3 ms·

Surface area? Don't you need volume to compute the thermal expansion of the ocean? And you also need the volume of land ice to compute how much might melt... if

Surface area? Don't you need volume to compute the thermal expansion of the ocean? And you also need the volume of land ice to compute how much might melt... if you want to convince people, you need to do more than just provide four statistics and walk away, you need to show how you use those to compute the level of expansion. Which you haven't done, and I'm 99% sure you can't with just those four numbers.

oldandtired 9y ago
Surface area by height (1 to 10 metres) is volume. Of course, if one doesn't know that specific idea then one might be stuck. The volume of land ice can be assumed to be sufficient by the scenarios given. As far as ice expansion is concerned, not really relevant for a first approximation for the energy required as it is relatively small.
- openasocket 9y ago
  I mean you need to know the volume of all the water in the ocean. Because as the temperature rises the water expands, which leads to rising sea levels, in addition to the land ice melting.
  - yorwba 9y ago
    To compute the total energy requirements, you don't really need to know the ocean volume, if you are willing to linearly approximate the thermal expansion. If you have less water, the same amount of energy will heat it up to a proportionally higher temperature and correspondingly expand it more, resulting in approximately the same sea level rise. Obviously this breaks down if you want a more accurate figure, but in that case you also have to account for water shrinking with increasing temperature between 0 °C and 4 °C and so on. In any case, melting a bunch of ice is a much more energy-efficient way of increasing the volume of liquid water than heating already molten water. The energy required for melting ice is roughly the same as that for heating the water to 80 °C, and 80 °C is not twice as voluminous as 0 °C water.
- averagewall 9y ago
  I find that when you're talking about technical things on the internet, it's best to assume the other person knows common knowledge and only doesn't know the idea you're trying to express. It's almost impossible that the GP didn't know V=A*h so pointing it out is more of an insult than anything useful.

oldandtired 9y ago

Surface area by height (1 to 10 metres) is volume. Of course, if one doesn't know that specific idea then one might be stuck. The volume of land ice can be assumed to be sufficient by the scenarios given. As far as ice expansion is concerned, not really relevant for a first approximation for the energy required as it is relatively small.

openasocket 9y ago
I mean you need to know the volume of all the water in the ocean. Because as the temperature rises the water expands, which leads to rising sea levels, in addition to the land ice melting.
- yorwba 9y ago
  To compute the total energy requirements, you don't really need to know the ocean volume, if you are willing to linearly approximate the thermal expansion. If you have less water, the same amount of energy will heat it up to a proportionally higher temperature and correspondingly expand it more, resulting in approximately the same sea level rise. Obviously this breaks down if you want a more accurate figure, but in that case you also have to account for water shrinking with increasing temperature between 0 °C and 4 °C and so on. In any case, melting a bunch of ice is a much more energy-efficient way of increasing the volume of liquid water than heating already molten water. The energy required for melting ice is roughly the same as that for heating the water to 80 °C, and 80 °C is not twice as voluminous as 0 °C water.
averagewall 9y ago
I find that when you're talking about technical things on the internet, it's best to assume the other person knows common knowledge and only doesn't know the idea you're trying to express. It's almost impossible that the GP didn't know V=A*h so pointing it out is more of an insult than anything useful.