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The research conducted by a pan-Canadian and international team — and led by the U of C’s Cryosphere Climate Research Group — combined 10 years of snow data from across Canada’s Arctic and microwave theory.

It found snow salinity tended to scatter the microwaves transmitted by the satellite on the snow surface, said Yackel.

“It hits higher up; it doesn’t penetrate,” he said. “It means this particular satellite has been overestimating the amount of sea ice which covers 75 per cent of the Arctic Ocean. … It hasn’t taken into account the salt in the snow.”

An ice-free summer once predicted to arrive in 2040 to 2050 could conceivably occur between 2030 and 2040, he said.

Those findings should lead to a correction factor being baked into the data produced by CryoSat-2, which is considered the premier satellite measuring ice thickness, said Yackel.

Climate scientists — with a virtually universal conclusion that human activity is responsible for global warming — point to the danger of a fast-melting Arctic. It’s being impacted more severely by the phenomenon than other parts of the globe.

The region works as a regulator of climate patterns and its disruption will lead to more dangerous longer-term trends and extreme weather, said Yackel.

“It acts as a coolant — as a refrigerator for the Earth’s climate system — and when we’re warming it up faster than at the equator, it’s causing the jet stream to change,” he said. “The jet stream doesn’t know where it wants to flow because there’s not that strong pressure or temperature gradient.”

The research team plans to return to Canada’s Arctic Archipelago next March to continue its work, said Yackel.

BKaufmann@postmedia.com

on Twitter: @BillKaufmannjrn