Posted on 10/20/2005 6:25:11 PM PDT by Pharmboy
Greenland's ice-cap has thickened slightly in recent years despite wide predictions of a thaw triggered by global warming, a team of scientists said on Thursday.
The 3,000-meter (9,842-feet) thick ice-cap is a key concern in debates about climate change because a total melt would raise world sea levels by about 7 meters. And a runaway thaw might slow the Gulf Stream that keeps the North Atlantic region warm.
But satellite measurements showed that more snowfall was falling and thickening the ice-cap, especially at high altitudes, according to the report in the journal Science.
Glaciers at sea level have been retreating fast because of a warming climate, making many other scientists believe the entire ice-cap was thinning.
"The overall ice thickness changes are ... approximately plus 5 cms (1.9 inches) a year or 54 cms (21.26 inches) over 11 years," according to the experts at Norwegian, Russian and U.S. institutes led by Ola Johannessen at the Mohn Sverdrup center for Global Ocean Studies and Operational Oceanography in Norway.
However, they said that the thickening seemed consistent with theories of global warming, blamed by most experts on a build-up of heat-trapping gases from (32.00F).
And the scientists said that the thickening of the ice-cap might be offset by a melting of glaciers around the fringes of Greenland. Satellite data was not good enough to measure the melt nearer sea level.
ICE SHEETS
Most models of global warming indicate that the Greenland ice might melt within thousands of years if warming continues.
Oceans would rise by about 70 meters if the far bigger ice-cap on Antarctica melted along with Greenland. Antarctica's vast size acts as a deep freeze likely to slow any melt of the southern continent.
The panel that advises the United Nations has predicted that global sea levels might rise by almost a meter by 2100 because of a warming climate.
Such a rise would swamp low-lying Pacific islands and warming could trigger more hurricanes, droughts, spread deserts and drive thousands of species to extinction.
Still, a separate study in Science on Thursday said sea levels were probably rising slightly because of a melt of ice sheets.
"Ice sheets now appear to be contributing modestly to sea level rise because warming has increased mass loss from coastal areas more than warming has increased mass gain from enhanced snowfall in cold central regions," it said.
"Greenland presently makes the largest contribution to sea level rise," according to the report by scientists led by Richard Alley of Pennsylvania State University in the United States.
I remember learning that the Vikes reversed the names of Iceland and Greenland so people would go to the wrong places, since Greenland was ice and Iceland was green. That it? (Those funny Vikings...)
they got their bases covered.
That's why they're so hot and cold on things. :)
23 Jul 2005 - According to glaciologists, the Kangerdlugssuaq Glacier
southeast of Greenland is now moving towards the sea at the "astonishing"
rate of more than seven miles (12 km) per year.
The discovery came after recent measurements of the glacier were compared
to those taken by NASA in 2002. During the 20th century the Kangerdlugssuaq
glacier remained stable. Now it appears to be moving as much as 38 meters
(117 feet) per day.
"Glaciers act in the same way that a river does with a source and a mouth. The
source is high in the mountains or at a higher latitude, where snow falls to contribute
to the source of the glacier and to feed it, allowing for advancement. This is rather
like a conveyor belt, where snow falls at the top of the mountain, this additional
weight pushes the ice sheet further down, and then ends in the sea, where parts
will break off to become icebergs.
The article blames the glacier's advance on "global warming."
They want it both ways, don't they?
If the glaciers recede, it must be caused by "global warming."
And if they advance? It must be "global warming."
The trouble is that the public believes it.
What a masterful piece of deception.
You can read the rest of the article, written by Matt Taylor, at
http://www.bbc.co.uk/weather/world/news/23072005news.shtml
.
Don't forget - Bush, Cheney, Rove, Haliburton and SUVs have also caused the polar ice caps on Mars to melt!
BTW, I am not a GW denier, like probably most freepers are, I am just sick of the crap the GW activists get away with.
Naw, I don't think anyone here on FR denies that average global temperatures have increased about a degree in the past hundred years. We have exact data on that.
I think our issues here are lack of long term exact data that would indicate this is all caused by the USA and human beings.
I mean seriously, that sun out there is not an absolute constant.
This planet has gone through temperature fluctuations since the beginning.
The current spate of Henny Penny global warming hysterics is not about determining that things change " naturally" on this planet but how eeeevil the USA and President Bush and the Conservatives are.
Agreed, and I think even most green conservatives (there are quite a few) would have to agree with that.
Summation...
We're not really sure what the hell is going on with these icecaps, but we're going to blame it on global warming anyway. President Bush is at fault.
All this cooling and warming is going to cause some massive potholes in the spring.
Global warming is a fact - the globe IS warming. Why are so many people denying this measured fact?
You got that right. It's why I never change my mind. I like the one I have.
Geez. Is EVERYTHING consistent with global warming???
You got that right,,, AND HOW .
Damn those SUVs
SARCASM ALERT!
Others have commented on this forum, and I agree, there is far too much criticism of our President, and his 'faults'. As the quote so often goes, 'it's Bush's fault."
So, you just want him to 'go away?'
Such posts as yours offer no support for our President whether in jest or not.
He is under fire from all sides these days, and I would hope a forum such as this would find people in support of him rather than those ridiculing him with 'tired' innuendos. Not to mention the fact we had a 'president' preceeding him whom many of us (rightfully so) chose not to recognize as 'commander in chief."
...and my name is not 'francis' (for the record).
Hardly. I'm a Bush supporter. I think that you misunderstand the whole "Bush's fault" thing. It's not ridicule of him at all. It's just a bit of sarcasm because it seems like pretty much anything gets blamed on the President already.
...and my name is not 'francis' (for the record).
"Stripes" (1982)
;-)
Makes sense to me. Warming an area at -55 C by one degree isn't going to cause any melting of ice, but it will allow the air to hold more moisture, and therefore there can be more snowfall in that area so the effect is that the ice will grow rather than melt.
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