ice sheet

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Greenland's Ice Sheet 'More Resilient Than We Thought'

Research says it may repair if we surpass climate goals, but only if things cool down fast

(Newser) - There's hope for Greenland's rapidly melting ice sheet. New research published in Nature says that even if global temperatures rise past Paris Agreement goals, the ice sheet has a chance to rebound under certain conditions. NPR untangles the findings, noting that the 2-mile thick, densely packed sheet has...

Growing Threat to Sea Levels: 'Zombie Ice'
Growing Threat to Sea Levels:
'Zombie Ice'
new study

Growing Threat to Sea Levels: 'Zombie Ice'

Melting Greenland ice sheet expected to lose 3% of its mass, no matter what

(Newser) - "Zombie ice" from the massive Greenland ice sheet will eventually raise the global sea level by at least 10 inches on its own, according to a study released Monday. Zombie (aka doomed) ice is ice that's still attached to thicker areas of ice but is no longer getting...

Worryingly, Scientists Can Wear T-Shirts in Greenland

Ice melt has accelerated in recent days

(Newser) - T-shirt weather has arrived for a group of people who would be a lot happier with colder temperatures: researchers stationed on Greenland's ice sheet. Scientists tell CNN that temperatures in some areas are around 60 degrees Fahrenheit, 10 degrees higher than normal. The spike in heat has triggered rapid...

From Bad to Worse for Greenland's Ice Sheet
Greenland Ice: They'll Have
to 'Invent New Upper Scenario'
in case you missed it

Greenland Ice: They'll Have to 'Invent New Upper Scenario'

It's melting 7 times faster than it did in the 1990s

(Newser) - Greenland's ice sheet is melting so fast that researchers will have to move the goalposts to estimate the impact on humans in the coming years. That's according to the Ice Sheet Mass Balance Inter-Comparison Exercise, a consortium of nearly 100 polar scientists who reviewed all satellite observations of...

'It's Too Late': Greenland's Ice Melt Will Raise Sea Levels

'The only question is: How severe does it get?'

(Newser) - Glacial ice on Greenland's coasts is calving into the sea , but that's just the tip of the iceberg, so to speak. By 2012, ice loss on Greenland's massive ice sheet had accelerated to a rate nearly four times what it was in 2003, and it may have...

Greenland Villagers Flee as Giant Iceberg Approaches

The giant hunk of ice could cause flooding as it approaches the town of Innaarsuit

(Newser) - A huge iceberg heading for a tiny Greenland town has sent villagers fleeing. Per Newsweek , the berg is so big it found itself lodged on the sea floor just beside the town of Innaarsuit, where the around 170 residents fear flooding could occur as chunks fall into the sea. The...

Antarctic Ice Melt Is Accelerating Rapidly

3 trillion tons of ice have melted since 1992, study says

(Newser) - Scientists monitoring ice loss in Antarctica have chilling news: The melting rate has accelerated alarmingly and the ice sheet is now shedding more than 200 billion tons a year, according to a study involving 88 scientists published in the journal Nature . The researchers say the rate of ice loss has...

What It Looks Like When a Glacier Calves an Iceberg

This was 'aftershock' from massive 2015 Antarctic event

(Newser) - There was nobody around to hear the crack when an iceberg around a mile long broke off from Antarctica's Pine Island Glacier, but a NASA satellite high above captured the dramatic event. The Landsat 8 satellite captured the iceberg's separation late last month in what was believed to...

Vast Find Made in Unknown Region of Antarctica

We know more about the surface of Mars than the bed of Antarctica

(Newser) - For more than 50 years, scientists from across the globe have been painstakingly mapping both poles, trying to get an accurate sense of the rock hidden beneath the ice sheets. Now, thanks to satellite data from multiple organizations and "serendipitous reconnaissance radio-echo sounding data" over the canyons of Antarctica,...

All Antarctic Ice Would Melt If We Burned All Fossil Fuels

Seas could rise 160 feet: study

(Newser) - If we were to burn all of the planet's fossil fuel reserves, we would be saying goodbye to the entire Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets. That's the takeaway from an international study announced today, Reuters reports. "To be blunt: If we burn it all, we melt it...

Mystery of Vanishing Glacial Lakes Solved

Meltwater causes tension on lake bottoms, spawning hydrofractures

(Newser) - For years, scientists have known glacial lakes can rapidly empty themselves of billions of gallons of water—in at least one case, faster than the speed at which water flows over Niagara Falls. Now, they finally know how it's done. Researchers had guessed that the weight of the water...

Scientists Find Life Half a Mile Below Antarctic Ice

The active ecosystem is below the West Antarctic Ice Sheet

(Newser) - A half a mile below the surface of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet, in a lake that hasn’t been touched by sunshine or wind in millions of years, life goes on. A large US expedition called WISSARD , led by a professor at Montana State University, has unearthed a thriving...

Under Greenland's Ice: Soil Older Than Mankind

Land mass once home to forests

(Newser) - The soil under the highest point of the Greenland Ice Sheet, scientists have learned, is 2.7 million years old, LiveScience reports. In other words, the silt buried under thousands of feet of ice "has been preserved from beyond the dawn of humankind," says Paul Bierman, who determined...

Big Find Under Greenland's Snow: 100B Tons of Water

Snow insulates it, keeping it liquid year-round, say researchers

(Newser) - As far as discoveries go, this one is literally huge: An aquifer holding more than 100 billion tons of water that covers an area larger than West Virginia has been discovered beneath Greenland's snow-covered ice sheet. And it caught the researchers who stumbled on it in 2011 off-guard, with...

2.6K Feet Below Greenland Ice Sheet, 2 Huge Lakes
2.6K Feet Below Greenland Ice Sheet, 2 Huge Lakes
in case you missed it

2.6K Feet Below Greenland Ice Sheet, 2 Huge Lakes

Researchers discover first subglacial lakes in Greenland

(Newser) - For the first time, researchers have discovered lakes underneath the Greenland Ice Sheet. The two newly identified subglacial lakes each measure about 8 to 10 square kilometers, and are nearly 2,625 feet below the surface, according to Science World Report . They were likely much bigger—three times bigger—in...

Polar Ice Sheets Melting Faster
 Polar Ice Sheets Melting Faster 
Huge study

Polar Ice Sheets Melting Faster

Process to blame for a fifth of sea-level rise

(Newser) - The most expansive study yet is helping to clarify long-held uncertainties about polar ice. The melting of polar ice sheets has sped up since 1992, raising sea levels 0.43 inches—a fifth of their total rise since then. And while the melting ice sheets accounted for 10% of the...

Greenland, Antarctic Ice Melting Faster Than Expected

Ice sheets could send sea level up 6 inches by 2050

(Newser) - The ice sheets of Greenland and Antarctica are melting significantly faster than previously estimated, according to a new international report led by scientists at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Unless the trend is reversed, the melting ice sheets will push global sea levels up six inches by 2050, the scientists...

In Antarctica, Ice Forms in Unexpected Ways

It's supposed to fall as snow, and form from the top down...

(Newser) - Ice in Antarctica is supposed to form from the top down, the result of falling snow. But researchers who scanned an Antarctic mountain range with lasers and radar have discovered new ice developing at the bottom of miles-thick ice sheets ... and altering the surface. The earth’s heat melted the...

18 Stories