Author(s): Motomu Oyama; Hajime Yamaguchi; Noriaki Kimura
Linked Author(s):
Keywords: Sea Ice; Remote Sensing and Forecasting
Abstract: The Northern Sea Route is getting more and more feasible for commercial shipping due to reducing sea ice trend in the Arctic. Shipping companies need to know summer sea ice condition several months ahead to select the NSR or normal Suez Canal route. Since 2015 we have been forecasting summer sea ice distribution based on winter-spring sea ice motion which is derived from satellite remote sensing data analysis. Our web site shows time series of summer sea ice distribution from July to September. Although this forecast followed the observed sea ice distribution well until 2020, it could not express the un-melted ice expansion in the Pacific side of the Arctic Ocean in 2021. We have also developed a method to estimate the sea ice age distribution by backward tracking the sea ice motion. It was suggested that the un-melted ice in the Pacific side consists of very old ice. Additionally, accumulated divergence of ice motion can represent how much area of young ice is contained in the old ice area. Thus, the forecast may be improved by introducing ice age and divergence into the current winter-spring ice motion method.
Year: 2022