“This study marks the strongest case yet made that humans, by warming the atmosphere and oceans, are pushing the Earth's climate toward the threshold where we will likely be committed to four to six or even more meters of sea level rise in coming centuries," said Jonathan Overpeck, co-director of the University of Arizona's Institute of the Environment.
Most climate scientists agree that, as the world's climate becomes warmer due to increased greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, sea levels will rise by up to three feet by the end of this century.
But researchers have grappled with the question of how much of that increase will be due to ice sheets melting as opposed to the oceans' 332 million cubic miles of water increasing in volume as they warm up?
For the study, UA team members analyzed paleoceanic records of global distribution of sea surface temperatures of the warmest 5,000-year period during the Last Interglacial, a warm period that lasted from 130,000 to 120,000 years ago. Read the full report here.
Source: by Bob Berwyn, Summit County Citizens Voice.
