Tag: Ice Sheets
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Ice sheet ‘retreat’ vs ‘collapse’: what is the difference and why does it matter?
The ice sheets over Antarctica and Greenland are going to ‘collapse’, we have been told by scientists. What does it mean for an ice sheet to ‘collapse’, though? Is it not just drammatic language made for headlines? There is, however, a difference. To learn the difference, we need to study past ice sheet retreat preserved…
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Why the disappearance of ice from West Antarctica is a big problem for our future.
If you have read an article or listened to someone talk about West Antarctica recently, it was probably about how the ice is all going to vanish overnight. Names such as the ‘doomsday glacier’ are mixed with words like ‘imminent collapse’ and others meant to inspire a fear of catastrophe. Yet, even in a warming…
Rivers of Ice 