4 ms·
> "I'm always unsure how to react to claims of 10 foot rise in sea level in 40 years." That is not considered likely. The IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Clim
by dalke 10y ago
> "I'm always unsure how to react to claims of 10 foot rise in sea level in 40 years."
That is not considered likely. The IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) Fifth Assessment Report, Synthesis Report, at http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar5/syr/SYR_AR5_FINAL_full_wcover.pdf http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar5/syr/SYR_AR5_FIN... on page 11 has a plot titled "Global mean sea level rise (relative to 1986–2005)".
The highest end of the worst case given is 1 meter rise by the end of the century. By 2050 the high end is only about 30 cm, or 1 foot.
> Global mean sea level rise will continue during the 21st century,
very likely at a faster rate than observed from 1971 to 2010. For the period
2081–2100 relative to 1986–2005, the rise will likely be in the ranges of 0.26 to 0.55 m for RCP2.6, and of 0.45 to 0.82 m for RCP8.5 (medium confidence)[10]
> 10. Based on current understanding (from observations, physical understanding and modelling), only the collapse of marine-based sectors of the Antarctic
ice sheet, if initiated, could cause global mean sea level to rise substantially above the likely range during the 21st century. There is medium confidence that this additional contribution would not exceed several tenths of a meter of sea level rise during the 21st century.
How you should react is to read the IPCC report and learn what it is that people think is likely to happen, rather than worry about hyperbolic statements like a 10 meter rise in a few decades.
- madaxe_again 10y agoAlthough you should also bear in mind that the IPCC reports have been considerably "watered down" in response to governmental pressure. Talk to a climatologist, and they'll tell you all sorts of things you don't want to hear. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/earth-insight/2014/may/15/ipcc-un-climate-reports-diluted-protect-fossil-fuel-interests https://www.theguardian.com/environment/earth-insight/2014/m...
- Tiquor 10y agoClimatologist in radio said in an interview the other day that sea level could rise 3cm to 10m in the next X years. Follow up question was, of course, "What happens at 10m sea rise." There is definitely some tendency all around to be hyperbolic.
- dalke 10y agoEven then the level is more like 2 meters by 2100, not 3 meters by 2060. http://e360.yale.edu/feature/rising_waters_how_fast_and_how_far_will_sea_levels_rise/2702/ http://e360.yale.edu/feature/rising_waters_how_fast_and_how_... > In the face of all these uncertainties, some have taken a different predictive approach. Instead of trying to model the physics behind every process contributing to sea level rise (from thermal expansion to melting ice), they argue, why not instead simply look at how sea levels have corresponded to temperature over hundreds of years and extrapolate? These so-called 'semi-empirical' models tend to top out twice as high as the 'process-based' models, making 2 meters of sea level rise feasible for 2100 — enough to flood the homes of 187 million people. But the IPCC says it doesn’t have much confidence in these results. "They’re interesting," says Chambers, "but I don’t think they should be given as much weight as the process-based models." > A few scientists disagree, including Stefan Rahmstorf of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Research, who works on semi-empirical models. "We have two different approaches, and they give different results," says Rahmstorf. "I don’t know which one is closer to the truth. But I object to the IPCC selecting one type and dismissing the other." Other reports, notes Rahmstorf, including a 2012 assessment by the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, give more pessimistic sea level predictions, going up to 2 meters by 2100.