world is a complex place where
many things are not understood.
But by increasing so-called greenhouse gases - including carbon dioxide and methane - more of
the sun's heat is trapped in the Earth's atmosphere, driving up global temperatures.
In Montana, it's unclear whether warmer temperatures worldwide will result in a wetter or drier
climate. It's possible that different parts of the state would experience different effects.
But what seems predictable is that winters will be shorter, temperatures will continue to rise, the
proportion of rain to snow will change, snowmelt will be earlier, growing seasons will shift,
plants will take up water sooner, and forests will dry out more quickly, said Julio Betancourt, a
paleo-ecologist and climate researcher for the U.S. Geological Survey in Tucson.
"There are a lot of unknowns," Betancourt said. "But if you're a Westerner, you've got to be
fearful of how temperature is going to end up affecting snowpack."
To learn more about what may happen in the Lower 48, researchers look to the top of the world.
***
Every summer, dozens of scientists come to Alaska's North Slope to study climate change.
The Toolik Lake Field Station - operated by the University of Alaska-Fairbanks and the Marine
Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, Mass. - is tucked just beyond the northern foothills of the
Brooks Range inside the Arctic Circle.
It's a remote spot at a bend in the gravel road that snakes along the 800-mile Alyeska pipeline.
Unless they drive north from Fairbanks, scientists fly into Prudhoe Bay on the edge of the Arctic
Ocean and then bounce along for a scenic, four-hour ride past musk ox, caribou, ice-covered
rivers and vast expanses of squishy Arctic tundra.
In 1975 scientists chose Toolik Lake - the Inupiak word for loon - as an ideal spot to study Arctic
lakes, rivers, wildlife and vegetation.
Aside from the highway and the pipeline, the tundra has remained essentially unchanged for
eons, a place of 24-hour sunlight in the summer, unbroken darkness in the winter, and snow
cover that lasts seven to nine months each year.
Ancient rituals of survival also play out here barely impeded by humans: wolves and grizzlies
chase moose and caribou; arctic grayling spawn as the ice breaks in small streams; low-lying
shrubs suck in summer light to last through the sunless winter.
All of them are likely to change in the face of temperatures that have climbed about 1 degree
Fahrenheit per decade over the past 30 years.
Overall, average temperatures in the Arctic have risen at nearly twice the rate as rest of the world
in the past few decades, according to a report compiled by an international team of Arctic
scientists.
The evidence is being seen in melting sea ice, thawing permafrost, and changes in water flow
and vegetation. Each threatens to spin out consequences not only in the Arctic, but beyond.
"This is a huge change that's occurring," says Donie Bret-Harte, a University of AlaskaFairbanks scientist who helps run the research station.
In some cases, changes in the Arctic could exacerbate conditions that lead to rising temperatures
in a phenomenon called "positive feedback."
When sea ice melts, for example, there is less white surface to reflect the sun's rays away from
the Earth. The water's dark surface absorbs more light, leading to warmer water temperatures,
which leads to more sea ice melting.
Elsewhere, thawing underground could release more carbon into the atmosphere, which could
add to the amount of "greenhouse gases," which could, in turn, lead to higher temperatures and
more underground thawing.
***
A few miles outside camp, a chunk of the tundra caved in two years ago. The gash in the ground
- apparently driven by an ice wedge helped along by warm temperatures - has grown about 15
feet since it first split.
Where there used to be a small stream, there's now a crumbly mess of dirt, exposed ice and
chocolate-brown pools of water.
"This is an example of the tundra falling apart," says William "Breck" Bowden, a University of
Vermont researcher studying how water moves through the Arctic landscape.
It's difficult to tie these kinds of land collapses, called thermokarsts, directly to climate change,
but researchers suspect a connection.
"We have this nagging suspicion that we are seeing them more frequently because they're
happening more frequently," Bowden said.
When the ground caves in, erosion of the tundra accelerates and more nutrients are released into
the water systems. More nutrients are fine but can throw the system out of balance, scientists say.
Vladimir Romanovsky, a Russian-born geophysicist at the University of Alaska-Fairbanks, has
been studying sinkholes and other phenomenon related to permafrost in Alaska's Arctic.
Romanovsky and the university's Geophysical Institute run the world's most extensive system of
stations tracking permafrost. They use gauges bored deep into the frozen soil to measure
temperature.
The permafrost, he says, is disappearing - melting on its bottom layers from the Earth's interior
heat and on the top from warmer surface temperatures.
By the end of the century, permafrost
throughout Alaska's interior will be
thawing, and the area could lose 50
percent of its resident permafrost, he
said.
The thawing could soak forests and
change how water flows. Boreal forests
could turn into wet bogs or dry out and
become treeless grasslands. The ground
could become less stable, driving up
costs to build roads, pipelines and
buildings.
"The ecosystems will change. There
will be some winners and losers,"
Romanovsky says late one night in the
cafeteria. "I can't say it'll be bad or
good. It'll be different."
***
In the Rocky Mountains, a shift could mean complex changes in alpine plant and animal
communities and make some species more vulnerable to extinction, according to a group of
federal and state scientists conducting climate research in the Western mountains.
Although there have been few large-scale studies about how climate change might affect the
West, some scientists say it's not hard to imagine what might happen.
Ski slopes, for instance, could see more uneven snow and shorter seasons, according to some
predictions.
The National Ski Areas Association recently launched a "Keep Winter Cool" campaign aimed at
educating skiers about climate change, how it might affect ski slopes and what consumers can do
about it.
"It's definitely on our radar screen, but I just wish the radar screen was a lot clearer," said Chip
Vicary, chief financial officer for Red Lodge Mountain Resort. "I remember back in the '70s the
talk was about an impending ice age."
The mountain has already made a preemptive strike against the wiggles of climate: Red Lodge
has the largest snowmaking system in the state.
Elsewhere in the state, short winter seasons have forced at least one ski area to close.
***
Mountain trees, too, may be showing signs of the warming trend.
Across the West, the native bark beetle population has exploded. Normally, the beetles play a
key role in regulating forest growth. But in recent years, massive outbreaks have occurred in
places they have not been seen before.
It's not uncommon for one type of beetle to proliferate in certain areas. But to have them in such
great numbers - including mountains in Montana and Wyoming - in so many places "is nothing
short of remarkable," said a recent scientific paper by Jesse Logan, an entomologist with the U.S.
Forest Service in Utah, and James Powell, of Utah State University.
In 2003, nearly a half-million acres of forest were hit by the tree-killing bugs in Montana. In
Yellowstone National Park, biologists estimate that bugs have infested 50,000 acres, perhaps the
largest outbreak recorded in the park.
Some have said the beetle outbreak is part of normal cyclical patterns. Others, though, think it
may be somehow linked to climate change: warmer temperatures allow them to multiply faster,
survive at higher elevations and spend more time finding trees in the summer.
"A warming climate is the one commonality across all of these spectacular outbreak events," said
the paper from Logan and Powell.
Cold water streams that host Montana's legendary trout could also heat up. Even a 1.5 degree
increase in air and water temperature could eliminate 5 to 30 percent of trout habitat, said Bruce
Farling, executive director of Montana Trout Unlimited.
In addition, changing conditions could give an advantage to non-native fish that outcompete
native trout, and even encourage whirling disease, a parasite-driven disease capable of wiping
out fish stocks.
"Some of this really freaks me out," Farling said.
Changes have already been seen in other parts of the state.
The amount of precipitation in Eastern Montana has decreased by 10 percent over the past 100
years, according to one analysis. Another says that the past five years have delivered the hottest
temperatures in 110 years in the Colorado and Missouri river basins.
The average temperature in Helena increased 1.3 degrees between the late 1800s and 1997.
Those shifts may seem small, but they can alter a sensitive balance to which man and nature have
become accustomed.
In many places across the West, ecosystems are already starting to react to climate change, said
Betancourt, of the USGS.
"This is getting awful dicey," he said. "I think people better start paying attention to this."
It's important that the public and especially public land managers take a long view of climate
change and how it might affect natural resources, Betancourt said.
"I think there are a lot of hard questions and none of us have the answers," he said.
***
Peterson, the scientist who has come to Toolik Lake since 1976, is troubled by the various
climate change phenomena being investigated on Alaska's North Slope.
His specialty is tracking how melting in the Arctic Circle will increase the flow of fresh water to
the ocean.
He doesn't like what he sees.
Rivers in the Arctic are dumping more and more fresh water into the Arctic Ocean, and
forecasters predict the trend will continue.
The problem is that the heavier fresh water weighs on the salt water, which could impede the
circulation of ocean currents. Those currents play an important role in redistributing the sun's
heat from the equator to the rest of the planet. It's a driving force in the Gulf Stream that pushes
warm water up the East Coast and across the Atlantic to Europe.
At some point, the "freshening" of the Artic Ocean could reach a critical point and shut down
that ocean circulation.
Those series of events could trigger "abrupt climate change," says Peterson, a nightmarish,
though still speculative, scenario that could cause some places to cool rapidly while others warm.
The Pentagon recently commissioned a study to look at the national security implications of such
a scenario.
Abrupt climate change could put a crimp in the world's food and water supplies, leading to more
global tension and wars and a shift in political allies away from religion or ideology to the need
for resources to survive, the report said.
Peterson, who spends a good deal of his time thinking about the future of the world under a
changing climate, said the details of the report might be up for debate, but the idea may not be
far off base.
It's unlikely that Peterson will see those kinds of scary scenarios in his lifetime, he said.
"But we don't know (whether) you can say that about your children or grandchildren," Peterson
said.
Reporter Mike Stark took part in ecology
research in northern Alaska in June as
part of a month-long science journalism
fellowship sponsored by the Marine
Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole,
Mass. Stark covers environmental issues
and Yellowstone National Park for The
Gazette.
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