Study Finds We’ll Lose Almost 40 Percent of Our Glacial Ice

A recent study published in Science used glacier models to better understand the effect that each degree of global warming will have on worldwide glacier melt. The impacts of the warming the Earth has already experienced are yet to be fully realized, because glaciers have not reached equilibrium with the changing climate. The models provide insight into how much ice the world is already set to lose, and how much more can be saved by limiting our emissions and warming.

“Eight different glacier evolution models were used to simulate the evolution of glaciers under a total of 80 warming scenarios,” Harry Zekollari told GlacierHub in an interview. Zekollari is the lead author for the study and an associate professor for glaciology at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel in Belgium. “This was a community effort realized within the framework of the Glacier Model Intercomparison Project (GlacierMIP3). There was a protocol to follow for anyone who wanted to join and conduct the experiments, and it was open to all. We could use the information from all the models to make global estimates,” he said.

The warming scenarios rested on the assumption that the temperature would hit a peak level and then stop warming. Should temperatures hit that peak today, glaciers will continue to melt in the coming years, regardless. This is because it takes some time for glaciers to respond to changing climatic conditions.

Read More: Columbia Climate School

Source: ENN