Rob Wooding said that resupplying Australia's Mawson Station -- the longest continuously operated station in Antarctica -- relied on access through to a bay, a task increasingly complicated by sea ice blocking the way.
"We are noticing that the sea ice situation is becoming more difficult," Wooding told a media briefing ahead of two days of meetings between science and logistics experts in Hobart.
Wooding said that at Mawson, the ice typically only breaks out for one or two months of the summer, but in the last four to six years this has not happened every year, and some years only partially.
Wooding said Australia had not yet come close to shutting down a base because of sea ice, but had to look at "unusual measures" to keep operating.
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Antarctic sea ice hit a new record in September last year, with the US-based National Snow and Ice Data Center reporting that the ice averaged 20.0 million square kilometres (7.72 million square miles) during the month.
Local conditions can also have a dramatic effect, with icebergs sometimes unpredictably grounding themselves in inconvenient locations and staying there for years as more sea ice builds around them.
Wooding said potential solutions included using large aircraft to deliver crucial fuel and other supplies to the outposts, as well as hovercraft, or funding other ways to resupply stations.
"I think a lot of it really will revolve around perhaps shifting more to an over-ice approach, or to even thinking about where your stations are located -- I think (that) is something that will have to be looked at over time as well," he said.