A new glaciology study suggests the Greenland ice sheet could lose hundreds of trillions metric tons of ice and contribute to approximately 1 foot in average global sea-level rise by the year 2100 — regardless of the greenhouse emissions cut during this period.
In other words, human-caused global warming, through greenhouse gas emissions, likely wouldn't have an impact with the Greenland ice sheet's melting or sea-rise levels.
Within these estimates, computer-modeling researchers calculate the ice sheet will ultimately lose 3.3% of its total volume this century (110 trillion metric tons of ice), or 10.6 inches.
To put that figure into context, the Nature Climate Change journal believes the amount of ice loss could cover the entire United States with 37 additional feet of water.
The glacial study comes on the heels of the Greenland Ice Sheet reportedly incurring a "sharp spike" in the rate and extent of melting — at 18 billion tons of water running into the North Atlantic over a three-day period.
According to Axios, satellite photos reveal "melt ponds dotting the ice cover," particularly near coastal regions.
The potential for perpetually burning fossil fuels didn't factor into the final calculations, says Jason Box, the study's lead author and a professor the National Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland (GEUS).
"It is a very conservative rock-bottom minimum. Realistically, we will see this figure more than double within this century," Box said Monday.
"In the foreseeable scenario that global warming will only continue, the contribution of the Greenland ice sheet to sea level rise will only continue increasing.
"When we take the extreme melt year 2012 and take it as a hypothetical average constant climate later this century, the committed mass loss from the Greenland ice sheet more than doubles to 78 cm" — or more than 30 inches by 2100.
Glacial experts assert that Greenland's melting ice remains the top annual contributor to the global sea-level rise.
Also, the National Snow and Ice Data Center says a "moderate melt surge" swept across northern Greenland and subsequently covered much of the ice sheet perimeter in mid-July.
And for the summer season in Greenland, the surge continues at a modest pace — relative to 2019 and 2021 — a result of neutral North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) index conditions "promoting frequent northern winds over Greenland but exceptional melt and southerly winds over Svalbard," the Norwegian-owned islands northeast of Greenland.
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