Warming Could Have Significant Impact on Mountain Glaciers and Ice Sheets by 2100
12.01.2011 - Water & Oceans, Ice & Snow, Bi-polar
According to a study recently published in the journal Nature Geoscience, global warming could cause three-quarters of Europe's alpine glaciers to disappear by 2100 and cause sea level to rise by 4 meters as the Greenland and West Antarctic Ice Sheets melt.
To conduct their studies, geophysicists Valentina Radić and Regine Hock of the University of Alaska based themselves on a computer model derived from records gathered from more than 300 glaciers between 1961 and 2004. The model, which follows a scenario according to which the Earth's mean surface temperature would rise by 2.8°C during the 21st century, was applied to the 19 different regions in which the world's glaciers and icecaps are located. The scientists found that the mountains of New Zealand and Europe could lose approximately 70 % of their glaciers; meanwhile, the figure for Greenland and the high mountains of Asia would be about 10 %.
This level of ice loss could have significant impacts on regional hydrology and water availability, with certain regions affected more than others depending on the altitude of the glaciers, the nature of the terrain, and the susceptibility to local warming.
