No quick fix to reverse Antarctic sea ice loss as warming intensifies: scientists

Sea ice in the Antarctic region has fallen to a record low this year as a result of rising global temperatures and there is no quick fix to reverse the damage done

Sea ice in the Antarctic region has fallen to a record low this year as a result of rising global temperatures and there is no quick fix to reverse the damage done, scientists said on Tuesday in a new study of the impact of climate change on the continent.

The continent's minimum summer ice cover, which last year dipped below 2 million square kilometres (772,000 square miles) for the first time since satellite monitoring began in 1978, fell further to a new low in February, according to a study published in the journal Frontiers in Environmental Science.

"It's going to take decades if not centuries for these things to recover. There's no quick fix to replacing this ice," said Caroline Holmes, polar climate scientist at British Antarctic Survey and one of the study's co-authors.

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"It will certainly take a long time, even if it's possible," she told a briefing with journalists.

This year's sea ice minimum is 20% lower than the average over the last 40 years, equivalent to a sea ice loss nearly 10 times the area of New Zealand, said Tim Naish, director of the Antarctic Research Centre at Australia's Victoria University of Wellington, who was not a participant in the study.

"In some cases we are getting close to tipping points, which once crossed will lead to irreversible changes with unstoppable consequences for future generations," Naish said.