Scientists believe that additional freshwater inflow into the North Atlantic could trigger a collapse of ocean currents.
Greenland’s ice sheet is melting 20% faster than thought and, according to recent studies, is losing 30 million tons of ice per hour due to the climate crisis.
The graph shows how the Jakobsgavn glacier has been retreating since 1985. The darker purple colors show the size of the glacier in the past, and the bright yellow color shows the most recent measurements.
The image shows how the Jakobsgavn glacier has been retreating since 1985. The darker purple colors show the size of the glacier in the past, and the bright yellow color shows the most recent measurements.
Scientists used artificial intelligence to analyze almost a quarter of a million satellite images to compare the monthly position of Greenland’s glaciers between 1985 and 2022 – and the final data showed a loss of a total of a trillion tons of ice (about 5000 square kilometers of ice cover in total). Of the 207 glaciers, 179 have significantly thinned, 27 have remained stable, and one has even slightly increased.
“Almost every glacier in Greenland has lost mass in the last few decades,” says Dr. Chad Green of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in the United States, who led the study. “It makes sense that if you discharge fresh water into the North Atlantic Ocean, you will definitely get a weakening of Amoc.”
The Amoc (the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation, which includes the Gulf Stream) is a vital current system that helps regulate the climate of the Northern Hemisphere, and its collapse could trigger global climate cataclysms. In 2021, researchers, as mentioned by The Guardian, were already talking about the weakening of Amoc and alarming signs of a tipping point for the current system, and a recent study showed that in the worst-case scenario, a collapse could be expected as early as 2025.
The latest update of the report, which added other measurements of Greenland’s ice cover, shows a loss of 221 billion tons of ice annually since 2003. Another study adds another 43 billion tons per year, or about 30 million tons per hour on average.
The Greenland Ice Sheet is one of the two ice sheets in the world, consisting of hundreds of glaciers and covering about 80% of the land area of Greenland. Reuters notes that if it melts completely, global sea levels will rise by about 7.4 meters.
The study was published in the journal Nature on January 17.
