NBC News
Home
Top Videos
Ongoing:
Michael Brown Shooting
ISIS Terror
Search
U.S.
World
Local
Politics
Health
Tech
Science
Pop Culture
Business
Investigations
Sports
More
Nightly News
Today
Meet the Press
Dateline
Science /Science News
35 minutes
advertisment
advertisment
Greenland Ice Sheet’s Soft Bed May Accelerate Melt: Study
Spongy sediments under Greenland’s ice sheet may accelerate its flow into the sea — an effect that previous estimates of ice loss failed to account for, according to University of Cambridge researchers. They said that means the ice sheet may be more sensitive than previously thought to overall climate change, along with short-term events like heavy rain and heat waves.
The researchers said it was thought that Greenland’s extensive ice fields rested on hard bedrock, but new evidence shows that soft sediments also are present. Those sediments weaken as they soak up water from seasonal melt, allowing the sheet to move faster to the sea, the researchers said. Greenland’s ice sheet covers 660,000 square miles (1.7 million square kilometers) to a depth of nearly 2 miles (3 kilometers) at its thickest. A 2012 study found that the sheet’s melting was accelerating, and a 2013 study estimated that because of melting in Greenland and Antarctica, sea levels could be 2 feet higher when today’s preschoolers are grandparents. The research was funded by the Natural Environment Research Council and published Monday in the journal Nature Communications.
On Thin Ice: Inuit way of life vanishing in Arctic
Ann Curry Reports
IN-DEPTH
Sea Ice Soars in South, Shrinks in North — But Why?
Warming World: Ice Sheets Melting Faster Than Predicted
Arctic Emergency: How Climate Change Is Mutating the Earth
SOCIAL
— Gil Aegerter
First published September 30th 2014, 9:35 am