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Grim Picture of Polar Ice-Sheet Loss
ananyo writes "A global team of researchers has come up with the most accurate estimate yet for melting of the polar ice sheets, ending decades of uncertainty about whether the sheets will melt further or actually gain mass in the face of climate change. The ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica are melting at an ever-quickening pace. Since 1992, they have contributed 11 millimeters — or one-fifth — of the total global sea-level rise, say the researchers. The two polar regions are now losing mass three times faster than they were 20 years ago, with Greenland alone now shedding ice at about five times the rate observed in the early 1990s. This latest estimate, published this week in Science, draws on up to 32 years of ice-sheet simulations and 20 years of satellite data to give an estimate two to three times more accurate than that in the last IPCC report."
LALALAALAAA we can't hear you.
I for one look forward to being an island-dwelling overlord...
We have a spare on Mercury.
Strange things are afoot at the Circle-K.
I mean, seriously, why do you care if Earth becomes another Venus?
My twin nieces, Ruby and Winnie. My nephews Leo and Max.
Sorry to appeal to emotion, but I find your attitude a little cold, a little remote, a little shitty.
Here's my non-predicted reaction: We're boned.
Specifically, we aren't going to do what's necessary until it's already too late, because humans do a really bad job of responding to threats that aren't immediate. I won't be surprised if some people manage to adapt and survive, but it's going to be very messy, expensive, and violent (desperate people do not just lay down and die quietly), and there's no way those who survive will have the same standard of living as a typical modern American.
I am officially gone from
Got into a discussion about this recently over the recent (and on-going) flooding in the UK. If the sea level and temperatures both rise, then a logical expectation of that would be that more water would evaporate off the oceans into the atmosphere, subsequently returning as rain and snow. That would entail more runoff and a corresponding rise in river levels and increased risk of flooding, particularly given the growing pressure on housing in some areas resulting in flood plains being used for development.
It's not just the people with beachfront properties that need to be worried...
UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!
Guys, guys.... Engage brain before a) posting and b) modding "informative". 1000 years ago Greenland had a couple of ice-free bays with just enough land for a handful of settlements. Which fared poorly. You do not seriously believe that then whole inland ice of Greenland was gone 1000 years ago?
Ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant.
it is incredibly foolish to believe that humans are responsible for the melting of the polar icecaps. one volcano eruption puts off more CO2 than all of the emmissions that humans have put out since there were humans.
That statement is factually incorrect. Volcanos do not emit more CO2 than humans-- they emit less, by orders of magnitude.
http://www.agu.org/news/press/pr_archives/2011/2011-22.shtml
http://hvo.wr.usgs.gov/volcanowatch/archive/2007/07_02_15.html
http://www.agu.org/pubs/pdf/2011EO240001.pdf
http://www.skepticalscience.com/volcanoes-and-global-warming.htm
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn11638-climate-myths-human-co2-emissions-are-too-tiny-to-matter.html
From http://news.sciencemag.org/sciencenow/2011/06/scienceshot-volcano-co2-emission.html :
"A popular myth among climate change skeptics is that volcanic emissions of carbon dioxide dwarf those generated by humans. But a new report in today's issue of Eos reveals precisely the opposite: In a mere 2 to 5 days, smokestacks, tailpipes, and other human sources of CO2 spew a year's worth of volcanic emissions of that greenhouse gas. According to the paper, five recent studies suggest that volcanoes worldwide (such as Alaska's Shishaldin, shown) emit, on average, between 130 million and 440 million metric tons of CO2 each year. But in 2010, anthropogenic emissions of the planet-warming gas were estimated to be a whopping 35 billion metric tons. Individual events—such as Mount Pinatubo, whose major eruption in 1991 lasted about 9 hours—can produce CO 2 at the same rate that humans do, but they do so only for short periods of time. It would take more than 700 Mount Pinatubo-sized eruptions over the course of a year to emit as much carbon dioxide as people do, the study notes."
Let me note that it is misinformed statements like this that tend to make real scientists dismiss global-warming deniers as crackpots. If you really want skepticism of anthropogenic global warming to be taken seriously, you need to have a basic understanding of the real world.
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
this clearly shows that humans are in no way responsible for global warming.
Unfortunately, it shows nothing of the sort.
It says that water vapor is the most significant greenhouse effect gas. Water vapor indeed is a greenhouse gas, but water vapor cycles in and out of the atmosphere based primarily on temperature. The hotter is is, the more water evaporates into the atmosphere; the colder it is, the more water condenses out of the atmosphere. So, basically, water vapor is an amplifying agent-- if you increase the temperature, more water evaporates, and the greenhouse effect increases. This is well known.
I would like to really suggest you read the IPCC Working-Group 1 report, "The Physical Science Basis of Climate Change" http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/publications_and_data_reports.shtml
You would be able to argue more effectively if you started out by being aware of what is already known.
http://www.geoffreylandis.com