Up until recently, although various studies had shown increases in both poles’ temperatures, no research could truly support pointing a finger at human activity as the cause. The UK’s University of East Anglia (UEA) has changed this, thanks to their Climatic Research Unit, which carried out research supporting for the first time the idea that anthropogenic climate change is responsible for warming at the Arctic and Antarctic. 

The UEA’s research included observations of mean land surface temperatures over a 100-year period in the Arctic and a 50-year period in the Antarctic (station data was not available before 1945 for the Antarctic), which were each tracked on modern gridded data sheets.

With tracking information in place, scientists then went on to use an average simulated response. The response consisted of two models; one observed natural forcings, such as solar cycles, volcanic activity or other events that have the power to affect temperatures, while the other examined the combination of natural and anthropogenic forcings, such as greenhouse gases, stratospheric ozone depletion and sulphate aerosol.

Information obtained from these models taught scientists that the changes in each polar region’s temperatures are caused by more than internal climate variability or natural climate drivers.

Dr. Alexey Karpechko, one of the report authors, explained the link of this discovery to human influence. "In both cases the accelerations are not consistent with natural forcing, which means that natural forcing alone cannot produce such a warming. So in a sense, we can say conclusively that this [warming trend at the poles] is due to human influence."

Full elaborations on the study’s research and conclusions exist in the paper entitled “Attribution of polar warming to human influence” and published by the science journal Nature Geoscience.

Antarctica’s involvement in the UEA's conclusion received additional attention because of its contradiction to information found in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's Fourth Assessment Report from 2007, which named Antarctica as the only continent without detection of anthropogenic climate change.  

The UEA’s report may also receive some extra attention from certain skeptics who use data to point out that the majority of Antarctica has been cooling for awhile.

Karpechko helped to explain this; "There is strong warming in the Antarctic peninsula. But for several decades there has been a slight cooling of the rest of the continent. This slight cooling is due to circulation changes which are partly caused by ozone depletion.”

"This is why there has been a bit of confusion as to what is happening in Antarctica. But we expect a recovery of the ozone layer in the future. We may also expect that the Antarctic warming trends will emerge more clearly."

Professor David Vaughan, a Glaciologist at the British Antarctic Survey who has been studying Antarctica’s patches of warming, agrees with Dr. Karpechko regarding results of the ozone hole, and he also admits that this cooling, which has been happening over the past 30 to 50 years, has been “a little perplexing”.  

"The likelihood is that over the next century the ozone hole will be substantially reduced," Professor Vaughan explained. "And it may mean that the Antarctic warming becomes much more apparent in that period."

Although the use of climate modeling is fairly new, according to Professor Vaughan, the UEA is known as one of the world leaders in this subject. Regardless of anyone’s reputation in this field, though, skeptics also exist who do not believe in climate modeling as a method of proving the existence of warming; however, as Professor Vaughan explained, "Simulations are built around physical principles and an understanding of the physical world."

Dr. Karpechko added: "I'm afraid that there will always be people that don't believe that we are making all these changes."

"Some people are waiting for the science to say that a particular heat wave is caused by humans. But attributing specific effects to human activities is much more difficult than attributing global changes. I don't know if we should wait for that because it will be too late."