Climate change has many impacts on the planet, and researchers recently discovered another striking one: North Pole is moving. It’s not the ice masses in the Arctic, but acually the Northern pole of the earth’s magnetic field.

With help of satellite measurements, scientists figured out that the pole is shifting about 20 centimeters per year towards Greenland. Position of the magnetic field’s poles is determined by mass distribution around the planet. This mass distribution changes due to climate change: Accelerated melting of the poles account for 90 per cent of the movement, the study concludes.

You wonder about the remaining 10 per cent? Well, you might not have known yet (so did we) that the pole is constantly moving as earth’s mass distribution changes anyway seasonally/continuously by snow- or rainfall or continental drift. The movement due to melting ice sheets adds up on this trend. For scientists, this is more than just a “nice-to-know”-fact: the satellite measurements can help climate researchers to tell, where ice is lost and in consequence provide more detail to predict climate change impacts.

Within this year’s summer period the arctic sea ice shield at the north pole melted dramatically to a new all-time low. The ice mass has fallen short of the record of 2007. And the low could get even lower, because the 2007 record was measured at 18 September. This year we saw the same record already in August. The ice usually melts until the mid of September and then starts again to grow during the winter period. But due to the large melting the new ice will be much thinner than usual. Scientists of the National Snow and Data Center explain that where have been an ice shield of a 3-4 meters just a few years ago, it’s possible to reach only 1-2 meters today. An ice free noth-pole could be the result, they say, followed by the irreversibility of the melting process. According to the Arctic Sea Ice Blog it’s just a question of when until we will see an ice free north pole.If you want to stay updated on that issue, there are lot’s of impressive and in somehow frightening opportunities. The picture on top of this post is provided by the Instituts for Arctic Climate Research at the University of Illinois. It’s going to be updated every day. So it will be possible to see the day the ice will be growing again. The website also offers a 30-day summary of the ice developement. You will also find tons of data about the planet’s ice shield’s via the National Snow and Ice Data Center.

But whats so bad about melting ice? Well, as Global Ideas Climate Expert Anders Levermann explained in one of his videos the arctic sea ice belongs to the earth’s tipping points. If the ice melts the dark ocean underneath will heat up and slowly melts even more ice. Here’s the video for you to see: