Great Expectations: Antarctic Core Clues To Higher Sea Level Rise

The lead author of the next international climate change assessment says his Antarctic ice research supports predictions of a doubling in the rate of sea level rise over the next century. Professor Tim Naish says rock cores drilled from the Antarctic coastline reveal how the Earth coped with a hotter climate 4 million years ago, when there was a similar climate to what we are heading towards in the next century with global warming.

ABC News Report (7 July 2010):

The Federal Government says it is too soon to act on the latest projections of a doubling in the rate of sea level rise within a century.

Researchers from New Zealand’s Victoria University made the projection based on drilling two kilometres below Antarctica’s western ice sheet.

Tim Naish, the lead author of the next international climate change assessment, says his ice research supports predictions of a doubling in the rate of sea level rise over the next century.

“We are looking at a sea level rise of around one metre, but potentially as high as two metres. That’s a significant increase on the last IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) assessment report,” he said.

The IPCC will release its fifth assessment in 2014.

The World Wildlife Fund’s Kellie Caught says a recent Galaxy poll in Queensland shows growing support for policy action.

“Seventy per cent of the community support an emissions trading scheme and they support it being implemented now,” she said.

But a spokeswoman for Climate Change Minister Penny Wong says the Government disagrees.

Prime Minister Julia Gillard has pledged to continue negotiating an emissions trading scheme if re-elected.

Professor Naish’s findings will be presented at the Australian Earth Sciences Convention in Canberra.

He says some researchers have forecast a two-metre increase in sea levels within the next century, but his studies support only a one-metre increase.

Professor Naish says rock cores drilled from the Antarctic coastline reveal how the Earth coped with a hotter climate 4 million years ago.

“It sounds a long time ago but it was the last time that the Earth had a climate that’s very similar to the climate that we are heading towards in the next century with global warming,” he said.

“In fact the earth was a very similar looking place to what it is today.

“The West Antarctic ice sheet had melted – [that] contributed five metres of sea level rise. The Greenland ice sheet had melted contributing another seven metres.”

Source: www.abc.net.au