Permafrost on Earth has entered the stage of apocalypse and may almost disappear in a decade - study

By 2100, most of the Earth's near-surface permafrost may disappear completely. This forecast was made after analyzing modern climate models in relation to the climate of the planet 3 million years ago.

According to SciTechDaily, an international team of scientists has determined that permafrost could decrease by 93% compared to the level observed in the pre-industrial period (from 1850 to 1900). The results of the study were published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Scientists believe that by 2100, the Earth's near-surface permafrost, within the top 3-4 meters of the soil layer, may exist only in the East Siberian Upland, the Canadian High Arctic Archipelago, and northern Greenland.

The study found that the area of near-surface permafrost was much smaller in the past than the temperatures expected now if global warming continues.

Study co-author Vladimir Romanovsky, professor emeritus at the University of Alaska Fairbanks Geophysical Institute, warns that the loss of this amount of permafrost over the next 77 years "will have broad implications for human and infrastructure activities, for the global carbon cycle, and for surface and subsurface hydrology."

He is convinced that the study is another "wake-up call about what is happening to the Earth's climate."

Modeling of the mid-Pliocene warm period and projections of permafrost area in 2100 focus only on near-surface permafrost, which is less resistant to climate warming than deep permafrost.

Ten computer models predict that the Earth will lose approximately 77% of its permafrost by 2100, compared to 1995-2014, provided that the air temperature rises by 13.5 degrees Fahrenheit under the proposed development scenario.

The scientists state that "the future of the near-surface permafrost in the Northern Hemisphere looks bleak."

"Further climate warming and the associated degradation of permafrost may cause environmental changes that humans have not yet experienced, which means that the importance of permafrost degradation needs to be further emphasized," the researchers emphasized.

Earlier, OBOZ.UA reported that according to scientists, global warming could kill a billion people in 100 years.

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