As climate change slowly strips Antarctica of its glistening white ice, the frozen continent is getting more and more green.
New NASA imaged reveal how vegetation cover across the Antarctic Peninsula has increased more than ten times since 1986, only 38 years ago.
The maps show that the area of land on the Antarctic Peninsula covered by plants increased from 0.33 square miles to 4.61 square miles between 1986 and 2021, with a notable acceleration in greening after 2016.
"This trend echoes a wider pattern of greening in cold-climate ecosystems in response to recent warming, suggesting future widespread changes in the Antarctic Peninsula's terrestrial ecosystems and their long-term functioning," the researchers wrote.
Maps of how Antarctica has been getting more green over the past 38 years. This is due to increasing temperatures and melting ice.Maps of how Antarctica has been getting more green over the past 38 years. This is due to increasing temperatures and melting ice.NASA Earth Observatory maps by Michala Garrison, based on data from Roland, T.P., et al. 2024.Antarctica is warming at varying rates as a result of climatic changes, with the Antarctic Peninsula in particular experiencing some of the fastest temperature increases on Earth.
"Antarctica has experienced significant increases in temperature over the past 60 years, with rates of warming highest in the West Antarctic and Antarctic Peninsula regions and occurring much faster than global average warming," the researchers wrote.
"The trend is expected to continue at 0.34 degrees C [0.61 degrees F] per decade until 2100."
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The Antarctic ice sheet is losing around 150 billion tons of ice mass per year, according to NASA, and is melting at an accelerating rate as climate change intensifies.
A 2018 PNAS paper found that ice loss speed had increased sixfold over the past 30 years, and there were 770,000 square miles less ice than usual last year.
The NASA images reveal the amount of green vegetation growing across the Antarctic Peninsula below 1000 feet of elevation in 1986, 2004, 2016 and 2021, with the shade of green in each hexagon representing the amount of land determined to have an "almost certain" level of plants growing.
Much of this vegetation is moss, with previous research finding that moss accumulation is increasing around the Antarctic Peninsula.
"Based on the core samples, we expected to see some greening, but I don't think we were expecting it on the scale that we reported here," Nature Geoscience study co-author Tom Roland, an environmental scientist University of Exeter, said in a statement.
"When we first ran the numbers, we were in disbelief," co-author Olly Bartlett, a remote sensing expert at the University of Hertfordshire added.
"The rate itself is quite striking, especially in the last few years."
Moss growing on Ardley Island, a small island at the tip of the Antarctic Peninsula. Moss growing on Ardley Island, a small island at the tip of the Antarctic Peninsula. Photo courtesy of Dan Charman University of ExeterThere are only two species of flowering plants native to Antarctica, but the continent is home to many species of mosses, liverworts, lichens, and fungi.
As the planet warms, plants and mosses may conquer more and more of the Antarctic landmass, including non-native plant species.
"Native vascular plants are already demonstrating range expansions across the Antarctic Peninsula," the researchers wrote.
"But questions remain over the role that lateral expansion of moss ecosystems, longer-distance and bare-rock colonization by mosses and any associated soil formation may play in providing a vector for further ecological translocation of vascular plants, including non-native, potentially invasive species—the threat of which is increasingly recognized."
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References
Roland, T. P., Bartlett, O. T., Charman, D. J., Anderson, K., Hodgson, D. A., Amesbury, M. J., Maclean, I., Fretwell, P. T., & Fleming, A. (2024). Sustained greening of the Antarctic Peninsula observed from satellites. Nature Geoscience. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41561-024-01564-5
Rignot, E., Mouginot, J., Scheuchl, B., Van Den Broeke, M., Van Wessem, M. J., & Morlighem, M. (2019). Four decades of Antarctic Ice Sheet mass balance from 1979–2017. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 116(4), 1095–1103. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1812883116
