The Arctic could be ice-free in summer a decade earlier than previously thought, even under a low-carbon emissions scenario. This is the conclusion of a study in which scientists used satellite data to examine the decline in sea ice cover in the region around the North Pole over 40 years. “The results show that, regardless of emission scenarios, the first sea-ice-free September will already occur in the 2030s to 2050s,” write the authors, led by South Korean researcher Min Seung Ki from Pohang University of Science and Technology, in the journal “Nature Communications”. .