“Major sea-level rise caused by melting of Greenland ice cap is ‘now inevitable'”
In 1995, I was convinced climate change was happening at an exponential rate; however, Sidd said we need more data over a longer time period. (The consensus at the time was it was linear, and we had thousands of years to solve the problem.)
It took until 2004 for Sidd to collect enough data. Indeed, we proved it… using sea level rise and Greenland’s ice sheets.
A new study has been published showing that even if we stopped greenhouse gas emissions today, Greenland’s ice sheet would continue to melt raising the sea level by at least 27 centimeters.
The Guardian reported:
“It is a very conservative rock-bottom minimum,” said Prof Jason Box from the National Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland (Geus), who led the research. “Realistically, we will see this figure more than double within this century.”
“The minimum of 27cm is the sea-level rise deficit that we have accrued to date and it’s going to get paid out, no matter what we do going forward,” said Dr William Colgan, also at Geus. “Whether it’s coming in 100 years or 150 years, it’s coming. And the sea-level rise we are committed to is growing at present, because of the climate trajectory we’re on.”
Colgan said: “If [2012] becomes a normal year, then the committed loss grows to 78cm, which is staggering, and the fact that we’re already flickering into that range [of ice loss] is shocking. But the difference between 78cm and 27cm highlights the [difference] that can be made through implementing the Paris agreement. There is still a lot of room to minimise the damage.”
“There is growing support in the scientific literature for multi-metre levels of rise within the next 100 to 200 years,” said Colgan. A collapse of the colossal east Antarctic ice sheet, which would lead to a 52-metre rise in sea levels if it all melted, could be averted if rapid climate action is taken.
Prof Gail Whiteman, at the University of Exeter, who was not part of the study team, said: “The results of this new study are hard to ignore for all business leaders and politicians concerned about the future of humanity. It is bad news for the nearly 600 million people that live in coastal zones worldwide. As sea levels rise, they will be increasingly vulnerable, and it threatens approximately $1tn of global wealth.” She said political leaders must rapidly scale up funding for climate adaptation and damage.
Read the report from the journal Nature Climate Change: Greenland ice sheet climate disequilibrium and committed sea-level rise
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