Greenland Rising as Ice Melts
Image: cortomaltese, Flickr
Scientists are reporting that Greenland is rising as the large weight of ice pressing down on land is melting. And the country's elevation gains are speeding up. Glacial melt on Greenland is being watched very carefully because ice that is piled up on land flows into the oceans when it melts, raising sea levels. Floating ice, on the other hand, already displaces a lot of water and has less impact of sea levels when it melts.
Greenland's rocky areas are shooting up almost an inch per year in some spots. That elevator may go up as much as 2 inches per year by 2025 if current trends continue, according to University of Miami professor Tim Dixon. The study, published in Nature Geoscience, adjusts for the confounding effects of historical glacial growth and retreat by examing the acceleration of the change in elevation on rocky territories, rather than the velocity. The study, led by Yan Jiang, found that "some parts of western coastal Greenland were experiencing accelerated melting of coastal ice by the late 1990s."
More on Greenland:
Greenland Glacier About to Lose Manhattan-sized Ice Chunk (Video)
Greenland Ice Cover Loss Shown with New Earth-Space Monitoring System (Video)
Watch Greenland Melting - on the Icecam
Strange New Fish Discovered Near Greenland
Greenland Questions Global Warming Controls While Embracing Independence
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