PHOTO BY JAN BOLZ
A recent study by Sapna Sharma, associate professor at York University, and her colleagues, shows that Earth’s lakes are warming at alarming rates, and the Great Lakes — Lake Superior in particular — are topping the charts.
The study reveals lakes in the Northern Hemisphere have warmed six times as rapidly over the past 25 years. Temperatures in all five Great Lakes have hovered at record highs since October, following the pattern of warming lakes all over the planet.
“If we continue emitting greenhouse gases at this rate, Lake Superior will not freeze after the 2060s. Lake Michigan will not freeze after the 2060s,” said Sharma, reports The Washington Post.
Sharma’s September study analyzed 60 lakes in the Northern Hemisphere, finding pronounced warming trends over the past several hundred years across the globe. Unusually warm weather is causing lower ice cover on lakes, with lakes freezing later and thawing earlier. The Great Lakes are among the fastest warming, with Lake Superior losing two months of ice cover per century, and warming up three times as fast as the global average. Lower ice coverage in winter leads to warmer temperatures in summer, and a host of connected issues that present ecological, economic and cultural challenges, including a reduction of available freshwater for aquatic organisms and people, algal bloom increases and more.
“There is an urgent need for research focused on implications of losing lake ice cover, both economically and in terms of lake ecology. Accumulating knowledge of winter ecology can improve our capacity to understand the role of ice cover on lakes, and the people who depend on ice cover, before it is lost,” the study concludes, reports The Weather Network.
To learn more, read the full study here.
