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The loss of Antarctic ice, along with the decrease in the Greenland ice sheet, have been responsible for a 14 millimeter rise in sea level since 2003. This is the main conclusion of a study published in the journal Science, which indicates that the Greenland ice sheet has lost an average of 200 gigatons of ice per year, while the Antarctic ice sheet 118 gigatons: one gigaton of ice is enough. to fill 400,000 Olympic-size pools.
The data is the result of measurements from NASA’s ICESat-2 satellite, which was launched in 2018: University of Washington researchers compared the new data obtained by this satellite with that of the first ICESat, collected from 2003 to 2009.
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With both data, the scientists were able to generate a complete portrait of “the complexities” behind the changes in the ice sheet and offer a vision of the future on Greenland and Antarctica, notes a press release from the aforementioned university. Regarding Antarctica, the authors explain that Sea level rise is being caused by the loss of floating ice shelves that melt in a warming ocean.
“If you look at a glacier or ice sheet for a month or a year, you will not learn much about the incidence of climate,” says Benjamin Smith, lead author of this study: “We now have a 16-year gap between the ICESat and ICESat satellite -2 and we can be much more confident that the changes we are seeing on the ice have to do with long-term changes in the climate. “
We can be much more sure that the changes we are seeing on the ice have to do with long-term changes in the climate
In addition, the researchers found that of the sea level rise resulting from the thaw, about two thirds came from Greenland and the other third from Antarctica. In Greenland, there was a significant amount of reduction in coastal glaciers: Kangerdulgssuaq and Jakobshavn, for example, they have lost 4 to 6 meters of elevation per year.
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In Antarctica, measurements showed that the ice sheet is thickening in parts of the interior of the continent, likely as a result of increased snowfall, Smith details. “But the loss of ice from the continent’s margins, especially in West Antarctica and the Antarctic Peninsula, far outweighs any gains inland.”
In this sense, he explains that in West Antarctica they could see that many glaciers are shrinking very quickly. At the ends of those glaciers, says Smith, there are ice shelves that float on the water; Those ice shelves are melting, causing more ice to flow into the ocean.
EFE
