Alaska News

Greenlandic glaciers on the decline

Like so much of climate science, the latest insight from the frozen world of Greenland offers one of those good news/bad news outlooks for the future of the world's ocean-front real estate.

A decade-long, eye-in-the-sky study of nearly 200 major outlet glaciers found that they haven't been tumbling into the ocean with the same dramatic acceleration once feared -- and that means these colossal rivers of ice might not contribute as much to catastrophic sea level rise as predicted by some worst-case scenarios.

Some climate studies had previously suggested that Greenland's coastal glaciers were poised to produce enough fresh water to raise the global sea level by 2.5 to 6.5 feet over the next 90 years.

But their tidewater meltdown — if it doesn't speed up beyond the rates seen during the past 10 years — will likely deliver a sea level boost measured in inches rather than feet, according to a new study published this week in the journal ofScience.

"Our wide sampling of actual 2000 to 2010 changes shows that glacier acceleration across the ice sheet remains far below (the high-end) estimates, suggesting that sea level rise associated with Greenland glacier dynamics remains well below the low-end scenario (of about four to five inches by 2100) at present," wrote lead researcher Twila Moon and three co-authors in the paper.

Read much more, here.

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