Climate change over the past 25 years is responsible for a temperature increase seen in more than 150 of the world’s largest lakes, new satellite data shows.

The results suggest an average warming rate of 0.81 degrees Fahrenheit (0.45 degrees Celsius) per decade, with some lakes warming as much as 1.8 degrees F (1 degree C) per decade. The warming trend was global, and the greatest increases were in the mid- to high-latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere.

Even small changes in water temperature can result in blooms of algae that can make a lake toxic to fish or result in the introduction of non-native species that change the lake’s natural ecosystem, the researchers say.

‘Our analysis provides a new, independent data source for assessing the impact of climate change over land around the world,’ said Philipp Schneider, of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.

Schneider is lead author of the paper describing the research to be published on Nov. 24 in the journal Geophysical Research Letters.

Schneider and JPL’s Simon Hook used thermal infrared imagery from satellites of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the European Space Agency. They focused on summer temperatures (July-September in the Northern Hemisphere and January-March in the Southern […]