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NASA Scientists Suggest We’ve Been Underestimating Sea Level Rise
- refurb 10y agoIn terms of sea level changes, however, the study found the effects of melting are more drastically felt in regions farther from its source. Would be nice if they had a theory why.
- rwh86 10y agoPart of the reason is gravitational effects. When a large amount of ice melts, the Earth's gravity is shifted away from that region. This gives you a sense of the absolutely huge amount of ice we're talking about. For example, if the West Antarctic Ice Shelf collapses we'll see about 10 metres of sea level rise, but mostly in the northern hemisphere. To underline just how much ice this is, this effect will slowly be counteracted as the ground below slowly rebounds (as it no longer has a huge amount of ice crushing it down from above).
- unavoidable 10y agoPotentially related is the centrifugal effect - the Earth bulges at the equator slightly because of spin. Logically, melted ice would tend to cause water to "rise" more at the equators (further from the ice caps) than near the poles.
- droopyEyelids 10y ago...and that would slow the rotation of the earth. I'd love to see a calculation of how much ice would have to melt for us to add another leap second. Or to back it up, how would timekeeping bodies deal with that? Would we actually remove a second because there would technically be less "time" (measured in days, meaning axial revolutions of the Earth) per year?
- Johnythree 10y agoIt's been done. I can't find the reference, but apparently the extreme accuracy of atomic clocks has proven that the mass of water moving from the poles to the equator has slowed the earth's rotation as predicted.
- leephillips 10y agoThere's a reference and some discussion at http://arstechnica.com/science/2016/04/the-leap-second-because-our-clocks-are-more-accurate-than-the-earth/ http://arstechnica.com/science/2016/04/the-leap-second-becau...
- elorant 10y agoThis makes me wonder. Could it affect seismic activity?
- deftnerd 10y agoIndeed it can! "rapid deglaciation promotes earthquakes ... rebound stress that is available to trigger earthquakes today is of the order of 1 MPa. This stress level is not large enough to rupture intact rocks but is large enough to reactivate pre-existing faults that are close to failure." - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-glacial_rebound#State_of_stress.2C_intraplate_earthquakes_and_volcanism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-glacial_rebound#State_of_...
- cloudjacker 10y agoI always make my self look smarter and more legitimate by quoting the source that wikipedia quoted You can do it too
- spdionis 10y agoI wonder if this is related to the streak of big earthquakes happening currently in Italy.
- trentnix 10y agoWhatever it is, you can be certain that the solution is massive taxation and central control by bureaucrats.
- lakmear 10y agoTry a revenue neutral carbon tax.
- orangecat 10y agoWe're trying. The left opposes it because it doesn't make government bigger: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-lefts-opposition-to-a-carbon-tax-shows-theres-something-deeply-wrong-with-the-left/2016/10/27/2b6e6bea-9bb4-11e6-a0ed-ab0774c1eaa5_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-lefts-opposition...
- lukeschlather 10y agoI'm not ideologically in favor of smaller or bigger government. I want smarter government, and there's nothing smart about passing legislation that will reduce the state government's revenue by between $80 and $900 million a year without defining what services to cut. Also, "bigger government" is a vague enough definition that it could easily apply to this initiative. It creates a new category of tax, and a new category of tax credit. It will probably reduce the government's revenue, but the legislature can and most likely will raise revenue in other places to plug the gaps rather than cutting necessary agencies.
- MichaelBurge 10y agoThe same people who want a smaller government are also usually in favor of a balanced budget amendment, which would force any proposal to cut taxes or raise spending to specify how it balances.
- flukus 10y agoMeanwhile, the right can't even recognize it's a real issue. What do you think the bigger barrier is?
- oddlyaromatic 10y agoMaybe I'm daft but one suggested itself to me: if you add more very cold water locally, that influences the temperature and pressure/density differentials with existing currents. It's presumably the effect on those currents that causes more water to build up elsewhere.
- roywiggins 10y agoGravimetry has been used to track ocean currents, and water temperature will presumably effect currents. https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.washingtonpost.com/amphtml/news/energy-environment/wp/2015/11/04/nasa-can-now-detect-worrying-ocean-circulation-changes-from-space/ https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.washingtonpost.com/amphtml/...
- oddlyaromatic 10y agoAwesome.
- jamesblonde 10y agoCheck out the north Atlantic cold spot. It has already contributed to making summers in Ireland even more miserable for the last 10 years.
- oddlyaromatic 10y agoI've missed the last 6 summers in Ireland but I hear you!
- lobster_johnson 10y agoThere are several reasons, the main one being that glaciers and ice sheets exert a large gravitational pull. http://harvardmagazine.com/2010/05/gravity-of-glacial-melt http://harvardmagazine.com/2010/05/gravity-of-glacial-melt http://m.nautil.us/issue/33/attraction/why-our-intuition-about-sea_level-rise-is-wrong http://m.nautil.us/issue/33/attraction/why-our-intuition-abo... From the last article: "Three things happen. One is that you’re dumping all of this melt water into the ocean. So the mass of the entire ocean would definitely be going up if ice sheets were melting—as they are today. The second thing that happens is that this gravitational attraction that the ice sheet exerts on the surrounding water diminishes. As a consequence, water migrates away from the ice sheet. The third thing is, as the ice sheet melts, the land underneath the ice sheet pops up; it rebounds."
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- mikro2nd 10y agoThey do. Search for Jerry Mitrovica (Harvard geophysicist) on YT for explanations.
- M_Grey 10y agoI suspect that we can expect a lot of bad news to emerge over the next few decades, as the promise of climate change becomes the reality of climate change.
- WillPostForFood 10y agoOn the other hand, people have been saying that for last few decades, and the bad news hasn't had much impact.
- CardenB 10y agoThat's the nature of an exponential, runaway trend.
- epistasis 10y agoPeople (well, climate science researchers) have been saying that the changes are decades ahead of us, even now, but that we need to take action now and in the past to prevent these changes. Given the general staidness of the actual research, I think we need to worry a lot more about where climate science has underestimated the change than where they've overestimated it. The loss function will be brutal on that side.
- tjic 10y ago> People (well, climate science researchers) have been saying that the changes are decades ahead of us, even now, but that we need to take action now and in the past to prevent these changes. Climate researchers have _not_ been implying that the bad effects are way out in the 21st century: they've made hundreds of testable predictions that catastrophe was at hand in the 80s, 90s, and aughts. We were going to see the end of arctic ice, have a perpetual ozone hole necessitating sun screen when venturing outside and decimating wildlife from cataracts, see New York and other major cities drowned, etc. (Not to mention famine killing billions of people, etc.) It is possible to think that climate research is useful and interesting even while acknowledging that they are often alarmist and full of nonsense in their predictions.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- blueprint 10y agoDuh. The important thing at this instant is to develop a self-sufficient extra-terrestrial colony or a means by which some people can survive far above the surface of the Earth for 30-80 years. Life on Earth itself has less time than most people are even ready to know. Something on the order of 1-10 years left. There are massive changes coming which will destroy all human civilization on Earth. Global warming is just the first step. It's like a fever in a human. 1-3°C is no big deal. 3-5°C is extremely serious. We're talking massive tectonic activity, volcanoes, and huge tsunami(s) caused by a huge wave of energy originating from Earth's core. This situation is caused by a problem in the circulation of the gravity field. I've met many scientists but aside from even finding people who understand this topic, I have barely even found anyone who genuinely wants to know either. And this is the very reason this phenomenon of collapse is determined to appear in this age of mankind.
- yellowapple 10y agoFascinating. Do you have any sources on this? I'm interested in learning more.
- blueprint 10y agoPlease see my reply to veeragoni.
- yellowapple 10y agoAaaaand it's a bunch of unsubstantiated spiritualist gibberish. Oh well.
- blueprint 10y agoThat hurts, because you lied about being interested in learning, giving me a little expectation about you – and you also don't admit the truth because of your pride. I need to find only a small handful of people from your life in order for everyone else to realize your true color. Obviously, you're used to hearing similar words to what I said from those who don't know a thing. However, in order for you, yourself, to avoid become a hypocrite, you need to not make the mistake you accuse me of doing. So, perhaps you could present proof that what I shared is unsubstantiated. It's to your detriment to treat it badly without confirmation.
- Eadrax 10y agoThere is nothing we can do, as long China and India get a pass, 3.2 billion people in 2 country doing nothing. Even if the US disappeared off the face of the map, its still to late. I say let it happen, it will propel us into a new era off innovation and environmental awareness. No one is going to take it seriously until its to late anyway .
- meric 10y agoThey're building solar power plants everywhere, shutting down factories and coal power plants around large cities. "Other main targets include: – reduction of emissions from coal burning industries and vehicles2 – boost cleaner and more efficient use of coal – promote the use of electricity and natural gas in place of coal – support for wind, solar and bio power sectors; increase in proportion of clean energy – encourage the use of waste straw as a resource – reduction in-field burning – implementation of control measures to deal with air pollution ... By 2020, he said, the intensity of water use per unit of GDP will fall by 23%, energy intensity by a further 15%, and carbon intensity by 18%." What about U.S.? It's people saying "as long China and India get a pass... Even if the US disappeared off the face of the map, its still to late... so let it happen." You're the problem. Even if the rest of the world disappeared of the map, U.S.'s carbon emissions and pollution still exceed world's capacity to absorb it. Do you know how much of the world's environment is scorched to produce raw resources to produce goods for consumption in the U.S.? You're not taking it seriously.
- M_Grey 10y agoNot to mention that we're incredibly hypocritical about the fact that we happily burned coal and oil and continue to, but expect developing economies to just... stop. It's worse when you consider Europe getting uppity about migrancy, which is being causes in large part by drought related to climate change. It's going to be the story of this century: the people least responsible for climate change are going to disproportionately suffer for it. Meanwhile those most responsible will demonize them for their efforts to survive it.
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- Kenji 10y agoAs the sea level rises, its surface grows by the square. So, more and more water is needed for it to rise more. So, all linear predictions are flawed anyway. What do you think, the sea is suddenly going to rise by meters? Get a grip on reality. I really dislike these alarmist articles. EDIT: Okay, I checked the math and the square really doesn't weigh much at this ratio of sphere radius vs. sea level rise. I guess I should rely less on asymptotes in the real world ;) Still, I remain largely unconcerned about sea level rises since even if it were to continue linearly, it's completely unproblematic except for some coastal/below sea regions.
- pithon 10y agoMany nonlinear problems can be approximated as linear and in this case the rough sea level rise (think altitude/distance) so ridiculously dwarfs the radius of the earth (the square in your argument) that the linear approximation is pretty good.
- danenania 10y agoDoesn't that assume perfectly flat coastlines?
- roywiggins 10y agoIf we were randomly distributed on land, I'd agree. But humans are disproportionately concentrated on coasts compared to inland.
- M_Grey 10y agoWhat a pity that we predominately live in coastal regions, and what a pity that you're ignoring the issue of our water table being inundated.
- bssrdf 10y ago"In terms of sea level changes, however, the study found the effects of melting are more drastically felt in regions farther from its source. According to InsideClimate News, melting sea ice in the Northern Hemisphere might raise water levels more in “the southern Pacific Ocean and equatorial regions.” With all due respect, but melting sea ice doesn't raise sea level. It's a scientific fact the author should check carefully before publishing.
- StanislavPetrov 10y agoIce is 90% more reflective. Melting sea ice turns the oceans into giant heat sinks and accelerates warming.
- michaelbuddy 10y agoExcept the most "reflective" areas get the least amount of sun per year anyway.
- flukus 10y agoThey also get it 24/7 for a good chunk of the year.
- marcosdumay 10y agoIt's a big amount. Relative data are useless here, we are talking about a 1-2K heating in a 300K body.
- frabcus 10y agoThe cited source https://insideclimatenews.org/news/21102016/melting-ice-glaciers-sea-level-rise-underestimated-study-Greenland https://insideclimatenews.org/news/21102016/melting-ice-glac... makes it clear it means ice above land, such as Greenland. It also doesn't use the phrase "sea ice" which seems a confusing phrase.
- yequalsx 10y agoThe author made a mistake by interchangeably using "sea ice" and "ice sheet ice". However, your correction itself isn't strictly correct. Melting sea ic can change sea levels by changing the density of the water in the ocean. Also, by melting it changes the amount of sunlight that is reflected. The increase in sunlight reaching the oceans will cause thermal expansion of the water.
- cheiVia0 10y agoFor the folks outside the USA, that is 14-17cm
- mattko 10y agoWhat am I missing here? 0.6"/decade since 1900 would be 6.6" by 2015, and the article says sea level rose as much as 6.7" in the last century.
- andrewstuart2 10y agoThe important thing is that 6.7 is more than ten times bigger than 0.6. Clearly you can safely ignore the words decade and century because they're words and not numbers.
- imron 10y agoHow many decades are there in a century?
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- pc86 10y ago6.7
- andrewstuart2 10y agoI was debating including /s to make it clearer that I was being sarcastic. I seem to have made the wrong choice.
- imron 10y agoLast century is up until 1999. So it hit the expected 2015 target 15 years early.
- jczhang 10y agoUh yeah I'm confused by this part as well. Can anyone clarify?
- Arnt 10y agoQuoting Vice's source: "The analyzed records have an average twentieth century rate of approximately 1.6 mm/yr, but based on the locations of these gauges, we show that the simple average underestimates the twentieth century global mean rate by 0.1 ± 0.2 mm/yr."
- BurningFrog 10y agoHave you noticed how you hear about 100 reports about how things may be worse than we though, for each report about the opposite? This says nothing about science, and a lot about what stories get people's attention.
- Daishiman 10y agoWhat this says about science is that the consensus from all the experts who have spent man-centuries looking at this is that we're looking at a huge shitshow.
- BurningFrog 10y agoI'm not at all talking about climate change specifically. This applies to any issue that humanity is worrying about.
- Hondor 10y agoYea, it's disappointing how biased the reporting is. I suspect the science is almost as biased. Even the papers that do show that things aren't as bad as we thought find some way to say "Don't worry, it's still bad!"
- veeragoni 10y agoI suggest people watch the documentary too. https://youtu.be/90CkXVF-Q8M https://youtu.be/90CkXVF-Q8M . I care about my son and their future. so, i change
- NumberCruncher 10y agoI like this quotation: >> We're all human. Oh, we all do our duty when there's no cost to it. Honor comes easy then. Yet sooner or later in every man's life there comes a day when it's not easy. A day when he must choose. People like to talk about human driven climate change but do not want to pay the price of stopping it. I have seen a demonstration against climate change in Germany. There weren't any banner with the text "I have thrown out my plasma screen and sold my car! Please do the same!" This lot of talking but no doing annoys me like hell.
- Xylakant 10y agoI don't own a car - not entirely for ecologic reasons, but that's one of them. I do most of my short-distance trips by bicycle, I'll use a car-sharing offer when I need to transport heavy stuff, though I currently consider buying a cargo bike to replace that use. I'm in the fortunate position that this is possible for me since I live in the city, have proper public transport, can walk to the supermarket and in a pinch have multiple car-sharing offers to pick from. Still, I believe that action against climate change cannot be effective at an individual level. It's the classic tragedy of the commons - what I save in energy, the neighbor next door easily blows through the tailpipe of his SUV. Foregoing a car is not possible for large chunks of the population, those that live in areas with less good public transport, for those that regular need to travel long distances etc. So action needs to come at at least federal level, probably even at a EU level: Public transport (and long distances railway) needs to be a real alternative to private car ownership in at least most places in germany. Clean energy needs to be supported, dirty energy not (we're still paying subsidies for a lignite mine in brandenburg). So yes, demonstrations make sense, because they support the policies at a level that actually makes sense.
- NumberCruncher 10y ago>> I believe that action against climate change cannot be effective at an individual level I believe it as well. Unfortunately on any other level you have players caring more about the own money / power than the well-being of the masses and players being deeply involved in the human driven climate change. Sometimes the latter pays the former. Sometimes? It is a windmill fight.
- neilsharma 10y agoSlight tangent, but how does one with SWE/product skills get involved in climate work? There seems to be some research every other day indicating how disastrous global warming is going to be, but a dearth of jobs outside of solar installation or academia.
- adrianN 10y agoMake the Linux kernel more efficient, save a bazillion CPU cycles in datacenters all over the world.
- brianwawok 10y agoWhich hipsters with Ruby and Node will burn away.
- colordrops 10y agoI hope you are being sarcastic.
- brianwawok 10y agoNot really. Node and Ruby both increase global warming
- TeMPOraL 10y agoHe's not. Inefficient code multiplied by millions of users = quite a lot of coal being wasted.
- brianwawok 10y agoFor example AirBNB talks about 2000 web servers with Rails. I bet they could be 200 web servers with Java. So because of Ruby, we have 1800 servers burning coal in a datacenter somewhere.
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- hydandata 10y agoI wonder how much waste can be averted if remote was the default option everywhere where it is a viable way of working. Perhaps this is one of the easier ways to contribute to averting the catastrophe.
- undersuit 10y agoBut then how would the pointy haired bosses be able to see that you are a diligent worker with no effort?
- wahsd 10y agoAnd yet our only solution is the equivalent of green washing and insignificant, self-defeating feel good actions. The reality no one wants to face is that the only immediately controllable solution is 1) to reduce the human population, which is the core driver of climate change and 2) stop moving people from low impact societies to high impact societies, stop moving them from the underdeveloped world to the developed world. Everything else is just beating around the bush and making things worse, respectively.