Scientists have given dire news on the state of West Antarctica’s ice shelves, stating that at the current rate of heating caused by emissions, it will be basically impossible to slow the ice sheet’s melting within the 21st century.
According to research published in the Nature Climate Change journal, the current models of even the best case scenario of humanity fighting climate change shows that “accelerated melting of ice shelves in West Antarctica is locked in.”
Meaning that even if all of humanity woke up tomorrow and decided to unite and tackle global warming and put in every effort they could, the melting of the West Antarctica ice shelves would still accelerate three times faster in the 21st century than it did in the 20th century.
Scientist at the British Antarctica Survey Dr Kaitlin Naughten, who was part of the team that conducted the research, delivered the unfortunate news in a post to X (formerly Twitter).
We’ve spent the last few years modelling the future of the Amundsen Sea in West Antarctica, and I regret to inform you that it’s not good news. https://t.co/h0i8ffIWN9
— Dr Kaitlin Naughten (@kaitlinnaughten) October 23, 2023
Whenever a scientist says “it’s not good news”, it should catch the world’s attention.
Naughten’s research delivered the news that nobody who plans on living on earth in the future (which is currently everyone) wants to hear:
“These results suggest that mitigation of greenhouse gases now has limited power to prevent ocean warming that could lead to the collapse of the West Antarctica Ice Sheet.”
The melting of the West Antarctica ice shelf will see water levels increase globally, again at an unprecedented rate, which will cause millions of people to lose their homes, resulting in a climate-refugee crisis.
Naughten also said that she does not want this bad news to be a source of people deciding not to take responsibility of the climate.
“It’s pretty bad news. But I would hate for people to read this story and think ‘we should give up on climate action, we’re all doomed anyway’,” Naughten posted.
“We must remember that West Antarctica is just one cause of sea level rise, and sea level rise is just one impact of climate change.”
As well as reminding us that there are other effects for climate change, Naughten reminded her audience of the “need to shift our focus to the longer term.”
Climate change has always been a battle for the future, fought in the present, which has historically made it extremely difficult to get people to agree on the need to fight it — because why prevent something that you won’t even see?
However, as we look at the impact that global warming is currently having — including the effects we can feel every year as each summer and winter continue to gets labelled the new “hottest on record” until the next one — the argument of “it wont effect me” is losing what small shred of validity it ever had.
