ABR in the 2024 Arctic Report Card

J.J. Frost and Matt Macander have lead the Tundra Greeness section of the Arctic Report Card for 5 years running, and they plan to continue this important work in the future. The full report card can be seen here: https://arctic.noaa.gov/report-card/report-card-2024/

Notable findings from the 2024 Arctic Report Card

In the air

• Arctic annual surface air temperatures ranked second-warmest since 1900. 

• Autumn 2023 and summer 2024 were especially warm across the Arctic, with temperatures ranking 2nd and 3rd warmest, respectively.

• An early August 2024 heatwave set all-time record daily temperatures in several northern Alaska and Canada communities.

• The last nine years are the nine warmest on record in the Arctic. 

• Summer 2024 across the Arctic was the wettest on record.

In the ocean 

On land

Fig. 3. Time-series of mean MaxNDVI for Arctic tundra from the MODIS MCD13A1 v6.1 (2000-24) dataset

Fig. 4. A major driver of circumpolar greening trends is the expansion of tall, canopy-forming shrub

Fig. 2. Circumpolar MaxNDVI anomalies for the 2024 growing season relative to mean values (2000-24)

“Many of the Arctic’s vital signs that we track are either setting or flirting with record-high or record-low values nearly every year," said Gerald (J.J.) Frost, senior scientist with ABR, Inc. and veteran Arctic Report Card author. "This is an indication that recent extreme years are the result of long-term, persistent changes, and not the result of variability in the climate system.”

Fig. 1. Magnitude of the MaxNDVI trend calculated as the change per decade using ordinary least squares regression for Arctic tundra (solid colors), and boreal forest north of 60° latitude (muted colors) during (a) 1982-2023 based on the AVHRR GIMMS 3-g+ dataset, and (b) 2000-24 based on the MODIS MCD13A1 v6.1 dataset. In each panel, the circumpolar treeline is indicated by a black line, and the 2024 mean August sea-ice extent is indicated by light shading.

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