West Antarctica’s contribution to sea level rise as Earth’s climate warms

Abstract

West Antarctica’s contribution to sea level rise as Earth’s climate warms Dr Dan Lubin, Researcher at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, explores the contribution of West Antarctica to sea level rise as Earth’s climate warms. Sea level rise (SLR) is one of the most pressing concerns with greenhouse gas-induced climate warming. Over one-third of the human population, including nearly two-thirds of the global urban population, lives within 100 km of the sea. SLR increases flooding from storm surges and high tides, deterioration of infrastructure, shoreline erosion, contamination of agriculture, and numerous other hardships. Climate warming causes SLR in two primary ways: the melting of polar ice sheets and glaciers and the thermal expansion of the ocean as it warms. The two largest contributors to SLR from the steadily warming polar regions are the Greenland Ice Sheet (GIS) and the West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS), at approximately 280 and 160 gigatons of ice per year, respectively. The GIS and WAIS have contrasts in the details of their ice mass loss.