This comprehensive, near-real-time Arctic Change Detection Product has been developed by the US/NOAA Arctic Research Office to track physical and biological changes for presentation on the web. The Product uses a narrative style to highlight land and marine ecosystems, the cryosphere, Arctic and sub-Arctic human impacts, and an overall summary by evaluating recent reports against historical information. The effort provides a continuous update to the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment (ACIA) Report. Released in November 2004, the ACIA report represents a multi-year, multi-government effort by hundreds of scientists.

The NOAA Arctic Change Detection project provides information from near-real time indicators and their potential impacts for the state of the Arctic in an accessible, understandable, and credible format. The web product builds on the 10 key findings, 19 climate trends and 10 society impacts enumerated in the ACIA Report. The ACIA Report and this web site are useful for managers, scientists and a broader audience because the credibility of the process is based on multiple lines of evidence; using such a procedure balances problems caused by having too many indicators which lack specificity, or too few indicators which do not consider the complexity of the process nor provide a robust result. The Change Detection Product is presented in the context of the Arctic Theme Page, and all background information is available to the reader/user. Results from this project are tailored towards ready understanding of the rate and extent of change in the Arctic to facilitate informed decisions concerning the impacts which result. The Product provides non-Arctic climate scientists with a quick and definitive update on the status of the Arctic climate.

The image in the header is a Hazan Plateau photograph that was very graciously provided by Douglas Hardy, UMass Amherst. See http://www.geo.umass.edu/climate/hazen/field99.html and http://www.geo.umass.edu/climate/hazen/dimages/mic99c6.jpg. The web page has been coordinated and developed by James E. Overland, Nancy N. Soreide, Muyin Wang, Mick Spillane, and Tracey Nakamura.

Images on the Home and News pages: Climate sunrise image is from the NOAA Photo Library; Global globe image is from the University of Illinois; Marine Ecosystem polar bear image is Courtesy of Scott Schliebe, USFWS; the polar bear on the ice in the home page collage is a photo from the US Navy Arctic Submarine Laboratory; Land image is from Torre Jorgenson; Ice boat image is from the NOAA Photo Library; Human seal hunter image is from Northwestern University Library, Edward S. Curtis's 'The North American Indian': the Photographic Images, 2001. (Volume 20), http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/award98/ienhtml/curthome.html, and the walrus on the ice in the home page collage is from the NOAA Photo Library.

News headlines are archived in the Arctic Change News Archive.

Questions or comments should be addressed to oar.pmel.arctic.webmaster@noaa.gov.