Cherry Picked Antarctic Ice Data Does Not Disprove Climate Change

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles., opens new tab "We are constantly being lied too (sic)," says a May 6, 2025 post on Threads. The post shares an image juxtaposing two charts measuring sea ice extent. One is from December 24, 1979, while the other from December 24, 2024. "Antarctic sea ice extent is 17% higher today than it was in 1979," text under the charts reads. Similar claims also appeared on other platforms, including Instagram and X.

Narratives seeking to deny the impact of climate change on the Arctic and Antarctic -- the polar regions surrounding the North and South poles -- often rely on sea ice data to make misleading... Satellite data shows that Antarctic ice sheets have grown in size, prompting claims that climate change is in reverse or even a hoax. But it's not that simple. A recent study has found that the Antarctic ice sheet mass has slightly increased in size in recent years, prompting a wave of claims on social media (such as here and here) that global... Published in March 2025 by researchers at Tongji University in Shanghai, China, the study reported that the Antarctic ice sheet gained approximately 108 billion tons of ice annually between 2021 and 2023. This data focused on four glacier basins in the Wilkes Land-Queen Mary Land region of the eastern Antarctic ice sheet, has been misinterpreted by some climate skeptics as evidence that climate change is a...

Claim: Posts on platforms like X (formerly Twitter) have gone viral, with one stating, "Moral of the story: Never believe a climate alarmist," garnering over 270,000 views. Another viewed more than 55,000 times, claimed,"Scientists have had to pause the Climate Change Hoax Scam." One post even featured a GIF that the user believed showed new land emerging off the coast of Dubai due to falling sea levels — apparently unaware of the artificial Palm Islands constructed there... A Dec. 23, 2024, Facebook post (direct link, archive link) shows a map of Antarctic sea ice extent, or area, with color coding that purportedly shows ice gain and loss between Dec. 21, 2016, and Dec.

21, 2024. "I love data," the caption reads. "'Sea ice extent at both poles today is higher than eight years ago. Antarctic sea ice extent is up 17% from this date in 2016' Is the (mainstream media) talking about this? Climate Scam!" More from the Fact-Check Team: How we pick and research claims | Email newsletter | Facebook page

The post is wrong about Arctic sea ice and climate change. On Dec. 21, 2024, the Antarctic sea ice extent was higher than on Dec. 21, 2016, but the Arctic sea ice extent was lower on that date in 2024 compared to 2016, according to government data. Regardless, long-term datasets show Earth’s climate is warming, and a comparison of polar sea ice extents on two random days does not provide enough information to confirm or disprove this trend. Antarctic sea ice extent was about 18% higher on Dec.

21, 2024, than on that date in 2016, according to the National Snow and Ice Data Center Charctic Interactive Sea Ice Graph − which reports five-day running averages. This is similar to the estimate in the post. An ocean temperature decrease between 2013-2022 proves global warming is a hoax. Misleading. The claim is based on cherry-picked data and evidence shows global warming is real. AAP FACTCHECK - A small decrease in ocean temperatures over eight years does not disprove global warming, despite claims being made online.

A graph based on data from the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) that shows global ocean temperature data from 2014 to 2022 is being used as evidence to undermine the science of... While the graph indicates a 0.02C decrease over the period, long-term data shows a clear warming trend. Despite its isolation, Antarctica has experienced warming and ice loss in recent decades, driven by greenhouse gas emissions.[1][2] West Antarctica warmed by over 0.1 °C per decade from the 1950s to the 2000s, and... The warming of the Southern Ocean around Antarctica has caused the weakening or collapse of ice shelves, which float just offshore of glaciers and stabilize them. Many coastal glaciers have been losing mass and retreating, causing net ice loss across Antarctica[7]: 1264 although the East Antarctic ice sheet continues to gain ice inland. By 2100, net ice loss from Antarctica is expected to add about 11 cm (5 in) to global sea level rise.

Marine ice sheet instability may cause West Antarctica to contribute tens of centimeters more if it is triggered before 2100.[7]: 1270 With higher warming, instability would be much more likely and could double global... The fresh meltwater from the ice dilutes the saline Antarctic bottom water[11][12] weakening the lower cell of the Southern Ocean overturning circulation (SOOC).[7]: 1240 According to some research, a full collapse of the SOOC... They include less precipitation in the Southern Hemisphere but more in the Northern Hemisphere, an eventual decline of fisheries in the Southern Ocean and a potential collapse of certain marine ecosystems.[14] While many Antarctic... On ice-free land, permafrost thaws release greenhouse gases and formerly frozen pollution.[16] Antarctic warming and associated changes in Southern Ocean circulation can also influence climate patterns in parts of Africa, affecting regional rainfall and... The West Antarctic ice sheet is likely to melt completely[19][20] unless temperatures are reduced by 2 °C (3.6 °F) below 2020 levels.[21] The loss of that ice sheet would take between 500 and 13,000... Antarctica is the coldest, driest continent on Earth, and has the highest average elevation.[1] Antarctica's dryness means the air contains little water vapor and conducts heat poorly.[27] The Southern Ocean surrounding the continent is...

During the Antarctic winter, the surface of central Antarctica becomes cooler than middle layers of the atmosphere,[27] which makes greenhouse gases trap heat in the middle atmosphere, and reduce its flow toward the surface... The effect lasts until the end of the Antarctic winter.[27][1] Early climate models predicted temperature trends over Antarctica would emerge more slowly and be more subtle than those elsewhere.[29] Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles., opens new tab

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