Canada Sees Impact of Climate Change

Scientific American covers a new report released from Natural Resources Canada on the measured impacts of climate change in Canada:

Between 1950 and 2010, Canada's average air temperature over land warmed about double the global average, or about 1.5 degrees Celsius.
The country as a whole has become wetter, while sea levels on the country's coasts rose about 21 centimeters between 1880 and 2012.
The impacts are apparent in Canada's north, the report says, where melting permafrost and glaciers are changing the landscape quickly. "Glaciers in Yukon have lost about 22% since the 1950s," the report notes. Lake ice—critical for activities such as ice hockey—may decrease in duration by roughly a month by midcentury, according to scientists.
Earlier this year, Canada's insurance industry reported that 2013 was the costliest ever because of claims from extreme weather, with losses rising above $3 billion (ClimateWire, Jan. 22).
On the other hand, climate change may help some food production and industries that can benefit from northward expansion such as maple syrup developers. "Total biomass of production from wild, capture fisheries in Canada [are] expected to increase due to climate-induced shifts in fish distributions," the report states.

It appears the biggest temperature changes will occur nearer to the poles, which is bad news for glaciers and sea ice.