Arctic Sea Ice Has Been Destroyed By Humans

Scientists claimed that the number one cause of climate change is human activities. Currently, scientists were able to identify how these activities affect the melting of the Arctic Sea Ice.

In the study published in the Journal Science, it has shown that for every metric ton of carbon dioxide released into the air, three square meters of Arctic sea ice decrease. The average Americans are melting approximately 50 square meters of ice every year.

German climate scientists from Hamburg at Max Planck Institute for Meteorology in Germany and lead author of the study, Dirk Notz, said that the study is their first time to understand how the human actions contribute to global warming.

Notz added that "when we talked about global warming, it was always these very big numbers, like billions of tons of carbon dioxide or very small numbers, like 0.1 degrees of temperature change or something. But now, suddenly with this three-square-meter loss per ton of CO2, it gives a very concrete and intuitive understanding of how we all cause Arctic sea ice to decrease."

 The scientists explained their study, the carbon dioxide acts as a greenhouse gas. It traps heat in the Earth's atmosphere, enabling the global temperature shoot higher. It also acidifies the world's oceans, making it hard for sea creatures to build their shells and corals to build reefs. As for the human activity, the experts saw that in large part of the fuel fossils that humans burn, it is speeding up the release of carbon dioxide, according to TIME.

In the average Americans produces roughly 16.39 metric tons per year as of 2013, the experts calculated that about three square meters of Arctic sea ice were lost for every metric ton of carbon dioxide released. it concludes that each person is contributing at about 50 square meters of lost sea ice.

Notz shared that, even for them as climate scientists, it is hard for them to make a change. But, after seeing the numbers, he said that it is very tangible, according to LA Times.