Table of Contents
How has global warming affected Alaska?
The effects of global warming in Alaska are significant, varied, and interrelated. They include melting permafrost, receding glaciers, eroding coasts, disappearing sea ice, and mounting problems for native species, such as caribou, sea otters, salmon, and polar bears.
How can we stop climate change in Alaska?
Actions the Alaskans Know Climate Change campaign endorse to mitigate climate change:
- • Advocate for carbon pricing.
- Demand an end to fossil fuel subsidies.
- • Support renewable energy projects.
- • Divest from fossil fuels.
- • Reduce individual, business, community and state carbon footprint.
- •
What are the current environmental issues in Alaska?
Alaska has recently experienced profound environmental change related to extreme weather events and deviations from the historical climate. Sustained warmth, sea ice loss, coastal flooding, river flooding, and major ecosystem changes have impacted the daily lives of Alaskans around the state.
What affects temperature in Alaska?
Alaska’s interior, a second climatic zone, has a continental climate influenced in the winter by cold air from northern Canada and Siberia. Average temperatures in the interior range from about 45 to 75 °F (7 to 24 °C) in summer and about 20 to −10 °F (−7 to −23 °C) in winter.
Why is climate change in Alaska?
In August 2016, the Environmental Protection Agency reported that “[o]ver the past 60 years, most of the state has warmed three degrees (F) on average and six degrees during winter” As a result of this temperature increase, the EPA noted that “Arctic sea ice is retreating, shores are eroding, glaciers are shrinking.
How is pollution affecting Alaska?
The American Lung Association “State of the Air” 2019 report found that Alaska has some of the worst air quality in the nation. Many Alaskans are living in areas with unhealthy air with wood-burning stoves and wildfire smoke contributing to poor air quality.
Is Alaska warming up?
Alaska’s new weather normal is warmer and wetter, NOAA says in once-a-decade data update. A once-a-decade data update released this week again shows Alaska experiencing climate change more acutely than much of the Lower 48.
How will global warming affect Seattle?
Seattle is already seeing the impacts of climate change, including record-breaking heat and smoke from West Coast wildfires; in the coming decades, parts of the city will be periodically inundated with floodwaters. Seattle’s Space Needle obscured by smoke from wildfires in September 2020.