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Zardoz
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Location: Oil-addicted Southern Californucopia
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 Posted: Mon Jun 11, 2007 2:02 am Post subject: National Geographic: The Big Thaw |
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None of the computer models predicted anything like this. Nobody thought the world's ice sheets could melt as quickly as they actually are. The scientific community is still struggling to understand the feedback loops that are accelerating the deterioration of the ice to what was previously thought to be impossibly-fast rates. Climatologists everywhere are in a state of shock as they observe what is going on:
From Greenland to Antarctica, the world is losing its ice faster than anyone thought possible.
| Quote: | Scientists are finding that glaciers and ice sheets are surprisingly touchy. Instead of melting steadily, like an ice cube on a summer day, they are prone to feedbacks, when melting begets more melting and the ice shrinks precipitously. At Chacaltaya, for instance, the shrinking glacier exposed dark rocks, which sped up its demise by soaking up heat from the sun. Other feedbacks are shriveling bigger mountain glaciers ahead of schedule and sending polar ice sheets slipping into the ocean.
Most glaciers in the Alps could be gone by the end of the century, Glacier National Park's namesake ice by 2030. The small glaciers sprinkled through the Andes and Himalaya have a few more decades at best. And the prognosis for the massive ice sheets covering Greenland and Antarctica? No one knows, if only because the turn for the worse has been so sudden. Eric Rignot, a scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory who has measured a doubling in ice loss from Greenland over the past decade, says: "We see things today that five years ago would have seemed completely impossible, extravagant, exaggerated." |
Melt consumes Montana's Grinnell Glacier, a robust body of ice decades ago. (Glacier National Park will be glacier-free in about twenty years.)
| Quote: | Jakobshavn is flowing ever faster. In the past decade it doubled its speed, to roughly 120 feet (37 meters) a day. By now it discharges 11 cubic miles (45 cubic kilometers) of ice each year, jamming the fjord with fresh icebergs.
The pace is picking up elsewhere around Greenland. Last year Eric Rignot reported satellite radar measurements showing that most glaciers draining the southern half of the Greenland ice sheet have accelerated, some even more dramatically than Jakobshavn. He calculated that Greenland lost a total of 54 cubic miles (225 cubic kilometers) of ice in 2005, more than twice as much as ten years ago—and more than some scientists were prepared to believe. |
The only question now is how much faster the melting can get as the feedback loops continue to accelerate the pace. We may be in for even more nasty surprises.
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shakespear1
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| Posted: Mon Jun 11, 2007 2:39 am Post subject: Re: National Geographic: The Big Thaw |
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That lake in the photo looks sad. At first glance for me it lookes like someone dumped garbage into it, which in a sense is what "WE" have done. 
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Battle_Scarred_Galactico
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| Posted: Mon Jun 11, 2007 2:53 am Post subject: Re: National Geographic: The Big Thaw |
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We are seeing this a lot now, that the predictions were overly optimisic.
Thats' why the "It won't happen in my lifetime" crowd make me laugh, anything to feel better.
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"One minute I held the key, next the walls were closed on me, and I discovered that my castle stands upon pillars of salt and pillars of sand." |
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Heineken
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| Posted: Mon Jun 11, 2007 7:37 am Post subject: Re: National Geographic: The Big Thaw |
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I showed this issue of NG to my elderly parents, and it turned them into doomers! Finally.
NG has improved greatly under its new chief editor. The emphasis is much more firmly on what it should be.
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Doly
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| Posted: Mon Jun 11, 2007 7:39 am Post subject: Re: National Geographic: The Big Thaw |
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| Heineken wrote: |
NG has improved greatly under its new chief editor. The emphasis is much more firmly on what it should be. |
I agree. They had this wonderful article on the increase of intensity and number of hurricanes, just before Katrina. |
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Heineken
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| Posted: Mon Jun 11, 2007 7:41 am Post subject: Re: National Geographic: The Big Thaw |
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Thanks, Doly. I'm glad we finally agree on something!
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"Actually, humans died out long ago."
---Abused, abandoned hunting dog
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roccman
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Joined: Apr 27, 2007
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Location: The Great Sonoran Desert
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| Posted: Mon Jun 11, 2007 7:59 am Post subject: Re: National Geographic: The Big Thaw |
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"NG has improved greatly under its new chief editor. The emphasis is much more firmly on what it should be."
A NG cover in 1977 had Hubbert's peak on it and a detailed explanation of peak oil inside and what crisis is ahead of us.
I don't think it has anything to do with editors. |
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Heineken
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| Posted: Mon Jun 11, 2007 8:02 am Post subject: Re: National Geographic: The Big Thaw |
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I said "improved." That doesn't mean that none of the issues that preceded the current editor weren't good. It just means that, on average, the mag is better now than it was in terms of coverage of the big picture.
It does "have something to do with editors." They decide what subjects get covered, and how. I should know---I was a magazine editor for many years.
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"Actually, humans died out long ago."
---Abused, abandoned hunting dog
"Things have entered a stage where the only change that is possible is for things to get worse."
---Me and my brother |
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roccman
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Posts: 4262
Location: The Great Sonoran Desert
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| Posted: Mon Jun 11, 2007 8:06 am Post subject: Re: National Geographic: The Big Thaw |
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| Excellent - then you of all should know how sheep are influenced. |
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Heineken
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Location: Rural Virginia
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| Posted: Mon Jun 11, 2007 8:20 am Post subject: Re: National Geographic: The Big Thaw |
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That's a non sequitur, roccman.
In any case, I had very little influence either way.
_________________
"Actually, humans died out long ago."
---Abused, abandoned hunting dog
"Things have entered a stage where the only change that is possible is for things to get worse."
---Me and my brother |
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