A huge international scientific study involving 60 scientists and 36 respected international institutions has revealed that the Earth's sea-levels could rise by 15 inches (38cm) by 2100 if the Greenland and Antarctica ice-sheets were to melt. Something that is deemed probable if current CO2 emissions are continued.
These results were published in The Cryosphere academic journal.
Heiko Goelzer, a scientist who played a part in the project, said:
"The strength of ISMIP6 was to bring together most of the ice sheet modelling groups around the world, and then connect with other communities of ocean and atmospheric modelers as well, to better understand what could happen to the ice sheets."
Much of the evidence gathered for this report was obtained with the help of NASA and their Ice Sheet Model Intercomparison Project (ISMIP6) which maps ice-sheet melt across the globe. According to the evidence they found, the melting of Greenland would contribute 3 to 10 inches to water levels, and the melting of Antarctica would contribute 1 to 11 inches.
Such a sea rise would place much of the Earth's coastal regions entirely underwater, including many of the world's major cities. It would also result in millions of refugees fleeing areas that are no longer habitable.
Sophie Nowicki, one of the leaders of the project, stated that it was of key importance to learn how much ice-sheet melt would contribute to sea-level rise. She stated:
"One of the biggest uncertainties when it comes to how much sea level will rise in the future is how much the ice sheets will contribute. And how much the ice sheets contribute is really dependent on what the climate will do."
She added:
"It took over six years of workshops and teleconferences with scientists from around the world working on ice sheet, atmosphere, and ocean modelling to build a community that was able to ultimately improve our sea level rise projections. The reason it worked is because the polar community is small, and we're all very keen on getting this problem of future sea level right. We need to know these numbers."
One curious factor that could emerge from the melting of the Greenland ice-sheet, as a result of global warming, is to actually plummet the North of Europe into freezing cold temperatures.
At present, the Gulf-stream, which runs from the Mexican Gulf, takes hot air across the Atlantic and makes the North of Europe far hotter than what it would otherwise be, relative to its latitude. Therefore, places such as Ireland, Scotland, England, lower Scandinavia and Northern France and Germany experience relatively mild weather compared to places on the same latitude, such as Russia and Canada. If the Greenland ice melts, the cold water could disrupt the Gulf-stream and lead to sub-Arctic conditions in Europe.
COMMENTS