Greenlands glaciers hold enough water to cause a sea rise of 23 feet.

[Dover]

Greenland¹s ice sheet represents one of global warming¹s most disturbing threats.
The vast expanses of glaciers ‹ massed, on average, 1.6 miles deep
contain enough water to raise sea levels worldwide by 23 feet.




July 27, 2008
Phenomenon
Ice Free

NYT
By STEPHAN FARIS

Greenland’s ice sheet represents one of global warming’s most disturbing threats. The vast expanses of glaciers — massed, on average, 1.6 miles deep — contain enough water to raise sea levels worldwide by 23 feet. Should they melt or otherwise slip into the ocean, they would flood coastal capitals, submerge tropical islands and generally redraw the world’s atlases. The infusion of fresh water could slow or shut down the ocean’s currents, plunging Europe into bitter winter.

Yet for the residents of the frozen island, the early stages of climate change promise more good, in at least one important sense, than bad. A Danish protectorate since 1721, Greenland has long sought to cut its ties with its colonizer. But while proponents of complete independence face little opposition at home or in Copenhagen, they haven’t been able to overcome one crucial calculation: the country depends on Danish assistance for more than 40 percent of its gross domestic product. “The independence wish has always been there,” says Aleqa Hammond, Greenland’s minister for finance and foreign affairs. “The reason we have never realized it is because of the economics.”

Climate change has the power to unsettle boundaries and shake up geopolitics, usually for the worse. In June, the tiny South Pacific nation of Kiribati announced that rising sea levels were making its lands uninhabitable and asked for help in evacuating its population. Bangladesh, low-lying, crowded and desperately impoverished, is watching the waves as well; a one-yard rise would flood a seventh of its territory. But while most of the world sees only peril in the island’s meltwater, Greenland’s independence movement has explicitly tied its fortunes to the warming of the globe....>

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/27/magazine/27wwln-phenom-t.html?_r=2&ref=science&oref=slogin&oref=slogin

[XemaSab]

1. I know!

:think:

The people of Kiribati can relocate to Greenland!

:D

[Mnemosyne]

2. KnR for more visibility.. n/t

[Dover]

3. And with the relocation/dispersion of its water weight and mass through melting,

how might that effect the earth's balance? Seems that too poses some very troubling
and possibly unanswerable questons.

[stuntcat]

7. unanswerable..

:scared: like, we can't tell exactly what would happen, but whatever it is will not be good.

My neighbor brought that Day After Tomorrow over to watch with me and it seemed so silly, how it made everything so cartoony, I'm think the crashing will instead be drawn out and pitiful. But then if Greenland starts to melt much who knows? The storms.. :scared:

[lfairban]

10. It does make the day go faster.

I don't know about balance, but the overall mass of the glaciers are monitored by measuring the speed of the earth's rotation.

I just ask myself why the measurement wouldn't include Antarctica, but then I realized that since it surrounds the South Pole, melting there would have little effect on rotation.

[hogwyld]

4. Surfs Up!

This should lead to a LOT of new ocean front property! :scared:

[Nederland]

5. Old news

This was covered in "An Inconvenient Truth" in 2006.

[stuntcat]

6. maybe after the thousanth time it's pointed out.. maybe then people will start paying attention

x(

k, r

[NMDemDist2]

8. yeah, but....

there's OIL under there!! :bounce:

do I really need the :sarcasm: thingie??

[longship]

9. And Greenland's nothing compared to the West Antarctic Ice Field...

... which is currently losing another ice shelf support:

Wilkins Ice Shelf, Near Antarctica, Hanging By Its Last Thread

In the middle of Winter!!!

Thousands of square miles of ice which help support the ice field gonna just go away.

[Terry in Austin]

11. West Antarctica

I've always wondered -- in Antarctica, how do you tell which way is "west?"

EMWTK