Antarctica Ice Sheet Trends

The global mean surface temperature is projected to increase by around 0.3 to 4.8 degrees Celsius above the pre-industrial values by the end of the 21th century. Therefore, if we continue to not check the anthropogenic emissions, the increase may be around 8 to 10 degrees Celsius, which is incredibly damaging to various ecosystems internationally. It is difficult to determine the possible aftereffects of the ice sheets melting because the equilibrium-response timescales of them is longer than both the atmosphere and ocean. The ice-sheet/ice-shelf model shows that if the atmospheric warming increases 1.5 to 2 degrees Celsius above the present temperatures, the Antarctic ice shelves will collapse and trigger a centennial scale response –a never-ending

The US government’s National Snow and Ice Data Center has reported that in the last 25 years the amount of ice that continues to cycle through the arctic every year, has seen a significant 30% drop, along with 2 square kilometers less ice forming since September. This number is even higher than it was just in 2012, when this trend started to become alarming.

Remote sensing has become a very valuable tool for documenting the response of glacier to changing climate (Bamber and Kwok, 2003; Kuhn, 2007; Pellikka, 2007; Solomon et al, 2007) because the rugged terrain, inaccessibility and legendary poor weather of glacier areas has resulted in relatively few field- based studies. Indeed, in order to use glaciers and their changes as indicators of climate change, or as an early warning signal for sea level rise, remote sensing is the only tool to provide glacier change information from all the continents and from a large number of glaciers and ice sheets. On the other hands, because space borne and airborne remote sensing data provide superior cost- effective and area effective data and methods for monitoring the glaciers and their changes, part of this monitoring can be carried out by it.

This problem could mark either the end of human civilizations or mark the beginning of the next era of human development. It would decide on our species survival, whether there will be another mass extinction like the one 65 million years ago. The question is “How might the breaking up and melting of continental ice in Greenland and the Antarctic affect Canada’s coastline?”. In the following sections, we have gathered an abundance of information from a variety of sources from which we will discuss, and analyze. We will find out how this data can help us understand the effect of melting glaciers on Canada’s coastline, as well as how and what we could do to stop or slow it down.

The rate of retreat and the rate of thinning in all seasons considerably surpassed the forecasts of most models (Wadhams, 2012). According to Barber et al. (2009) investigation of thermodynamic oceanic contributions to sea-ice thickness specifies that longer summer melt season, a decrease in multi-year and ridged ice, and warmer Atlantic water account for continued thinning of the Arctic Ocean sea ice. “Sea ice in the Arctic Ocean has been in retreat, the annual-averaged rate speeded up to 10.7% per decade from 1996 onwards” (Wadhams, 2012). According to Bring and Georgia 2013, new model predictions, the summer sea ice disappearance within 20–30 years. At the same time, submarine sonar measurements have revealed that the ice has been thinning much more rapidly. (Wadhams,

One of the global warming changes our planet is going through is the melting of glaciers in the Arctic sea. John Hawkins states, “How much Arctic ice really matters is an open question since the very limited evidence we have suggests that a few

Antarctica is essential for science because of its enormous effect on the Earth's climate and ocean systems. The Antarctic is critical our understanding of global climate change. Preserved in its four kilometre-thick ice sheet is a unique record of the

“The Glacier, and with it the Duck, might have moved since then.” Lou Sapienza is the lead organizer of a Coast Guard Operation searching for a missing World War II plane; the Grumman Duck and its lost crew. A challenging problem the party has with finding the Duck is the movement of glaciers since the planes went down close to 70 years ago. Since the 1950s the extent and the movement of the ice sheets have rapidly changed due to Global Warming. Most affected by this climate change is The Arctic, Antarctica and the Greenland Ice Cap. Lou Sapienza and his team of specialists only have a hand-drawn map of where the Duck crashed and an old radar survey from years ago. Their daring task is to predict how the movement of the ice sheet accelerated by global warming might have moved their missing plane. Since global warming is a problem, everyone will be affected by it in one way or another. It is time to act, to confront the problem and find a solution.

As Earth’s surface temperature rises, the ocean also becomes hotter which results in an increase in sea level and decrease in Earth’s ice. “The oceans have absorbed much of this increased heat, with the top 700 meters of ocean showing warming of 0.302 degrees Fahrenheit since 1969” (“Climate Change: How Do We Know?”). Since greenhouse gases are trapping energy from the sun, the oceans absorb more heat which ultimately increases surface temperature. Oceans are able to absorb large amounts of heat energy because water has a greater heat capacity than air. As oceans become warmer, the frozen water on Earth melts at an accelerated pace. The thickness of Arctic Sea ice has dramatically declined throughout the last several decades. “Arctic sea ice

In order to provide context for the recent decline of ice in the sea, it is imperative to understand how the sea ice has varied over the past two centuries. Of particular interest, the period around 1920-1940 showed an “increase in almost twice the global average rate in past 100 years. [ ]” The warming during this time can be used to compare the decline of sea ice observed since 1979, but what will also be discussed is how this time period was also quite controversial due to its substantial variance between the official views and views held by other people. The reliability of the sea ice observations during the first half of the 20th century according to some people cannot provide certainty to estimating

In the Ian Eisenman, Tapio Schneider, Davis Battisti, and Cecilia Bitz’s article “Consistent Changes in the Sea Ice Seasonal Cycle in Response to Global Warming”, published in Journal of Climate, authors describes and illustrates how global warming affect arctic ice. Authors explain that even though, changes in distribution in ice on both hemispheres of earth looks different it is only due to geological factors. However, in conclusion, the rate of withdrawal of the ice is drastic on both hemispheres, and it is mostly due to global warming.

The Northern Hemisphere Glaciation (NHG) is believed to have initiated into large scale, permanent ice sheets ~2.5 Ma, which is almost 31.5 Ma after the initiation of the Antarctica ice sheets. There are many possible causes for the onset of this climate event, some of which we will be reviewing in this essay. In this essay we will look at the cores from IODP and ODP sites 302, Arctic Ocean; 913, Greenland basin; and 907, north of Iceland, in order to identify the characteristics and possible causes of the northern hemisphere glaciations. First we will look at the evidence for the onset of this event and the proxies

Recently, arctic sea ice has been melting due to global warming. In 1984, there was 1.86 square kilometers of “old sea ice” and now there is only 110,000 square kilometers of the “old sea ice.” usually, as the atmosphere gets warmer, the new ice melts faster but the old ice is not melted away completely. Now, the old ice is getting weaker and melting faster due to global warming/climate change. This is an issue because as the earth gets hotter, the old ice will no longer get thicker, which helped keep ice on the sea. If there is no old ice, there is a chance that there will be no sea ice at all.

The ocean bottom around Antarctica is turning out to be naturally wealthier as an aftereffect of ocean ice decreases, and in the process cleaning up a carbon's portion dioxide that is creating the loss of that same ocean ice. How critical this will be to putting a beware of a dangerous atmospheric devation stays dubious, however it's an uncommon bit of uplifting news in a for the most part grim picture.

Ice is one of the first indicators of global warming actually occuring and it is important for research to be done on these layers of before they disappear. The recession of glaciers and the fragmentation of ice caps has been a clear sign to many that rising temperatures are having an impact, even on our very lives.