Antarctica, ice sheet melt has never been this rapid
Environment — di Andrea Barolini
A study raises the alarm over the condition of the Antarctic ice sheet: “Melting is six times faster than it was 40 years ago.”
Antarctica, ice sheet melt has never been this rapid
A study raises the alarm over the condition of the Antarctic ice sheet: “Melting is six times faster than it was 40 years ago.”
The annual melting of the ice sheet in Antarctica has never been this rapid. The process of ice melt in the Southern Ocean is in fact six times faster than it was forty years ago. And this is already contributing decisively to the rise in sea levels around the world.
The Antarctic ice sheet is losing six times more mass than it was four decades ago - now shedding 252 billion tonnes per year, adding 3.6mm to sea levels per decade. washingtonpost.com/energy-environ… PNAS paper here: pnas.org/content/pnas/e…
252 billion tonnes of ice melt every year
The finding comes from a report by the American Academy of Sciences (Pnas, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences), published on Monday 14 January. According to the analysis, the shrinkage of the Antarctic ice sheet is already responsible for a 1.4-centimetre rise in ocean levels, recorded between 1979 and 2017.
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To obtain these results, scientists carried out the most in-depth assessment of glacial mass ever conducted, across eighteen regions of Antarctica. To this end, ultra-high-resolution photographs taken by Nasa aircraft were used, as well as radar images from satellites belonging to numerous space agencies.
"The Antarctic lost 40 billion tons of melting ice to the ocean each year from 1979 to 1989. That figure rose to 252 billion tons lost per year beginning in 2009, according to a study published in @PNASNews"
msn.com/en-us/weather/…
msn.com/en-us/weather/…
The eastern ice sheet, considered less exposed, is also affected
All of this made it possible to determine that, in the period between 1979 and 1990, the average loss was 40 billion tonnes of ice per year. Whereas in the period between 2009 and 2017 the figure grew enormously, reaching 252 billion tonnes.
But that is not all: another cause for concern relates to the eastern portion of the ice sheet, once considered "sheltered" from climate change. According to the study's authors, this area too has contributed to the overall loss of glacial mass. To put the scale into perspective, it is worth bearing in mind that East Antarctica represents the world's most important reserve of fresh water.
The heat is on: Antarctic ice is melting 6 times faster than it did in 1980s
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#Antarctic
If the entire ice sheet were to melt, sea levels would rise by 57 metres
Its complete melting would cause a rise in sea levels of 52 metres. Adding the five metres attributable to the western portion of the ice sheet would bring the total to 57 metres.
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Yet even a rise of just 1.8 metres by the end of the century — not ruled out by scientific projections — would cause the flooding of entire coastal regions and force millions upon millions of people to flee.