Greenland/Antarctica’s glaciers melting 5 times faster than in 1990s

         Climate change may not seem like a big issue locally but in fact it is causing devastating effects on the shrinking Greenland and Antarctica ice sheets that have been around for an extremely long time and are now reaching the smallest sizes ever recorded. We might not be feeling the effects of the melting ice sheets in the present but eventually all the melted ice will raise sea levels significantly and have a destructive effect on coastal cities. Already the sea level has been raised 11mm since 1992 just from the Greenland and Antarctica ice sheets alone, which is said to be only one-fifth of the ice that has been raising the sea level. Recently scientists have found new evidence that all but one of the worlds major ice sheets are rapidly shrinking. The only ice sheet that hasn’t melted significantly but instead gradually growing in size is the one on the east side of Antarctica due to climate change causing more snow to fall in this region, however this phenomenon is not enough to make up for the damage done to the rest of the continent. In the past there has been much conflict about how climate change is actually affecting the ice sheets. Since 1989, there has been 30 different study’s trying to prove what the exact effects are. These study’s that were done most recently marks the first time scientists have come up with a way to measure the changing size of the ice sheets that they can all agree upon, the evidence was found using mostly satellite technology.

        

It frustrates me to hear that our natural ice sheets that have been around for many years are shrinking to record sizes mostly because of our self-centered ways of living. Many of us do not even realize that damage we are doing to the ice sheets just from little things such as idling are cars. I believe that the government should make a strong effort to enforce greener ways of living before it’s to late and we don’t have any ice sheets to save as well as the coastal cities that will be submerged in the ocean that will be unsalvageable.

                                 By Margo McDiarmid, CBC News Posted: Nov 29, 2012 2:04 PM ET

http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/story/2012/11/29/pol-ice-sheets-melting-greenland.html