Recent climate change in Iceland

The climate in Iceland has warmed by about 1°C per century since the start of the 20^th century. The warming has been intermittent with strong decadal variablility but the last two decades stand out as the warmest since continuous measurements began in the 19^th century. Changes in precipitation, snow fraction and extreme precipitation have also occurred. The warming has impacted glaciers which have lost 16% of their mass and 19% of their area since the early 20^th century. Several small glaciers have vanished, new pro-glacial lakes have formed and significant changes have occurred in the drainage system from some glaciers. The iso-static rebound resulting from the ice mass loss is widespread and exceeds 1 cm per year on the southeastern shore where it is highest. The warming has generally increased the productivity of plants leading to observed greening.

The recently published Climate Change Impact Assessment for Iceland, the fourth since the start of this century concluded that Climate Change is having a strong impact on physical and biological systems, with increasing societal impacts, especially with increasing risks associated with natural hazards such as flash floods, landslides, subglacial eruptions, and coastal flooding.