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Studies reveal irreparable loss to Greenland ice

A net loss of 600 billion tonnes from the Greenland ice sheet was enough to raise the global watermark 1.5 millimetres in 2019, about 40 percent of total sea level last year

 

Studies reveal irreparable loss to Greenland ice

 

By Patryk Krych | The World Daily | AUGUST 16th 2020

 

The Greenland ice sheets have been melting for a long while now. New research suggests, however, that no matter what’s done for reducing climate change and greenhouse gas emissions by this point, the lost ice may have shrunk beyond recovery.

Greenland has been in the spotlight for a short while within the climate change community and among scientists, with its severe melting occurrences back in the Summer of 2019, which researchers said could be blamed on a consistent high pressure zone, as well as a warming climate. Its ice sheets have been melting on a near record rate for a long while now, much faster on average than in any previous decades.

With the study performed by researchers at Ohio State University, published Thursday in the Nature Communications Earth & Environment journal, it’s now suggested that no matter the efforts to slow the progress of global warming, the Greenland ices will end up melting entirely, regardless.

The studies were performed across 34 years through 2018, focusing on the data of 234 glaciers spanning the Arctic region. What they’d found in these studies was that the yearly snowfall experienced by the island country is no longer enough to replace the lost, melted ice. This is primarily a cause of the summertime heat that’s been worsening recently.

“We are still draining more ice now than what was gained through snow accumulation in ‘good’ years,” said the lead author of the study, Michalea King, a glaciologist at Ohio State University. “Things that happen in the polar regions don’t stay in the polar region.”

It’s also been found that the melting of these ices is causing the sea levels to rise by a millimetre annually. Though it could take decades, the total ice in the Greenland ice shelfs could melt into enough water to add six entire meters to sea levels. Enough to entirely drown many worldwide coastal cities and small islands.

“Greenland is going to be the canary in the coal mine, and the canary is already pretty much dead at this point,” said Ian Howat, another glaciologist from Ohio State University. The concern over the eventual melting of the ice sheets in Greenland has been a long pressed one in the minds of scientists. It’d previously been noted that the glaciers had at least a 50% chance of regaining some of their mass by 2000. Since then, however, the chances of regaining any ice at all have been slipping.

An offer was made last year by the United States President Donald Trump to buy Greenland from Denmark – being a part of their territories. The offer was refused by Denmark. It’s thought that this offer was made due to Greenland’s importance to the US as a strategic position for its ballistic missile early warning system.

King went on to say that the revelation may at least inspire worldwide governments to begin preparations for the continued risings of sea levels. However, the rate of the ice melting may still be slowed down by better restrictions and actions taken against climate change, and that this research should not be taken as a message to give up.

“When we think about climate action, we’re not talking about building back the Greenland ice sheet,” said a glaciologist at the National Snow and Ice Data Centre, Twila Moon, who wasn’t involved in the research. “We’re talking about how quickly rapid sea-level rise comes to our communities, our infrastructure, our homes, our military bases.”

The Arctic has, in particular, been seeing warming twice as quickly when compared to the rest of the world due to its position on the globe. This has been happening for the last 30 years at least. Satellite imagery involved in the study reveals that the ice sheets in the region will only gain mass once every 100 years, nowhere near enough to save it. All anyone can be done now is try to slow the tragedy down.

 

By Patryk Krych | © The World Daily 2020