Global warming, Earth lost nearly 28 trillion tons of ice in just 23 years

Scientists from the universities of London together with the University of Leeds, Edinburgh, analyzed satellite surveys of glaciers, mountains and ice sheets between 1994 and 2017, to determine the impact of the present. global warming. Their review has been published in Cryosphere Discussions magazine.

Scientists say they are “stunned” to find that the amount of ice has disappeared, glaciers and melting ice can cause the sea level to rise dramatically, possibly reaching one meter (3 feet) by the end of the century. this.

Professor Andy Shepherd, director of the Center for Polar Observation and Modeling at the University of Leeds, said: “To imagine, every centimeter of sea level rise means about a million people will have to be displaced from their homeland. their sunken ”.

Severe ice loss can have other dangerous consequences, including the disruption of the biological balance of the Arctic and Antarctic waters and a decrease in the Earth’s ability to reflect solar radiation.

Ice melts on the glacier surface in Greenland, July 17, 2013. (Joe Raedle / Getty Image News)

Scientists have confirmed that the findings are consistent with worst-case predictions made by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

“In the past, researchers have been examining individual regions – such as Antarctica or Greenland – where the ice is melting. But this is the first time we look at how much ice is disappearing,” Shepherd said . on the entire planet. What we found stunned us. “

“We combine satellite observations and numerical modeling to come up with statistics that Earth has lost nearly 28 trillion tons of ice between 1994 and 2017. Arctic sea ice (7.6 trillion tons), shelf Antarctic ice (6.5 trillion tons), mountain glacier (6.2 trillion tons), Greenland ice sheet (3.8 trillion tons), Antarctic ice (2.5 trillion tons) and ice South Ocean Sea (0.9 trillion tons). “

“Much of the ice loss on Earth is a direct result of global warming,” the team said.

Ice melts in a heat wave in Kangerlussuaq, Greenland on August 1, 2019

The discovery comes a week after researchers at Ohio State University found that the Greenland ice sheet was gone.

The annual snowfall, which replenishes glaciers, is no longer able to keep up with the rate at which the ice melts, which means Greenland’s ice will continue to lose even as heat, according to the researchers. Globalization stopped increasing.

The Greenland ice sheet is the second largest ice sheet in the world.

“What we found was that the ice thawed in the ocean far exceeded the amount of snow accumulated above , “ said Michalea King, lead author and researcher at Ohio State University’s Center for Polar and Climate Research. ice surface “.

According to a NASA study, 2010-2019 was the hottest decade ever recorded.

Reference: ScienceAlert