(STAR TRIBUNE)  Jennifer Brooks, December 16, 2015 — Researchers say Lake Superior is warming even faster than global average.

The world’s lakes are warming up — even frigid Lake Superior — scientists warn.

Dozens of researchers pooled decades’ worth of data from hundreds of lakes and concluded that the world’s lakes are warming even more rapidly than the oceans or the atmosphere. The warmer waters threaten fish populations, ecosystems and fresh water supplies around the globe.

Closer to home, University of Minnesota Duluth Professor Jay Austin says the thick sheets of ice that blanketed Lake Superior for the past two winters did nothing to change the fact that Superior, like the other Great Lakes, is growing ever warmer.

“Lake Superior is one of the more rapidly warming lakes” among the 235 lakes in the study, Austin said. A two-degree temperature shift can mean the difference between an iced-over Superior or an ice-free lake, he said. “Relatively small changes can lead to large changes in systems that define our region. Duluth would be a fundamentally different place if Lake Superior never formed ice.”

The study, which was funded by NASA and the National Science Foundation, found that lakes have been warming by more than half a degree per decade. That might not sound like much, but when lakes warm up, toxic clouds of algae can bloom, fish habitats can be disrupted and invasive species currently held at bay by Superior’s inhospitable cold might be able to make themselves at home.

Source: World’s lakes are warming up, even Superior, scientists warn – StarTribune.com