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Perennial Sea Ice Not Being Replaced, Threatening Ice Cap Stability

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posted on Apr, 3 2007 @ 06:31 PM
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Perennial sea ice in the Arctic is melting faster each summer than it can be replaced during winter, a new study confirms.

The new study, detailed today in a NASA statement, finds that the ice is not being replaced, threatening the overall stability of the Arctic summer ice cap, which other studies have predicted could disappear completely by 2040.

When perennial ice disappears, it is sometimes replaced by thinner seasonal ice, some of which melts the following summer.

"Recent studies indicate Arctic perennial ice is declining seven to 10 percent each decade," said Ron Kwok of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

Kwok found that after the 2005 summer melt, only about four percent of the nearly 965,000 square miles of thin, seasonal ice that formed the previous winter survived the summer and replenished the perennial ice cover.


SOURCE:
LiveScience.com


This is very distubring news.

If the arctic ice melts, it will cause global sea levels to rise a significant
amount, which, depending on the level of rise, could cause the largest
human migration in history, displacing millions of people.


Comments, Opinions?



posted on Apr, 3 2007 @ 06:46 PM
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Sea ice melt will do nothing to raise sea levels.

It's the ice on the land you should worry about, like Greenland or Antartica.

EDIT: To add, a reduction in any ice cover is a concern because of lowered surface albido reflecting back sunlight. If there is less reflection, more sunlight will warm the surface, causing more melt...and so on...

[edit on 3/4/07 by stumason]



 
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