A study from the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES) in Colorado, USA considers for the first time the effect of melt water as it flows into ice sheets in places like Greenland and the Arctic. The scientists found that as the water spreads along ice crevasses, factures or large drains, it speeds the melting of vast areas such as the Greenland Ice Sheet and could result in disintegration over decades rather than centuries, as previously forecast.
Research scientist and lead author Thomas Phillips said, “We are finding that once such water flow is initiated through a new section of ice sheet, it can warm rather significantly and quickly, sometimes in just 10 years.” CIRES Director Konrad Steffen also noted that this melt water data has been overlooked in prior models of Greenland warming, and thus could offer key information in understanding a more rapid ice decline.
Researchers at the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences, we appreciate the new concepts coming from your work, despite their urgent implications. Let us act now in planet-cooling efforts that restore the vital balance of the Arctic regions and our Earth.
Supreme Master Ching Hai has often reminded that such worrying phenomena could be halted by addressing the primary source of global warming, as in this November 2009 videoconference in Washington, DC, USA.
Supreme Master Ching Hai : In the Arctic, North Pole, so much ice has already melted that scientists are forecasting an ice-free summer within as little as 3-6 years, which would be the first time in one million years - first time in one million years! Greenland is shedding 85 million tons of icebergs each day due to warming, and at a rate that is increasing by 7 percent each year.
And if all of Antarctica and Greenland were to melt – meaning the ice – then the sea levels could rise to as much as 70 meters, which would be deadly or disastrous to most lives on Earth.
To solve this, we do need to move quickly, and of course we know what to do, right? Yes? Be vegan. NASA announced that methane actually contributes much more to global warming than previously understood and it traps 100 times the atmospheric heat over 20 years.
And the largest source of methane is? You know - livestock. So, we remove the livestock-generated methane, and the planet cools fast!
http://www.physorg.com/news/2010-11-ice-sheets.html http://motherjones.com/blue-marble/2010/11/science-shots-climate-shifts-everywhere