Spatiotemporal variations and regional differences in air temperature in the permafrost regions in the Northern Hemisphere during 1980–2018

Surface air temperature is an important factor for the permafrost thermal state in the Northern Hemisphere. It is therefore necessary to understand the variations and regional differences in air temperature to determine the interactions between permafrost degradation and climate change. In this study, we used observational data from the National Centers for Environmental Information, the China Meteorological Administration, and the World Data Centre for Meteorology to quantitatively analyze the variations and regional differences in air temperature from 1980 to 2018. The results demonstrated that the annual mean air temperatures were low in continuous permafrost regions and high in sporadic and isolated permafrost regions, with a significant warming rate of 0.371 ± 0.086 °C/decade. Air temperatures warmed the slowest during the winter and fastest during the spring, and no “warming hiatus” was observed in the permafrost regions of the Northern Hemisphere. The spatial patterns of freezing degree-days (FDDs) and thawing degree-days (TDDs) had different spatial characteristics. The decreasing rate of FDDs was −6.97 °C·days/year, while the increasing rate of TDDs was 6.4 °C·days/year. The air temperatures and warming trends had largely regional differences with respect to high latitude, transitional, and high altitude permafrost regions. Air temperature and its warming trend was the highest in high altitude regions. In addition, air temperature warming trends gradually decreased from the continuous permafrost zone to the island permafrost zone. The FDDs had a significant decreasing trend from the continuous permafrost zone to the island permafrost zone, whereas TDDs exhibited the opposite trend. The results indicate that the air temperature warming rate in the permafrost regions was approximately 2.0 times that of the global warming rate, and 1.3 times the global land warming rate from 1980 to 2018. These findings offer a perspective on the differences in permafrost and its thermal state across different regions under climate change.