Is Our World Melting Away?

Now before you panic, yes there is A LOT of ice in Antarctica, however, researchers have recently found it has been melting at an alarming rate. Now, three million odd years ago Antarctica melted so much that it pushed the oceans about 17 metres higher than they are today. So if we’re talking about that happening again – what do you think the outcome would be? This could very easily reshape coastlines, swamp places currently occupied by millions of people, or even make entire nations disappear. You’re panicking aren’t you?

Let’s break it down; Antarctica and Greenland only play minor roles in the rising of the world’s ocean right now. Currently the seas are rising about 3.2mm each year and about one third of that is coming from warming oceans taking up more space. The second biggest driver is the melting of glaciers around the world. The ice sheets in Antarctica only account for about one sixth of that 3.2mm but as mentioned before is getting progressively worse.

So are we having a repeat of 3 million years ago? It’s possible. A recent study showed that Antarctica’s ice is currently melting at a rate of 159 billion tons per year. This is happening because of an increase of greenhouse gas emissions on our planet. The more emissions put out into our atmosphere the warmer our oceans get. If we as humans don’t take initiative to cut these gas emissions sea levels could rise as high as one metre from where they were a decade ago.

So this begs the question… can you picture a world made up of just water? Hard to believe right? There are ways you can actively help out the situation which we will discuss tomorrow! Please share any current suggestions you have in eliminating greenhouse gas emissions below 🙂

– K