CMOS Toronto Centre - Perspectives on the Changing Arctic - Mark C. Serreze

Topic: Perspective on the Emerging New Arctic
Speaker: Professor Mark Serreze, Director National Snow and Ice Data Centre, University of Colorado, USA
Date: September 25, 2024
Time: 12:00pm - 1:00pm ET
Through what is now a long career as a climate scientist with a special focus on the Arctic, most of my research has focused on the physical environment and questions of the what and the why. What are the trends in Arctic Sea ice extent, and why are we seeing them? Why are the trends bigger in summer than in winter? What changes are we seeing in patterns of Arctic precipitation and temperature and what is causing them? But over the past decade, I have also been drawn to questions surrounding impacts: why it all matters. What are the impacts of the “New Arctic” on terrestrial and marine environments, the peoples of the north and the rest of the world? Why should we care about the changing north? In this talk, I’ll provide some personal reflections on how my thinking about Arctic change has evolved through the years, and events that have driven that change. What I’ve realized is that like many others, I am in the middle of a very steep learning curve, made all the steeper by the rapidity of the interconnected changes unfolding in the north.