...Those restrictions call for halving greenhouse emissions by 2050 and eliminating CO2 emissions entirely by the end of the century. But the German researchers said the resulting limited increase in temperature is predicated on strict adherence to those restrictions without exception, and even then there are many variables which could thwart the goals.
Schnellnhuber, who is official adviser to German Chancellor Angela Merkel on climate-change issues, said the new findings employed data unavailable to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) for its most recent global warming report.
The two experts said the IPCC report had been based on data up to 2005 only, but since then ice loss in the Arctic had doubled or tripled. Schnellhuber charged that 20 per cent of the loss of the ice sheet on Greenland could be directly linked to the added carbon dioxide emissions from new Chinese coal-fired power stations.
The new sea level predictions, according to Schellnhuber, are based on studies of melting Himalaya glaciers and the shrinking Greenland ice cap....
This is the satellite view of the 'melt ponds' which can be seen in the center left of picture. The ice is breaking up and flowing into sea on a regular basis. Noted the broken ice sheets in the Greenland Sea, above.
Melt Ponds, Northeastern Greenland (click here)
...Melt ponds have played a role in the breakup of the Larsen Ice Shelf on the Antarctic Peninsula, where dense pools of water sliced through sections of the shelf like a wedge. In Greenland, melt ponds ultimately find their way into crevasses or moulins—chutes that carry melt water through the ice sheet. Many glaciologists suspect that the melt water finds its way to the bottom of the ice sheet where it lubricates the base of the ice, reducing friction between the ice and the underlying rock, and speeding glacier flow. As the glacier accelerates, it pushes ice into the ocean. This introduction of additional ice into the ocean can raise sea level, just as dropping extra ice cubes into a glass raises the level of a drink.
Ducky Science (click here)
When a science probe failed to return data about melting glacial ice, a researcher from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory labeled 90 rubber ducks with an email address and the words "science experiment" and "reward" written in English, Danish and the native Inuit language, then set the toys loose in the glacier. The idea was that fisherman would find the ducks and notify him where they were found.
The Jakobshavn Glacier (click here)
The retreat of the Jakobshavn Glacier, pictured here, has been recorded since 1850. It is one of the fastest-moving glaciers on Earth, and over the last decade scientists have reported that it is speeding up, sometimes sliding dozens of feet per day toward the Ilulissat Fjord....
