A recent study has calculated the mass loss and the melting of glaciers in the main regions of the world, revealing concerning results.
This study was conducted by an extensive international group of scientists affiliated with the GlaMBIE (Glacier Mass Balance Intercomparison Exercise) initiative, coordinated by the World Glacier Monitoring Service (WGMS), based at the University of Zurich (UZH) in Switzerland.
The research community collected, standardized, and analyzed information on the glaciers’ mass changes, using measurements both on the ground and from satellites.
Subsequently, they compared and combined the results to create an annual time series of glacier mass changes for all regions of the world from the year 2000 until 2023.
Glacier Melting and Contribution to Sea Level Rise
The detailed analysis revealed that from 2000 to 2023, the global glacier mass loss amounted to around 6.5 trillion tons. This is an average of approximately 273,000 million tons of glacier mass lost each year.
This ice loss has contributed 18 millimeters to the global sea level rise, at an annual rate of about 0.75 millimeters.
Therefore, glaciers are currently the second-largest factor contributing to the rise in sea level. Additionally, the permanent loss of glacier mass leads to regional losses of freshwater, which in other seasons is replenished by precipitation and stored in a frozen state until the next seasonal thaw.
“To put it into perspective, the 273,000 million tons of ice lost in a single year equivalent to the water consumed by the entire world’s population in 30 years, considering three liters per person per day,” stated Michael Zemp, a professor at the UZH Department of Geography, who led the study.
Glaciologist Inés Dussaillant, from the University of Zurich and a co-author of the study, emphasized that glaciers are vital freshwater resources for local communities in regions like Central Asia and the Central Andes, where glaciers dominate runoff during warm and dry seasons.
The study, titled “Community estimate of global glacier mass changes from 2000 to 2023,” was published in the academic journal Nature.
Sea Level Rise Threatens Cities like Los Angeles, Shanghai, or Bombay
The sea level could inundate cities like Los Angeles, Shanghai, or Bombay: UN Secretary-General António Guterres has stated that there will be a one-meter rise in the global sea level.
The sea has absorbed over 90% of the global warming in the past 50 years.
Only by limiting the global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees, in line with the commitments of the Paris Agreement, “we will have a chance to prevent the irreversible collapse of Greenland and the West Antarctic,” Guterres asserted, specifying that “this means cutting current emissions by 43% by 2030 compared to 2019 levels, and by 60% by 2035.”
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