Climate change estimates have once predicted that a complete summer melt of the Arctic ice caps may happen between the years 2070 and 2100, but scientists in the National Snow and Ice Data Center report that it may happen as soon as 2030.

According to a new study based on the most recent satellite images of the frozen North, the ice has shrunk to an all-time low of 2.02 million square miles, a shade smaller than the previous low of 2.05 million square miles in 2005.

Scientists explain that the figure could dip further as there's still roughly a full month left before the Arctic's melt season is over and ice starts forming again.

The Northern ice sheets are critical to the stability of the planet's temperature, according to the research institution. Ice is a natural reflector of the suns rays back into space. With less ice, oceans tend to absorb more sunlight, then heat up to melt the ice further, causing a compound effect of melting.

More distressing is the fact that the skies over the Arctic Ocean are unusually clear. This means that more sunlight goes into the region, causing the oceans to heat up faster and for the melting to happen on a much bigger scale. This may result in a faster meltdown than experts have originally expected. Researcher Mark Serreze says that there's very strong evidence that greenhouse gases have a lot to do with the acceleration of this phenomenon.

Skeptics, however, say that the melting of ice is part of a natural process that will stabilize in due time, but Serreze thinks otherwise. "We simply can't explain everything through natural processes," he says.