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James Balog and the Extreme Ice Survey team documented the vanishing glaciers around the world on an ambitious photographic survey
July 18, 2012 | 3
July 23, 2006. In the mid-1980s ice filled this valley up to the lower edge of the dark band of vegetation.
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July 27, 2005. A fast-melting face of the Furtwängler Glacier near the summit.
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August 29th 2009. The glacier has recently retreated from this cliff.
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June 7, 2010. Crevasses filled with meltwater.
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Greenland Ice Sheet, Greenland. July 18,2008. Lake bed, bare after the lake has drained, shows a moulin (cavity) that swallowed millions of gallons of water.
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July 14, 2008. Bubbles of air, possibly 15,000 years old, are released as the ice sheet melts.
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July 10, 2008. Silt and soot blown from afar turn into black "cryoconite," absorb solar heat, and melt down into ice.
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3 Comments
Add CommentI am having trouble finding out where all the heat will go, once the ice is gone. I'm guessing the next relatively cold body would be the ocean. But it will not pull as much heat out of the air as the ice did. This, to me, would suggest a mass exodus from the equatorial area would be in order. Does anyone know of a link to any models that predict heat transfer when the ice is gone?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisActually, the increase in heat content of the oceans is far larger than what would be needed to melt the ice thus far. The phase change energy is significant, but is pretty small in the larger picture.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://www.skepticalscience.com/how-do-we-know-global-warming-is-still-happening.html
When the ice is all gone we will have shifted to a World Tropic as in the Mesozoic, with far higher coastlines. The world’s weather has oscillated from the current 15 degree average to a 25 degree average. The tropics will not become inhabitable, but there will have to be massive city-building to relocate currently coastal populations, and probably massive desalinization – irrigation programs to deal with drought. Big Oil should pay the bill.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAll or most of the technology for a clean, sustainable economy is already in place; it is a matter of (massive) public political pressure:
See the fine documentaries:
Who Killed the Electric Car
http://www.movie2k.to/Who-Killed-the-Electric-Car-watch-movie-780880.html
and
Why We Fight
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TO7-GBRx1xM