Sea Level Rise May Be Faster Than Originally Thought - WP/BG

[hatrack]

WASHINGTON -- Two new scientific studies measuring Greenland's rapidly melting ice sheet and the pace of Antarctic snowfall suggest that the sea level may be rising faster than researchers previously assumed.

The papers, both published Thursday in the journal Science, provide the latest evidence of how climate change is transforming the global landscape. University of Texas researchers, using twin satellites, determined that the Greenland ice sheet, the earth's second-largest reservoir of fresh water, is melting at a rate three times faster than during the previous five years. A separate study by 16 international scientists concluded that Antarctic snowfall accumulation has remained steady over the past 50 years, with no increases that might have mitigated the melting of the ice shelf, as some researchers had assumed would occur.

Taken together, the two reports indicate that global sea level rise may increase more rapidly in the coming years, though the Greenland study is based on only 2 1/2 years of data. The melting of 57 cubic miles a year from Greenland's ice sheet could add 0.6 millimeters alone, which is more than any previously published measurement for Greenland, according to University of Texas Center for Space Research scientist Jianli Chen. ``It's a very big number," Chen said, noting that for the past few hundred years the sea level has increased an average of 1.8 millimeters annually.

Byron Tapley, one of Chen's co-authors, said the ice loss along the sheet's eastern shoreline is particularly significant because it could help weaken the counterclockwise flow of the North Atlantic current. The more-buoyant fresh water from the ice melt could lower water temperatures and ultimately make Western European winters colder, he said. If enough fresh water enters the Norwegian current and you interrupt return flow, then there could be climate effects in Europe," Tapley said.

EDIT

Followed, of course, by the obligatory CEI bullshit, courtesy of the Washington Post - what a great newspaper!

:puke:

http://www.boston.com/news/globe/health_science/articles/2006/08/14/sea_may_be_rising_faster_than_previously_thought/

[thecrow]

1. I saw a show on Nat'l Geographic channel last night

about just this same thing. The scientists agreed that the "conveyor belt" system was indeed slowing down and predicted a freeze that could last from months to many years.

[mom cat]

2. So! Lets solve it all with a few more wars.

Bitter :sarcasm:

[NNadir]

3. More wars?

Why not just change the channel?

I have heard - in such a way as to believe it - that Lindsay Lohan has been staying out late drinking to excess.

[Delphinus]

4. Hahahahahahahahahaha!!!

Thank you for a much needed early Tuesday morning laugh!

Now, back to the seriousness of the situation, the leaders and a lot of the people of the world will not recognize the gravity of this until waters are lapping at their front doors OR until we go through a "mini ice age". Then most of them will still be looking around, wondering what is going on.

[thecrow]

5. Nat'l Geo was not talking "mini ice age"

They were talking about a thousand years...
I guess mini is all a perception.