Arctic Ice Melting Faster Than Previously Predicted
MIAMI (CBSMiami.com) - South Floridians owning oceanfront property might want to consider moving if a new assessment from the international Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Program comes to fruition.
According to AMAP, climate change in the Arctic shows that the regions ice and snow are melting faster than previously thought.
That means scientists' initial projections about the global sea level rise were not drastic enough.
AMAP said that Arctic temperatures in the past six years were the highest since measurements began to be taken in 1880.
Based on that and other measurements, the sea ice on the Arctic Ocean is shrinking much faster than the U.N. panel on climate change predicted.
AMAP now projects that the Arctic Ocean will be nearly ice free during the summer in 30-40 years. That includes Greenland's massive ice sheet.
Based on those numbers, by 2100, global sea levels will rise by anywhere from 3-5 feet. The U.N. panel had previously estimated 7 to 23 inches.
Still, don't expect much action on greenhouse gasses or climate change from the United States.
Republican Senators like Marco Rubio of Florida have hedged their bets with big oil and other polluters who all deny that global climate change is happening. Rubio said he doesn't "think there's scientific evidence to justify it (man-made climate change)."
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