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Climate change and impact
Effects on our planet from climate change
Effects on our planet from climate change
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SEA LEVEL RISE
1. Definition:
1.1 Sea level:
- Is the level of the ocean's surface, especially the level halfway between mean high and low tide
- Be used as a standard in reckoning land elevation or sea depths.
1.2 Sea level rises:
- Happens when the mean high tide level increases year after year
2. Reasons:
Sea levels are rising today not only because of thermal expansion but also melting of glaciers and polar ice caps.
2.1Thermal expansion
As seawater becomes warmer it expands. Heat in the upper layer of the ocean is released quickly into the atmosphere. However, heat absorbed by the deeper layers of the ocean will take much longer to be released and therefore, be stored in the ocean much longer and have significant impacts on future ocean warming.
2.2 Melting of glaciers and polar ice caps:
Large ice formations, like glaciers and the polar ice caps, naturally melt back a bit each summer. But in the winter, snows, made primarily from evaporated seawater, are generally sufficient to balance out the melting. Recently, though, persistently higher temperatures caused by global warming have led to greater-than-average summer melting as well as diminished snowfall due to later winters and earlier springs. This imbalance results in a significant net gain in runoff versus evaporation for the ocean, causing sea levels to rise.
2.3 Ice loss from Greenland and West Antarctica:
As with glaciers and the ice caps, increased heat is causing the massive ice sheets that cover Greenland and Antarctica melt at an accelerated pace.
- The ice sheets of Greenland and Antarctica which fully melted would raise sea level by 64m.
- With Greenland, loss of between 50 and 100 billion tons of ice has taken place annually over the period 1993-2003 with...
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...s needing to be constructed.
5. Solutions
- High levees system for each country affected by sea level rising.
- Floating homes — yes, what used to be called houseboats —a re popular as ever, and other flood-prone countries are trying their own hands at water-top homes.
- Burn fewer fossil fuels.
A new study by the Scripps Institution for Oceanography, NCAR, and Climate Central, says curbing emissions of certain pollutants can help prevent the sea level rise.
- Reducing emissions of four specific pollutants—methane, tropospheric ozone, hydrofluorocarbons and black carbon—we could possibly prevent the rate of sea level rise by approximately 25 to 50 percent.
- Less fracking, cutting back on motor vehicle exhaust, industrial emissions and chemical solvents, including windshield washer fluid, creating fewer CFCs and cutting back on anything that creates smoke or soot
It is predicted that the effect of permafrost melting will be that the ocean levels will rise and will significantly increase the temperature and accelerate the rate at which global warming occurs. Permafrost covers 24% of the land in the Northern Hemisphere (Insert Citation), if this was to melt 1700 gigatonnes of methane and carbon dioxide (Insert Citation), powerful heat trapping gases, would be released into the atmosphere increasing the amount of greenhouse gases by 200%.
Recent studies based on satellite monitoring by NASA reveals that melting ice from both the poles has been responsible for a fifth of the global rising sea levels since 1992 (11 mm). Antarctica and Greenland are now contributing three times as much ice to sea levels as they were 20 years ago. Although the Greenland ice sheet is only about...
Some studies have found “that atmospheric CO2 concentration is approximately 383 parts per million by volume (ppmv), a level not seen in at least 650,000 years, and it is projected to increase by 0.5% per year throughout the 21st century.” (Guinotte) “This is because…the ocean absorbs about a third of fossil fuel emissions, but this amount is likely to increase to 90% in the future.” (Bralower) As a result, “the chemistry of the world's oceans is changing at a rate not seen for 65 million years, with far-reaching implications for marine biodiversity and food security, according to a new United Nations study...” (Knight) “…This change is cause for serious concern [for] many marine organisms…, [because they] may not be able to adapt quickly enough to survive these changes.” (Guinotte)
A. Sea level rise- The temperatures around the globe rise, the oceans start to warm up and water expands, the ice caps and glaciers start to melt, and more precipitation starts to fall falls instead of snow. These are some of the causes for sea levels rising. Recorded by the Department of Ecology, the sea levels have risen four to ten inches in the past one hundred years. When the climate changes it usually increases the oceans temperatures, causing water to expand which causes the sea level to rise by thermal expansion. When the water amount begins to take up more space. The sea level rising depends souly on the temperature of the ocean. Climate Change is also effected by ice glaciers melting over areas of land, which run off into our oceans. A big contribution to climate change and sea level rising is the melting ice masses of Antarctica and Greenland.
The use of fossil fuels has greatly increased the amount of atmospheric and oceanic CO2 to a point where it’s ruining the natural flow of the world; the earth’s temperature is rising. As a result, the polar ice caps are melting causing the seas to rise. With only a 1 meter increase in sea level the United States alone could lose over 10,000 square miles of land, and thousands of houses will be destroyed. The effects will be just as prominent around the world: many islands will become submerged, 17% of Bangladesh will be underwater, and tens of thousands of people will be displaced (“Global Warming” 3).
During the 20th century both air and sea temperature has increased and causing several problems. The increase in temperature has caused damages to our eco system. In some countries temperature has increased by a few degrees. In winter, in places where it was cold, now the temperatures has increased and even the sea temperatures have increased, which is melting the Iceberg and destroying the marine life. Scientists projected that if emissions of heat-trapping carbon emission aren’t reduced, average surface temperature could increased 3 to 10 degrees Fahrenheit by the end the century. A good example is that in some Europeans countries the...
90 percent of the effects of global warming are attributed to rising temperatures and heat. This heat tends to affect our oceans due to the ...
With talk of global warming still being threatened by scientists and governments, the depletion of the polar ice is a major concern. Many experiments have been done to monitor current ice levels and predict future ice levels. Since then scientists have tried to discover what would cause the melting of our polar ice. One major concern is that the melting of the polar ice would create extreme flooding for all costal and island inhabitants. Is the polar ice melting and could greenhouse gases be the cause?
Various glaciers in Alaska and other parts of the United States have shrunk dramatically. If temperatures continue to rise, the ice will continue to melt, and some glaciers could disappear completely, which causes sea levels to rise. There are many animals, birds, and seafood that depend solely on glaciers for survival. With an increase in sea water temperature, and increasing sea levels, sea-plants that these fish thrive on will be lost, lowering the number of seafood, which in-turn will make survival of many species difficult. The arctic is source region for cold ocean currents and with no ice it will have no density and temperature distinctions, which pushes the ocean currents. If the ocean current heat transfer mechanism powers down,
Jacob, T., Wahr, J., Pfeffer, T. W., & Swenson, S. (2012). Recent contributions of glaciers and ice caps to sea level rise. Nature, 514-518. http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nature10847
Scientists appear to have become aware of the issue of rising sea levels in the mid to late 1980s. An article published in Science News in 1987 predicted that “global warming… will cause… the world's oceans to expand, raising the average sea level by 4 to 8 centimeters in the next 40 years” (Monastersky). Though 4 to 8 centimeters sounds like a miniscule amount in relation to the vastness of the world’s oceans, this early article disturbed many readers. Many for this reason: early stud...
The global sea level rose about 17 centimeters (6.7 inches) in the last century (NASA). The rate in the last decade, however, is nearly double that of the last century. With climate change on the rise, higher temperatures, more droughts, and wilder weather will prevail. These changes will affect animals, ecosystems, and people.
As ice from polar glaciers begin to melt, the sea level rises to a new high. According to
One of the major effects of global warming is the rise of sea level due to thermal expansion of the ocean, in addition to the melting of land ice. Now there are dozens of land areas that sit well below sea level and the majority of those land areas are very well populated. At least 40 percent of the world 's population lives within 62 miles of the ocean, putting millions of lives and billions of dollars ' worth of property and infrastructure at risk. (Juliet Christian-Smith, 2011) This means if the sea level rises to the projected level of 25 meters (82 feet) half of the world will retreat back to the ocean. (Rohrer, 2007) Also rising sea levels means higher tides and storm surges riding on ever-higher seas which are more dangerous to people and coastal inf...
Global warming is a serious problem with two major effects: increasing sea level and degradation of wildlife. Increase in sea level affects the entire landmass of the earth. According to NASA, the polar ice cap is melting at the alarming rate of nine percent per decade. Arctic ice thickness has decreased 40 percent since the 1960s (Oskin). The amount of water is more than the land on our planet.