Study: Ice sheets melting, sea level rising faster than previously thought WaPo

[JohnWxy]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-carbon/post/study-ice-sheets-melting-sea-level-rising-faster-than-previously-thought/2011/03/08/ABjIyOP_blog.html

The vast ice sheets of Greenland and Antarctica are melting faster than previously thought, and that melting is accelerating, according to a new report that verifies 18 years of melting via two independent techniques.

Left unchecked, the extra water dumped into the oceans could push average global sea level 6 inches higher by 2050, the report finds. That would mark the ice sheets as the largest contributors to sea level rise, outstripping melting from Earth’s two other huge, frozen reservoirs, mountain glaciers and polar ice caps.


A new study finds the melting of ice sheets in Antarctica and Greenland is accelerating, outstripping previous estimates of their contribution to sea level rise. (Eric Rignot) The new estimate of ice sheet melting – and the subsequent rise in sea level – outstrips more modest figures offered by the International Panel on Climate Change in 2007, the last time that international body published a comprehensive assessment of the ice sheets
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