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Simmons blogs at Thoughts on Global Warming and Thoughts on the World. If you feel like writing for us, drop us an email!

New islands are appearing in the Arctic as sea ice shrinks to record lows.

The U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said in a report earlier this year that summer sea ice in the Arctic could almost vanish by the end of this century.

“Islands are appearing just over the fjord here” as glaciers recede, said Kim Holmen, research Director at the Norwegian Polar Institute, gesturing out across the bay. “I know of two islands that appeared in the north of Svalbard this summer. They haven’t been claimed yet,” said Rune Bergstrom, environmental expert with the Norwegian governor’s office on Svalbard. Svalbard is a Norwegian archipelago.

The U.S. National Snow and Ice Data Center said on Friday that Arctic sea ice had “fallen below the 2005 record low absolute minimum and is still melting”.

The vanishing sea ice is a big concern for wildlife in the area; Polar bears and seals depend on the sea ice to hunt.

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