A recent sea-born scientific expedition to the Totten glacier in East Antarctica has discovered that the glacier is thinning from the bottom at the rate of 10 metres per year. This unexpected discovery is similar to the situation in West Antarctica and shows that the whole of the Antarctic ice is under threat. The oceans have been absorbing 93% of the heat from the Sun and it is beginning to make itself felt.
Sea water at the surface of the Southern Ocean is -1.8 C and if it becomes colder it would freeze and become ice. The sea water at greater depths is much warmer and this is the problem. As the winds in the Southern Ocean speed up it is bringing this warmer water up from the deep and this warm water although still very cold at 0.9C is entering valleys in the sea bed and reaching right under the ice shelf.
As the ice shelf thins it becomes vulnerable and large amount break off and no longer act as a buffer to hold the land ice sheets in check. It will take a few years for these huge glaciers to start moving, the way that they have in West Antarctica and Greenland, but it has started.
We only need one metre of sea level rise to have grave economic impacts to the USA and Europe and none of this recent research was included in the IPCC report so we are moving into a critical climate change stage. While politicians are arguing about climate change and how to cheat the system nature is relentlessly moving ahead.
Occasional blog posts on topical news items concerning the climate. Please click the RSS feed to receive updates.