Greenland Ice Sheet Slip Sliding Away
The Greenland Ice sheet is melting up to three times faster in the last decade than in the last century.
The world's second largest ice-cap is melting at an alarming rate
The Greenland Ice Sheet is the second largest in the world, measuring 2,400 kilometres in length, 1,100 kilometres in width and 3 kilometres thick in places. Satellite images - available since 1992 - indicate that it is melting at an alarming rate and contributing significantly to global sea level rise.
In fact, between 2003 and 2010, Greenland dumped 186 billion tonnes of melt water per year into the world's oceans. But a new study by Dr. William Colgan, an Assistant Professor at the Lassonde School of Engineering at York University in Toronto, has compared the more recent satellite information with thousands of aerial 3-D photographs of Greenland dating back to 1900.
The results show that current climate conditions have caused the Greenland Ice Sheet to melt nearly 3 times as fast in recent years as it did during the entire 20th century.
Related Links
- Paper in Nature
- University of Copenhagen release
- CBC News story
- Scientific American story
- York University release on follow-up study
- CBC News - follow up story