Sea ice loss increases methane danger

Antarctic sea ice

The image below shows Antarctic sea ice concentration by the University of Bremen (left) and National Snow and Ice Data Center (right) on January 7, 2026. 

The image below shows Antarctic sea ice thickness on January 7, 2026. 

Massive loss of albedo amplifies the decline of Antarctic sea ice and the decline of the snow and ice cover over Antarctica, resulting in elevation of the global temperature that can be expected to persist at least through September 2026, when Arctic sea ice typically reaches its minimum extent.

Additional elevation of the global temperature can be expected due to an emerging El Niño.

The next El Niño

[ from earlier post ]

[ click on images to enlarge ]

The above image shows very high temperature anomalies forecast around Antarctica and over the Arctic Ocean for September 2026, at a time when Arctic sea ice volume is expected to be very low. Moving from the bottom of a La Niña to the peak of a strong El Niño can in itself make a difference of more than 0.5°C, as discussed in an earlier post. 

The image on the right, adapted from NOAA, shows Niño-3.4 region temperature anomalies and forecasts. 

The image on the right, adapted from NOAA, shows ENSO (El Niño-Southern Oscillation) probabilities, with El Niño (red bar) emerging in the course of 2026. 

The image below, adapted from ECMWF, shows the ENSO anomalies and forecasts for developments through November 2026 in Niño3.4 (left panel) and in Niño1+2 (right panel), indicating that the next El Niño will emerge and strengthen in the course of 2026. 

[ from earlier post ]

Arctic sea ice

Sea ice is low at both poles. This results in loss of global albedo, which elevates temperatures. El Niño can be expected to further elevate temperatures in the course of 2026.

Adding to the problems, Arctic sea ice has become very thin. Arctic sea ice volume is at a record low for the time of year, it has been at a record daily low for well over a year. The image below shows Arctic sea ice volume through January 7, 2026.

Note that Arctic sea ice volume for 2026 (pointed at by the arrow) is visible in black and is partly faded behind the legend. 

There is a huge danger that seafloor methane and methane from thawing terrestrial permafrost will add strongly and abruptly to the temperature rise, as discussed in many earlier posts such as this one and as illustrated by the screenshot below.

[ screenshot from earlier post ]

Greenhouse gas concentrations 

Carbon dioxide concentrations typically reach an annual maximum in May. The image below shows carbon dioxide concentrations (surface flasks) as high as 437 ppm recorded half 2025 at Mauna Loa, Hawaii.

Currently, concentrations of greenhouse gases at Utqiaġvik (formerly Barrow), Alaska, are very high and rising. The image below is adapted from an image issued by NOAA January 8, 2026, and shows recent monthly carbon dioxide concentrations as high as 442 ppm. 

The image below shows daily measurements of carbon dioxide concentrations from 2020. 

The above image and the images below are adapted from images issued by NOAA January 6, 2026.

These images show concentrations of greenhouse gases recorded at the Barrow Atmospheric Baseline Observatory (BRW), a NOAA facility located near Utqiaġvik (formerly Barrow), Alaska, at 71.32 degrees North latitude.

The image below shows hourly average methane measurements from 2020. 

The image below shows monthly average methane measurements from 2001.

The image below shows monthly average nitrous oxide measurements from 2016.

Temperatures

In the Northern Hemisphere, 2025 was the third year in a row with temperature anomalies more than 1.5°C above 1951-1980 and much more when compared to pre-industrial. Note also that El Niño wasn't elevating temperatures in 2025.

As illustrated by the image on the right, the highest temperature anomalies in the Northern Hemisphere in 2025 occurred over the Arctic Ocean. 

Climate Emergency Declaration

UN secretary-general António Guterres recently spoke about the need for “a credible global response plan to get us on track” regarding the international goal of limiting the global temperature rise. “The science demands action, the law commands it,” Guterres said, in reference to a recent international court of justice ruling. “The economics compel it and people are calling for it.”

What could be added is that the situation is dire and unacceptably dangerous, and the precautionary principle necessitates rapid, comprehensive and effective action to reduce the damage and to improve the outlook, where needed in combination with a Climate Emergency Declaration, as described in posts such as this 2022 post and this one and as discussed in the Climate Plan group.

Links

• NSIDC - Sea Ice Today
https://nsidc.org/sea-ice-today

• Tropicaltidbits.com
https://www.tropicaltidbits.com

• The threat of seafloor methane eruptions
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2025/11/the-threat-of-seafloor-methane-eruptions.html

• Feedbacks in the Arctic
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/feedbacks.html

• NOAA - Global Monitoring Laboratory, Data Visualisation, flask and station methane measurements
https://gml.noaa.gov/dv/iadv

• Focus on Antarctica
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2025/09/focus-on-antarctica.html

• Danish Meteorological Institute - Arctic sea ice volume and thickness
https://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/icethickness/thk.uk.php

• University of Bremen - sea ice concentration and thickness
https://seaice.uni-bremen.de/start

• Extinction
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/extinction.html

• Transforming Society
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2022/10/transforming-society.html

• Climate Plan
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/climateplan.html

• Climate Emergency Declaration
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/climate-emergency-declaration.html

Antarctic sea ice area reaches record daily low

Antarctic sea ice area remained at a record daily low on October 24, 2025, following a record daily low on October 23, 2025. Antarctic sea ice area was 12.40 million km² on October 24, 2025, a deviation from 1981-2010 of -3.57σ, as illustrated by the image below.

The above image also shows that Antarctic sea ice reached a record low area of 1.09 million km² on February 24, 2023, close to a Blue Ocean Event and corresponding with a deviation of -2.86σ, i.e. smaller than the deviation of -3.57σ reached recently (on October 23, 2025).

Global sea ice extent

Low sea ice extent means that less sunlight gets reflected back into space and instead gets absorbed by the sea surface, resulting in high sea surface temperatures. Currently, sea ice is low at both poles. The low global sea ice extent at this time of year spells bad news for Antarctic sea ice, which typically reaches its minimum extent in February. 

The image below shows that the standard deviation from 1981-2010 of the global sea ice extent was -6.89σ on October 31, 2025, which is remarkable given the absence of El Niño conditions in 2025. 

Arctic sea ice volume

Meanwhile, Arctic sea ice volume remains at a record daily low, as it has been for more than a year. The image below shows Arctic sea ice volume through October 31, 2025.

High temperatures

Low sea ice and polar amplification of the temperature rise contribute to high air temperatures at both poles. The image below shows the September 2025 temperature anomaly compared to 1951-1980.

[ from earlier post ]

The low sea ice and the high temperatures are even more remarkable given the absence of El Niño conditions.

[ click on images to enlarge ]

Little sunlight is yet reaching the South Pole at this time of year. While temperatures over Antarctica are still well below zero °C, they are rising fast. Antarctic temperature anomalies were high in September 2025 (see the above image) and in October 2025 (see the image below). 

The image on the right, adapted from NOAA, shows the ENSO outlook (CFSv2 ensemble mean, black dashed line) favors La Niña persisting into the early Northern Hemisphere winter 2025-26. 

[ image from earlier post ]

The image on the right, adapted from ECMWF, shows the ENSO anomaly and forecast for developments in Niño3.4 through August 2026, indicating that the next El Niño will emerge and grow in strength in the course of 2026.  

A record high daily Antarctic temperature was reached on October 26, 2025, corresponding with a temperature anomaly of +5.08°C versus 1979-2000, as illustrated by the image below. 

The inset on the image below shows high temperature anomalies at both poles vs 1991-2020 on October 26, 2025. 

A record high daily Arctic temperature was reached on October 27, 2025, corresponding with a temperature anomaly of +5.99°C versus 1979-2000, as illustrated by the image below. The inset on the image below shows high temperature anomalies at both poles vs 1991-2020 on October 27, 2025. 

Global temperature anomalies have been rising over the past few months, and reached a record daily high of 15.04°C, an anomaly of +0.93°C versus 1991-2020, on October 25, 2025, as illustrated by the image below.

The following day, on October 26, 2025, the temperature reached another daily high. The image below shows temperature anomalies in red from January 1, 2023, through October 26, 2025, with a non-linear (polynomial) trend added in blue. 

Note that the anomalies on the above images are calculated from 1991-2020. When calculated from pre-industrial, the anomalies will be much higher, as discussed in earlier post such as this one. 

The image below shows a forecast of the temperature anomaly vs 1981-2010 for November 2025. 

The image below shows a forecast of the temperature anomaly versus 1981-2010 for December 2025. 

The situation is dire. An Antarctic Blue Ocean Event (sea ice approaching a low of one million km²) threatens to occur in February 2026, triggering an Arctic Blue Ocean Event later in 2026 while the next El Niño is strengthening, which comes with a huge danger of massive amounts of methane erupting from the seafloor. 

Southern Ocean sea surface getting more salty

High temperature anomalies are present at both the poles, as illustrated by the image below that shows the situation on October 25, 2025. 

High temperatures come with Jet Stream distortion on October 25, 2025, as illustrated by the image below that shows the Jet Stream (at 500 hPa) moving deep over Antarctica. 

This came with high precipitable water anomalies over Antarctica, as illustrated by the image below. 

This came with snowfall over Antarctica, as illustrated by the image below. 

The danger has been discussed in earlier posts such as this one. The increased snowfall thickens the snow on Antarctica with only little freshwater returning to the ocean. As a result, the Southern Ocean surface is getting more salty, and as also discussed in an earlier post, saltier surface waters sink more readily, allowing heat from the deep to rise, which can melt Antarctic sea ice from below, even during winter, making it harder for ice to reform. This vertical circulation also draws up more salt from deeper layers, reinforcing the cycle.

This leads to a loss of sea ice (and thus loss of albedo and latent heat buffer), as well as less heat getting transferred from the atmosphere into the Southern ocean, while more heat can be transferred from the Southern Ocean to the atmosphere. 

The methane danger

The methane danger is illustrated by the image below, adapted from an image issued by NOAA October 29, 2025, showing hourly methane averages recorded at the Barrow Atmospheric Baseline Observatory (BRW), a NOAA facility located near Utqiaġvik (formerly Barrow), Alaska, at 71.32 degrees North. 

Danger assessment

A state of emergency is typically declared after a disaster hits a specific area. The idea is that repairs or replacement of buildings, equipment and infrastructure can quickly restore the situation to what it previously was. Insurance companies have traditionally determined premiums for insurance policies by calculating the risk of events by their severity and probability.   

However, extreme weather events can increasingly be expected to occur more frequently and important considerations are the intensity and severity at which one specific place gets hit by an event, as well as ubiquity and imminence of such events. As temperatures rise, more extreme weather events can be expected to occur with greater intensity, more frequently, over larger areas, with longer duration and to become more ubiquitous and follow each other up with increasing if not accelerating rapidity.

As the likeliness of a huge and accelerating temperature rise, the severity of its impact, and the ubiquity and the imminence with which it will strike all become more manifest—the more sobering it is to realize that a mere 3°C rise may suffice to cause human extinction.

Climate Emergency Declaration

UN secretary-general António Guterres recently spoke about the need for “a credible global response plan to get us on track” regarding the international goal of limiting the global temperature rise. “The science demands action, the law commands it,” Guterres said, in reference to a recent international court of justice ruling. “The economics compel it and people are calling for it.”

What could be added is that the situation is dire and unacceptably dangerous, and the precautionary principle necessitates rapid, comprehensive and effective action to reduce the damage and to improve the outlook, where needed in combination with a Climate Emergency Declaration, as described in posts such as this 2022 post and this one and as discussed in the Climate Plan group.

Links

• Kevin Pluck - Sea ice visuals
https://seaice.visuals.earth

• Climate Reanalyzer
https://www.climatereanalyzer.org

• Danish Meteorological Institute - Arctic sea ice thickness and volume 
https://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/icethickness/thk.uk.php

• Copernicus
https://pulse.climate.copernicus.eu

• Tropicaltidbits
https://www.tropicaltidbits.com

• NOAA - Global Monitoring Laboratory - Data Visualisation - flask and station methane measurements
https://gml.noaa.gov/dv/iadv

• Focus on Antarctica
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2025/09/focus-on-antarctica.html

• Antarctic sea ice in danger
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2025/10/antarctic-sea-ice-in-danger.html

• Transforming Society
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2022/10/transforming-society.html

• Climate Plan
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/climateplan.html

• Climate Emergency Declaration
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/climate-emergency-declaration.html

Emissions and Temperature Rise

The image below shows the Planet by land biome, i.e. forests, grassland, desert, tundra and shrubland. Rainforests are common in equatorial areas and they have steady temperatures year-round and high precipitation allowing for evergreen and semi-evergreen trees. Boreal forests, also called Taiga, cover much of the planet’s northern latitudes and their trees are coniferous (non-shedding), while trees in temperate areas do shed their leaves (deciduous).

Forests come with many climate benefits. Trees take carbon out of the atmosphere and store the carbon in the trees and in the soil, thus reducing global warming. Less carbon dioxide in the atmosphere also reduces ocean acidification. The top layer (canopy) of rainforests contains giant trees that can grow to heights of 75 m (about 250 ft) or more. The canopy prevents much sunlight from reaching the ground, thus cooling the surface locally. Trees hold the soil together and can pump up water from deep in the soil and, through evaporation, keep the surface and soil cool, thus also avoiding erosion and reducing fire hazards.

So, trees are responsible for cooling in many ways. Trees can darken the surface, which can cause more sunlight to be absorbed, thus resulting in more warming, but trees can also cause cooling in another way. Trees also release terpines and other biogenic volatile organic compounds (BVOCs) into the air. These BVOCs can react chemically in the atmosphere to form aerosols that reflect incoming solar radiation and thereby cause global cooling. These aerosols can also act to start clouds to form that result in rainfall and that shade the surface, reflecting more solar radiation back into space and thus cause further global cooling. 

While BVOCs have many benefits, they can also indirectly increase potent greenhouse gases including ozone and methane by depleting hydroxyl. A study led by Gillian Thornhill found that this could cause half the cooling effects of BVOCs to be lost. A recent study led by James Weber found that, when all the effects are combined, they can reduce the net climate benefit of wide scale tree-planting by up to one third.

The above image shows that organic matter aerosol optical thickness (55 nm) as high as 0.93 τ was recorded over North Australia on October 14, 2025 06:00 UTC.

A recent study led by Hannah Carle finds that a transition from sink to source has occurred for the aboveground woody biomass of the Australian moist tropical forests. Forests need to be supported and not just for their capacity to sequester carbon. The net climate benefit of trees is huge and is underestimated. While trees can cause some warming, they also cause more cooling. Their BVOCs are responsible for some depletion of hydroxyl, but this should be no reason to withhold support for forests. Instead, climate action should strongly support forests, while greater hydroxyl abundance is best accomplished by cleaning up industry sectors such as agriculture, transport and electricity generation.

IPCC downplays the temperature rise

The IPCC downplays the temperature rise in efforts to hide some of the most effective and necessary action, e.g. by presenting the impact of land use, gases and aerosols in most peculiar ways. Instead of comparing the climate impact of forests versus agriculture in commonly comprehensible language, such as a rise in degrees Celsius, the IPCC uses technical terms to make things less comprehensible for the typical reader (and voter).

As an example, the IPCC seeks to present deforestation as a change in land use that results in greater cooling, e.g. by arguing that deserts reflect more light back into space. As another example, the IPCC makes it look as if the temperature started rising only from 1850-1900, in efforts to hide the huge impact of deforestation that took place before those years.

Of the 14.9 billion hectares of land on the planet, only 71% of it is habitable – the other 29% is either covered by ice and glaciers, or is barren land such as deserts, salt flats, or dunes. About 10,000 years ago, 57% of habitable land was covered by forest and 42% was covered by wild grassland and shrubs. In 2023, 45% of habitable land was used for agriculture, as illustrated by the image below.

People have been herding animals and burning or cutting down trees for thousands of years. Before the Industrial Revolution, wood and plants were used for shelter and as building material. Plants also provided food for people and fodder for animals that were herded and that were used for food, ploughing, hunting, herding and transport. Biomass was also burned for heating, preparing food, cooking water, lighting and protection. 

Deforestation was the result of people's growing demand for biomass. Deforestation also increased due to trees getting cut down or burned as demand grew for land that could be used for urban purposes, as pasture or to grow more food and fodder.

[ click on images to enlarge ]

The 1850-1900 period that the IPCC uses as base to measure the temperature rise doesn't reflect pre-industrial well, for a number of reasons. Firstly, people's emissions pushed up temperatures long before that. Secondly, the 1850-1900 period was dominated by burning coal to provide heating and energy, which came with sulphur co-emission causing surface cooling, masking the temperature rise.

The rise from 1750 to 2024 in methane, carbon dioxide and nitrous oxide is illustrated by the image on the right, based on IPCC and WMO data.

While emission by people did accelerate since the start of the Industrial Revolution and even more recently, the rise in emission by people had already started thousands of years ago with growth in agriculture, herding of animals and associated deforestation, as illustrated by the combination image below, based on Ruddiman et al. (2015).

[ from earlier post ]

The temperature has risen accordingly since those times. Deforestation and growth in irrigation and numbers of people, livestock and herded animals and their crop waste, sewage and manure resulted in emissions. While much of the forests could initially regrow, the net result was a gradual loss of trees and the cooling aerosols they previously provided and a gradual growth in emissions such as methane, carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide and black carbon (soot). 

A 2013 study by Bond et al. calculates that black carbon has a warming effect of about 1.1 W/m², part of which is caused by black carbon darkening the snow and ice cover since pre-industrial times, as discussed on the aerosols page. By some calculations, the temperature in 1520 had risen by 0.29°C, compared to thousands of years earlier.

September 2025 temperature anomaly

The image below shows how much higher the September 2025 temperature was than it was in 1951-1980. 

The above image shows that the September 2025 temperature anomaly was high over both poles and especially high over some areas in Antarctica, where anomalies higher than +10°C versus 1951-1980 were recorded. 

As the image below shows, the temperatures recorded over Antarctica throughout September 2025 were higher than in most earlier years, while a record daily high temperature was recorded on October 10, 2025, a +3.62°C anomaly compared to 1979-2000. The inset shows high temperature anomalies versus 1991-2020 at both poles on October 10, 2025.

The image below shows that the global September 2025 temperature anomaly was 1.306°C higher than 1951-1980. Note that the 2025 anomalies were reached under borderline La Niña conditions that suppress temperatures and that the monthly temperature anomaly would be significantly higher when calculated from 1850-1900, which is typically used by the IPCC as baseline. 

[ Temperature Rise, click on images to enlarge ]

The full historic temperature rise and the rise to come soon could be much higher, as described on the image and below. The inset is also displayed and discussed in more detail below. 

Emissions and Temperature Rise

The observed temperature rise (O) is actually masked by aerosols (M) and the IPCC only includes the rise from the period 1850-1900, ignoring the rise before the period 1850-1900 (P) and the rise that took place to negate the natural fall in temperature. Aerosols could fall out of the air soon, so when adding things up (E1+E2), the historic temperature rise from pre-industrial (O+M+P) is huge. 

When also taking into account that the temperature would have fallen naturally, i.e. in the absence of these emissions and in line with Milankovitch cycles (E3), the rise caused by people to negate that could also be included (H), adding up to an even higher historic temperature rise (O+M+P+H).

Additionally, the full impact of all past emissions may not be fully felt yet, e.g. the full effect of carbon dioxide emissions reaches its peak only a decade after emission (E4). Furthermore, humans are likely to continue to cause emissions in the near future (E5). Finally, additional releases of greenhouse gases are likely to come from what was once called permafrost and from sinks turning into sources, resulting in an additional rise that's already baked into the cake (E6). Therefore, the historic rise plus the rise to come soon (O+M+P+H+F) may approach 5°C.

The diagram below further illustrates the importance of feedbacks and deforestation. Removal of trees has caused deforestation and soil carbon loss since prehistoric times, in turn causing emissions including carbon dioxide, methane and black carbon, while also reducing cooling aerosols released by trees and while also reducing the heat buffer of evaporation that previously cooled the atmosphere. Since prehistoric times, burning wood and deforestation has caused emissions of black carbon and dust that blackened the snow and ice cover, thus speeding up its decline. 

[ from earlier post ]

The image below illustrates how much the temperature may have risen from pre-industrial times and how much potential there is for a 3°C rise as early as in 2026.

[ from earlier post ]

Climate Emergency Declaration

UN secretary-general António Guterres recently spoke about the need for “a credible global response plan to get us on track” regarding the international goal of limiting the global temperature rise. “The science demands action, the law commands it,” Guterres said, in reference to a recent international court of justice ruling. “The economics compel it and people are calling for it.”

What could be added is that the situation is dire and unacceptably dangerous, and the precautionary principle necessitates rapid, comprehensive and effective action to reduce the damage and to improve the outlook, where needed in combination with a Climate Emergency Declaration, as described in posts such as this 2022 post and this one and as discussed in the Climate Plan group.

Links

• NASA - Earth by Biome

https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/biome

• Nullschool.net

https://earth.nullschool.net

• Climate-driven chemistry and aerosol feedbacks in CMIP6 Earth system models - by Gillian Thornhill et al. (2021) 

https://acp.copernicus.org/articles/21/1105/2021

• Missing the forest for the trees: The role of forests in Earth’s climate goes far beyond carbon storage - by Sarah Blichner and James Weber (2024) 
https://thebulletin.org/2024/05/missing-the-forest-for-the-trees-the-role-of-forests-in-earths-climate-goes-far-beyond-carbon-storage

• Chemistry-albedo feedbacks offset up to a third of forestation’s CO2 removal benefits - by James Weber et al. (2024) 

https://www.science.org/doi/full/10.1126/science.adg6196

• Aerosols

https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/aerosols.html

• Aboveground biomass in Australian tropical forests now a net carbon source - by Hannah Carle et al.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-025-09497-8

discussed on Facebook at: 

• Pre-industrial

https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/pre-industrial.html

• The World lost one third of forests

https://ourworldindata.org/world-lost-one-third-forests

• The Role of Energy Quality in Shaping Long-Term Energy Intensity in Europe - by Ruta Gentvilaite et al. (2015)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/8/1/133

• WMO news release: Carbon dioxide levels increase by record amount to new highs in 2024
https://wmo.int/news/media-centre/carbon-dioxide-levels-increase-record-amount-new-highs-2024
WMO Greenhouse Gas Bulletin - No. 21 (issued October 15, 2025)
https://wmo.int/files/greenhouse-gas-bulletin-no-21
discussed on Facebook at:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/arcticnews/permalink/10163357891699679

• Record low Arctic sea ice volume minimum highlights methane danger

https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2025/10/record-low-arctic-sea-ice-volume-highlights-methane-danger.html

• Transforming Society

https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2022/10/transforming-society.html

• Climate Plan
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/climateplan.html

• Climate Emergency Declaration
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/climate-emergency-declaration.html

Double Blue Ocean Event 2026?

A double Blue Ocean Event could occur in 2026. Both Antarctic sea ice and Arctic sea ice could virtually disappear in 2026. A Blue Ocean Event (BOE) occurs when sea ice falls to or under 1 million km², which could occur early 2026 for Antarctic sea ice area and in Summer 2026 in the Northern Hemisphere for Arctic sea ice area.

Arctic sea ice area reached an annual minimum of 2.70 million km² on September 9, 2025, the fourth-lowest minimum area, as illustrated by the image below. 

The low Arctic sea ice area is worrying, especially when considering that this minimum was reached in the absence of El Niño conditions. Lower air temperatures are now causing rapid growth of Arctic sea area, which is sealing off the Arctic Ocean and this makes it more difficult for ocean heat to be transferred to the atmosphere. Furthermore, Arctic sea ice volume was at a record daily low on September 16, 2025, as it has been for more than a year, as illustrated by the image below. 

More ocean heat could therefore reach sediments at the seafloor of the Arctic Ocean, which threatens to destabilize hydrates and cause huge amounts of methane to be released. Eruption of methane from the seafloor of the Arctic Ocean is one of the most dangerous feedbacks of rising temperatures. As the seafloor of the Arctic Ocean heats up, heat can penetrate sediments and cause destabilization of hydrates, resulting in eruption of methane. Since the seas in the Arctic Ocean can be very shallow, methane eruptions can occur abruptly, with great force and in the form of plumes, leaving little opportunity for the methane to get decomposed in the water. Furthermore, there is very little hydroxyl in the air over the Arctic, which extends the lifetime of methane over the Arctic.

[ The Buffer is gone, from Accelerating Temperature Rise ]

The above image illustrates the danger. Sea ice constitutes a buffer that previously consumed much incoming ocean heat (left); as sea ice thins, the buffer disappears while more heat also enters the Arctic Ocean (right). Further heat entering the Arctic Ocean from the Atlantic Ocean and the Pacific Ocean threatens to destabilize sediments that contain methane, causing eruption of huge amounts of methane.

The danger is also illustrated by the image below, adapted from an image issued by NOAA September 18, 2025, showing hourly methane averages recorded at the Barrow Atmospheric Baseline Observatory (BRW), a NOAA facility located near Utqiaġvik (formerly Barrow), Alaska, at 71.32 degrees North. 

Antarctic sea ice area reached an annual maximum of 13.73 million km² on September 5, 2025, a deviation from 1981-2010 of -2.08σ, as illustrated by the image below. 

Loss of sea ice area results in less sunlight getting reflected back into space and instead more heat getting absorbed by the ocean. 

[ image from earlier post ]

Sea ice area is low at both poles, despite the absence of El Niño conditions. Low global sea ice area causes more sunlight to get absorbed by the ocean. Global sea ice area was 2.40 million km² below the 1981-2010 mean on September 16, 2025, a deviation from 1981-2010 of 3.91σ. 

With sea ice area low at both poles, global sea ice area could fall further over the next few months, thus causing even more sunlight to get absorbed by the ocean and threatening to cause an Antarctic Blue Ocean Event early 2026.  

On March 1, 2025, Antarctic sea ice area reached an annual minimum of 1.21 million km², almost as low as the 1.09 million km² reached on February 22, 2023 (highlighted), as illustrated by the image below. 

A study by Duspayev et al. (2024) calculates that global sea ice has lost 13%–15% of its planetary cooling effect since the early/mid 1980s, corresponding with an implied global sea ice albedo feedback of 0.24–0.38 W m⁻² K⁻¹.

The IPCC has failed to warn about Antarctic sea ice decline, and - importantly - the amplifying impact of Antarctic sea ice decline on the global temperature rise. This was addressed in a 2023 post as follows:
Sea ice loss results in less sunlight getting reflected back into space and instead getting absorbed by the ocean and the impact of Antarctic sea ice loss is even stronger than Arctic sea ice loss, since Antarctic sea ice is located closer to the Equator, as pointed out by Paul Beckwith in a video in an earlier post [and in the video below]. A warmer Southern Ocean also comes with fewer bright clouds, further reducing albedo, as discussed here and here. For decades, there still were many lower clouds over the Southern Ocean, reflecting much sunlight back into space, but these lower clouds have been decreasing over time, further speeding up the amount of sunlight getting absorbed by the water of the Southern Ocean, and this 'pattern effect' could make a huge difference globally, as this study points out. Emissivity is a further factor; open oceans are less efficient than sea ice when it comes to emitting in the far-infrared region of the spectrum (feedback #23 on the feedbacks page).

In the video below, Paul Beckwith discusses the situation in Antarctica. 

An Antarctic Blue Ocean Event early 2026 would further accelerate the global temperature rise, thus likely causing an Arctic Blue Ocean Event as well later in 2026. Further increasing this danger is the potential for an El Niño to emerge in the course of 2026. 

Climate Emergency Declaration

The situation is dire and the precautionary principle calls for rapid, comprehensive and effective action to reduce the damage and to improve the situation, as described in this 2022 post, where needed in combination with a Climate Emergency Declaration, as discussed at this group.

Links

• Kevin Pluck - Sea ice visuals
https://seaice.visuals.earth

• Danish Meteorological Institute - Arctic sea ice thickness and volume
https://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/icethickness/thk.uk.php

• NOAA - Global Monitoring Laboratory - Data Visualisation - flask and station methane measurements
https://gml.noaa.gov/dv/iadv

• Transforming Society
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2022/10/transforming-society.html

• Climate Plan
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/climateplan.html

• Climate Emergency Declaration
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/climate-emergency-declaration.html