Study: ‘Runaway’ melt on Antarctica, Greenland

[RamboLiberal]

Source: MSNBC

The most detailed satellite information available shows that ice sheets in Greenland and western Antarctica are shrinking faster than scientists thought and in some places are already in runaway melt mode, a new study found.

"Dynamic thinning of Greenland and Antarctic ice-sheet ocean margins is more sensitive, pervasive, enduring and important than previously realized," researchers wrote in the paper published online Wednesday in the peer-reviewed journal Nature.

Using 50 million laser readings from a NASA satellite, scientists for the first time calculated changes in the height of the vulnerable but massive ice sheets and found them especially worse at their edges. That's where warmer water eats away from below. In some parts of Antarctica, ice sheets have been losing 30 feet a year in thickness since 2003, according to the study.

Some of those areas are about a mile thick, so they've still got plenty of ice to burn through. But the drop in thickness is speeding up. In parts of Antarctica, the yearly rate of thinning from 2003 to 2007 is 50 percent higher than it was from 1995 to 2003.

These new measurements confirm what some of the more pessimistic scientists thought: The melting along the crucial edges of the two major ice sheets is accelerating and is in a self-feeding loop. The more the ice melts, the more water surrounds and eats away at the remaining ice.



Read more: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32985250/ns/us_news-environment/

[SpiralHawk]

1. "Move along. Nothing to see here." - Rush 'DraftDodger' Limbaugh (R)

"What are you going to believe? Facts and documentation, or my patented corporate Republicon bloviated denials of reality. Have another kool aid, and move along. Everything is just peachy (if you are getting paid $30 million a year to lie and obfuscate). Smirk."

- Rush 'DraftDodger' Limbaugh (R - Overpaid Propagandist)

[2QT2BSTR8]

2. AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

You just had to post his ugly ass mug shot on here? GACK! I would rather look at a donkey's ass....oh .....wait...ummm never mind.

[XemaSab]

8. ok

[Zoeisright]

12. MUCH better, thank you.

[2QT2BSTR8]

15. I never said I wanted to look at Bush! Sheesh! Didnt you hear what I said? :)

[audas]

16. There is nothing wrong with Rush, or Fox - it is MURDOCH who is the problem

Wake the fck up. Target your frustration on this sith lord - and things will very quickly change if he realises people hate him, and his global fcking empire - not just American idiots looking at FOX!

[Octafish]

26. SpiralHawk knows all about that stuff.

And SpiralHawk's been contributing for years. For example:

A Primer on INSLAW

PS: Welcome to DU, audas.

[IndianaGreen]

3. If there is any consolation, much of Bible Belt will be under water

and the parts that are not, will see their water table become brackish.

The bad news is that rising sea levels will impact the entire planet.

[2QT2BSTR8]

4. Ummm I live in the bible belt.

And in the third most non-conservative city of Dallas, after Austin as #1 and El Paso as #2.

[Soylent Brice]

5. invest in scuba gear, or relocate. either option is cheaper than

the bribe that would take the powers that be to stop it.

[happyslug]

13. New York City will be hit worse, as would be most of the East Coast

Florida will be hit the worse, followed by Louisiana, but In Florida the worse affect would be in the Everglades and in Louisiana it would be the area around New Orleans and the Coast (Where the Cajun live). In Texas even Houston is above any expected sea level rise over the next 50 or so years (Galveston is another story but Houston is the big city in that part of Texas).

Now the West Coast will be affected, but given that the North American Continent is slowing moving westward the Western shoreline goes up rapidly. Now the Gulf of Cortez will spread northward, maybe to the Salton sea (While the Salton Sea in near sea level there appears to be a narrow area just south of the Mexican border that may block the expansion through that might be only a temporary block, the affect of the rapid increase may undermine that block and send in water from the Gulf o Cortez, only time will tell). Another big change on the West Coast could be that the San Francisco bay gets extended to Stockton and Sacramento. This is another area of low lying lands just above sea level. The rest of the West Coast seems to climb to fast to lose to much land area to any increase in seal level (Notice I said to much land, land will be lost but not to the extent as elsewhere).

On the East Coast and Gulf coast it is a gradual rise in height from the sea shore. Thus a 20 feet increase in height will take in minimal area on the West Coast, but take almost all of Southern Florida and Louisiana (Which are extremely low to start with) and move well inland elsewhere.

Side note: The big concern for world wide ocean levels mostly involved three huge ice sheets. The largest with 70% of the world Fresh Water is the East Antarctic Ice Sheet. While it is a concern and world wide ocean levels for raise extremely high if it melted, it is also on the highest Continent on the planet. Antarctica is the highest, while Asia and South American have taller mountains, these are off set by massive lowlands, Antarctica does NOT have mountains as high as the Andes or the Himalayas (But the Antarctic Mountains are higher then the Appalachians) the over all height is higher the every other continent. This has the affect of isolating the East Antarctic Ice Sheet from to much interaction with the Southern Ocean (The Ocean that flows around Antarctica). Furthermore in most programs the are the result of studies of Global Warming, the East Antarctic Ice sheet is expected to EXPAND over the next 50 or so years. This is expected to be the result of higher world wide temperatures leading to more moisture in the air (Higher the temperature, the more water can be held in the Air). This higher level of moisture will mean more snow in Antarctica and thus an expansion of the East Antarctic Ice Sheet (Much like the theory of why the Saharan desert became so dry starting about 6000 years ago, temperatures DROPPED so the monsoon from the Atlantic did not have enough power to reach all the way into the Sahara thus drying out the Sahara, yes Global warming will make some places cooler then there are now, most places hotter and it is these changes we have to deal with).

The next two largest ice sheet contain about 10% each of Fresh water (The remaining 10% of Fresh water in in the Rivers, Lakes and Glaciers in other parts of the World). These are the Greenland Ice Sheet and the West Antarctic Ice Sheet. Both are of major concern, if either melts world wide Ocean levels go up 20 feet. The Concern from Greenland is a gradual melting over the next 50 years and a slow but steady increase in world wide sea levels. Some people have planned for this by proposing building large sea walls to keep these waters out, possible given the time involved but unlikely given the time it has to be done in.

Now the Godzilla of Global Warming is the West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS). Unlike the East Antarctic Ice Sheet (EAIS), the WAIS is located in an area of islands, furthermore is based BELOW sea level so it is affected directly by the temperatures of the Southern Ocean. Being based below sea level it is possible for it to "break" free of its base and float where it is (Through most of the WAIS would have to float out to sea). It is possible for this to occur within days i.e. we have a sudden increase in sea levels in as short as a week as the Ice displaces the water it would be floating on (Right now, the WAIS is based on land so it is displacing some water in the ocean but no where near what it can if and when the WAIS starts to float, this is the difference between an Ice Sheet and an Ice shelf. The later floats on top of the water and it displaces the water it will become when it melts (Thus no increase in world wide sea levels when an Ice Shelf like the Arctic Ocean melts). Ice sheets, on the other hand, like the WAIS are NOT presently displacing the water they would be if melted, but will be as soon as they start to float. Some people believe this happened 120,000 years ago, when the last Ice Age started. World wide sea levels went up 20 feet, and then down 80 feet within 100 years. It is called the "Madhouse Century" massive melting then massive ice formation as the Glaciers quickly expanded.

I do NOT want to be little the affect of the melting of ice outside of the above three Ice Sheets, but these will be the Major source of world wide sea level changes. The ice in the rest of the World is minor, most of the rest of the fresh water is held in Lakes and rivers NOT Glaciers (Though a good chuck of that 10% is in the form of Ice).

Here is a program you can play with regarding world wide sea level change, it is is meters so the 20 feet I discussed above is 6 meters (That is NOT an exact conversion, but given the error rate is making such calculations exceeds any error rate between 20 feet and 6 meters):

http://flood.firetree.net/

Map of New York City area (Again meters and the WAIS is only a 6 meter threat):
http://geology.com/sea-level-rise/new-york.shtml

World wide map:
http://geology.com/sea-level-rise/

San Francisco, San Francisco bay gets extended to Stockton and Sacramento:
http://geology.com/sea-level-rise/san-francisco.shtml

Another map program:
http://merkel.zoneo.net/Topo/Applet/

Google Map on Sea Level Rise (Again meters, 7.3 Meters for Greenland ice Sheet, 5 Meters for WAIS and 52m for EAIS):
http://googlemapsmania.blogspot.com/2008/04/google-maps-sea-level-rise-explorer.html

OK, if you want to see worse case scenario go to this site, it show up to 70 meter in sea level increase (The most expected do to melting of all of the ice in all of the Ice Sheets in the world). Most expects do NOT think it will get this bad but it is possible:
http://www.globalwarmingart.com/wiki/Special:SeaLevel

[audas]

17. Wrong on a fe points -

I was dissapointed to read your entirely US centric view of things and decided I would skim - came across your SNOW theory which has been completely debunked - not true.

Secondly the ice sheets which float on the water hold back the massive internal glacial sheets which is like uncorking a bottle of champas - massive consequences to sea levels rising through releasing of these internal glaciers.

Thirdly the destabilising of the sea bound sheets also allows sub glacial water to enter below the internal glacial sheets and cause rapid melting much like the mulons in the northern hemisphere

Fourthly there is what is known as the gravitational effect - the massive destabilisation of such huge masses causes significant rises in sea levels through the transfer of mass

Fifthly frozen sea ice is not like ice in your fridge - it holds significant quantities of potential expansion from its frozen state - again causing significant rises in sea levels.

As you can see - the depletion of sea ice sheets is potentially the GREATEST threat we face in the fight against sea level rises from global warming -

And as a last note - perhaps as an American you might start to look at the consequences for the rest of the planet from your grotesque social model - your myopic, narcissistic, devout solipsism WREAKS of the asinine right wing inanities which the Repubs are so proud of - I thought the let might have SOME degree of social responsibility extending beyond their own bedroom door - there are about 10 times the population of the US who are going to be dead WELL before you need to worry about significant sea level rise !

And yes - that is due to YOUR activities -

[FirstLight]

18. ...and all this should be exponentially modeled

If the models previously used and those that the IRCC (is that right?) makes reccomendations on are all
-happening faster than originally thought AND
-showing worse feedback loop than originally thought

then perhaps the models need to be re-calculated...ya think?
and then we can just watch while the changes forecast for the next 50 years happen in the next 10...

Oh crap!

[Soylent Brice]

6. YAY!!! WE'RE FUCKED!!!

*sigh*

[Juche]

7. We might have to do climate engineering

Its unpopular, but we may have to create clouds, paint roofs white, put sulfur in the atmosphere, etc. in an effort to slow down the damage we have done so that flooding does not destroy trillions in wealth that could otherwise be spent on renewable energy, education or health care.

Obvious that is not a long term solution (many problems of emissions like ocean acidification will still be there) but it may buy us some time while we change our energy infrastructure.

Countries keep saying 20-25% renewables by 2020-2025, and a 70% decline from 1990 carbon levels from 2050.

[audas]

19. Figures are far worse than that

We would need a drop of almost 70% by 2015 to prevent a three degree warming - a three degree warming is not a tipping point - it is a point at which we will be forced to go to extremes of 6 degrees or more - the earth will respond to this - however there is every chance of seeing pan global super storms, methane erruptions which from methane hydrates which release with explosive force IGNITING them with the power of about 10,000 hiroshima detonations - the actual slipage of these methane hydrates would also cause tsunamis several hundred times larger than the Indonesian tsunami -

Both of these are forecast to occur at levels of 6 degrees which has a 75% chance of occurring if we do not abate our output by around 70% by 2015 - we have known this for almost two decades and studiously ignored it - well when i say we I mean the US -

Thanks

[Overseas]

9. K&R. Add this to the pile of alarming evidence about accelerated warming.

Wonder if we should put ice sheet updates into our weather reports.

And ocean temperature updates-- on this day last year, vs today's readings.
Or 5 years ago today, such & such point was X-temp...

We need to get the urgency further into the minds of more Americans, although more of us recognize the urgency than our legislators have been led to believe. Most of us want the environment protected for our kids.

[gtar100]

14. At this point there is only willful ignorance.

[Mr Generic Other]

10. here is a link to james balog's, extreme ice survey

and time lapse video.
the video is nearly 23 minutes long but well worth the view. scary and remarkable footage.
i am old enough to have seen some of the glaciers in this film before the melt began. the difference in size is insane.
balog's introduction last a bit over 7 minutes. the film is after that.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DjeIpjhAqsM

[psychopomp]

20. A good link

The speaker projects confidence that we can do something to lessen the severity of this problem but I am not so hopeful. With more people around the world getting rich and demanding more conveniences, I don't see how we are going to be able to tell everybody to delay gratifying those desires.

Especially when it is Americans telling them to do so.

[Umbral]

11. 50 million lasers!! No wonder it's melting!!

You know someone will say it, and mean it.

[alfredo]

21. I found this interesting too.

Climate change causing earthquakes and volcano eruptions?

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20327273.800-climate-change-may-trigger-earthquakes-and-volcanoes.html

[ProudDad]

22. We've got Five Years

Then, it's the end of the world!!!

http://www.350.org/

The Age of Stupid:

This ambitious documentary/drama/animation hybrid stars Pete Postlethwaite as an archivist in the devastated world of the future, asking the question: "Why didn't we stop climate change when we still had the chance?" He looks back on footage of real people around the world in the years leading up to 2015 before runaway climate change took place.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Age_of_Stupid
http://www.ageofstupid.net/

This is the big one and thanks to the anti-democratic Senate, we're pretty much doomed!

[alfredo]

23. Tom Toles TOON

[Blue_Tires]

24. that's a good one...

[alfredo]

25. It was timely considering Beck tried to prove the metaphor about the frog

in boiling water jumping out, but if it was not then slowly heated up it would die before it figured out what was wrong. Well he threw a frog in boiling water and you can guess the rest.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=385x376590

There wasn't any frog in his hand, but many won't think that.