What Would Happen If All Ice On Earth Melted?

many people have wondered what would happen if all the glacial ice on the planet melted some believed that it would be a water world with no land in sight while others think that could never happen but the earth is changing in more ways than you might think on its own many might wonder how much of the Earth's current global warming trend is affected by humans regardless of who is to blame whether the planet is just going through a natural phase in its evolution or if we are responsible the evidence shows that the planet is getting warmer and warmer every year but just how much of the planet could end up covered in water if all the glacial ice melted well it turns out that all the ice melting would just be the beginning of our problems as many more catastrophic things would happen you all probably know by now that about 71 percent of the Earth's surface is already covered in water but it wasn't always this way between 2.4 and 2.1 billion years ago the planet's water was frozen in an ice age called the huronian glaciation the early stages of this ice age was severe and the entire earth was frozen over like a giant snowball this was likely triggered by a 250 million year law in volcanic activity less carbon dioxide in the air meant a reduced greenhouse effect resulting in a much colder climate the interesting thing is that during the 200 million years of the cryogenian period the earth was plunged into the deepest call that it had ever experienced and it is theorized that the emergence of complex life may have caused this the theory is that this glaciation was triggered by the evolution of large cells and possibly multicellular organisms these organisms would have sunk to the seabed floor after perishing sucking all the co2 out of the atmosphere further weakening the greenhouse effect which lowered global temperatures even more yes even in theory life-forms can cause a global ice age there is evidence that the planets ice came and went in regular cycles and that it's possible that it was driven in changes in the Earth's orbit as well as what happened on the surface of the planet when plants emerged and started to cover the earth they too pulled the co2 out of the atmosphere the reason we mention all of this is that regardless if we are or aren't responsible for the Earth's warmer climate today evidence shows that the earth goes through its own cycles of on and off ice ages but it also proves that life can be responsible for changes in global temperature the Arctic isn't the same as it was today as it was say 100 years ago temperatures there have been rising at twice the normal rate which has been sparking some very alarming changes unlike anything seen in recorded history 87% of Antarctica Peninsula glaciers have melted since 1945 in other regions sea ice is declining by 13% each decade scientific predictions that foresaw an ice-free Arctic Ocean during the summer between 2040 and 2050 may come to pass even sooner than we thought the reason is that satellite estimates for sea ice thickness were overestimated by 25 percent due to the saline properties of the snow cover on top of the ice which affected the accuracy of the readings with that in mind we can expect the ice to melt much sooner and that's a scary thing the oceans are also soaking up more heat if the oceans become too hot they will be unable to support marine wildlife because of the decline in oxygen if all the glacial ice from the poles and the mountaintops melted right at this moment ocean and sea levels would rise by more than 215 feet there would be new shorelines and many places on earth would go underwater a lot of people will think well that's no big deal just get everyone to move to higher ground sounds like a simple solution however aside from the fact that billions of people would be displaced there would be more to worry about now that all the Arctic ice has melted what is not commonly known is that the Earth's poles not only get less direct sunlight than lower latitudes but the sea ice is white and therefore reflects most of the sunlight that hits back out into space that reflectivity called albedo hell keeps the poles cold and limits the heat absorption from the Sun that sea ice also influences the oceans currents which have a big effect on our weather the reason is that oceans and air act like heat engines which move heat to the poles in a constant quest for balance ocean currents move this warmer water along what you would call a global conveyor belt in a process known as thermohaline circulation without getting too technical warming up the poles would disrupt Earth's overall heat flow throwing weather out of control it's no surprise that global warming has boosted severe weather in general over the decades massive hurricanes could form because there would be no sea ice which limits the amount of moisture that moves from the ocean into the atmosphere and super tornadoes more powerful than any ever recorded would touch down in many parts of the world another thing that sea ice does is insulate the air it does this by limiting how much of the planet's warmth rises up to the surface and from the warmer water entering the poles when sea ice melts and cracks it becomes dotted with gaps which lets this heat escape but that's not all scientists have known for a long time that Arctic tundra and marine sediments contain large frozen deposits of methane gas which if released into the atmosphere will increase greenhouse gases so as the Arctic sea ice melts this source of methane will increase think runaway greenhouse effect which likely helped destroy the atmosphere on Mars along with the solar winds that strip the planet of its atmosphere all lady forms of wildlife including polar bears and Arctic seals which use the sea ice for everything from giving birth to using it as cover to catch their prey walruses also use the sea ice as a place to gather with the sea ice God it would force them to overcrowd beaches and they would have to swim farther to find food ice-free waters also absorb more co2 which makes the ocean more acidic reducing its carrying capacity for calcium carbonate that shellfish and corals need to build their shells and skeletons the nine million people who live in the Arctic would now have to contend with coastal erosion thawing permafrost warmer temperatures and changes in the animal and species that some traditional lifestyles depend upon but that's not all during this time there could be massive earthquakes if the ice melted fast enough one of the more uncommon ly known things is that all that ice has some serious weight and suppression to it and it has been holding down the earth and global warming has already bled the frigid continent of about 2.7 trillion tons of ice with over half of those losses occurring in the last five years this loss of ice has already raised global sea levels by almost a half an inch that doesn't sound like much until you realize how much ice has already melted the Pine Island Waits Haines Smith and Koehler glaciers located in the Amundsen Sea in Bayman of West Antarctica have all risen by a process called glacial isostatic adjustment as the ice thins the land immediately underneath the ice sheet quickly springs back in response to the loss of weight a study showed that is the glaciers of Antarctica retreat the land beneath is rising up five times faster than anyone thought meaning than in a hundred years the land will be up 32 feet higher than it is today and here is what it looks like the amount of ice that has melted since 1992 until now has increased exponentially and it is estimated that the rate of ice loss is 219 Giga tons per year that's 219 billion billion metric tons that's a huge number to wrap your mind around but we can use Olympic sized swimming pools which require 2,500 metric tons of water to fill every second Antarctica loses roughly triple this mass this means that every 40 hours Antarctica loses 1 Giga time or 1 billion tons of ice that's enough to fill four hundred thousand Olympic sized swimming pools which if you put the scale would equal New York's Central Park now imagine that for this 25 year period between 1992 and 2017 then Antarctica lost 109 Giga tons of ice per year that adds up to 2710 gigatonnes of ice that is turned to water you might be wondering if there's anything you can do to help stop global warming most climate scientists agree the main cause of the current global warming trend is human expansion of the greenhouse effect warming that results when the atmosphere traps heat radiating from earth towards space the industrial activities that our modern civilization depends upon have raised atmospheric carbon dioxide levels from 280 parts per million to 400 parts per million in the last 150 years the United Nations said that a scientific panel concluded that there is a 95% probability that human-produced greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide methane and nitrous oxide have caused much of the observed increase in Earth's temperatures over the last 50 years some of the things you can do are to buy anything reusable and be conscious of garbage and waste and try to recycle everything saving gas by walking more or taking the bus can help as well as planting trees but it takes more than just a handful of people to make a change it takes everyone to make an impact perhaps humanity will embrace this global threat on our planet and governments will act fast enough to possibly reverse the damage and for those people who procrastinate the time for action is now because we may just have an ally in our own Sun a periodic solar event called a grand minimum can overtake the Sun perhaps as soon as 2020 and last through the Year 2070 the results of this are diminished magnetism infrequent sunspot production and less ultraviolet radiation reaching the earth all bringing a cooler period to the planet they may span 50 years the last time this happened was during the mid 17th century it was called the maunder minimum and lasted between 1645 and 1715 during a longer span of time when parts of the world became so cold that the period was called the Little Ice Age which lasted from about 1300 to 1850 however scientists have said we are unlikely to see the return of the extreme cold from centuries ago but in the case of global warming all of mankind should take advantage of any help we can get it was lyndon b johnson the 36th President of the United States who was quoted as saying if future generations are to remember us with gratitude rather than contempt we must lead them a glimpse of the world as it was in the beginning we hope you enjoyed the video do you have any idea on how we could stop global warming let us know in the comments if you enjoyed watching this video then make sure to LIKE subscribe and turn on notifications so you'll be the first to know when a new episode arrives thank you for watching [Music]

Channel: Destiny

Views: 824,471

Rating: 4.2403622 out of 5

Keywords: what if, what would happen, what happens, ice, ice melted, global warming, destiny, interesting facts, space, earth, the earth, global warming documentary, documentary, ice globe, glacier, antarctica, arctic, polar, water, ocean, sea, river, lake, science, asapscience, water crisis, warming, is the arctic melting?

Id: -0QwdJ37Y38

Length: 11min 40sec (700 seconds)

Published: Tue Dec 18 2018

Reddit Comments

[u/BobQuasit]

Takes too long to get to the point.