Scientists discover evidence that sea-evel rises because of the current atmospheric carbon dioxide. In a Mallorcan cave, they found 4-million-year-old geologic evidence giving them new insight into magnitude global sea-level rise.
Sea Rise: 16 Meters
An international team is studying the evidence, which is preserved in the coastal cave in Mallorca. The evidence illustrates that three million years ago, the Earth was two to three degree Celsius warmer than the pre-industrial ear. Sea level was 16 meters higher than at this moment. Their findings foresee important implications and understandings about the current-day sea level rise. With these new findings, they can predict the rapidity of sea-level rise in a warming climate.
CO2 At Current Levels Will Cause A High Sea Rise: 16 Meters
The State of Sea Level Rise (2019)
CO2 At Current Levels Will Cause A High Sea Rise
The sea level is rising as a result of the ice caps which are melting, such as those of Greenland and Antarctica. But how much and how fast the sea level will rise during global warming is a question that scientists have tried to answer. Reconstructing the ice sheet and the changes in sea level in recent periods, when the climate was naturally warmer than it is today, offers a global laboratory experiment to study this question. This is according to USF PhD student Oana Dumitru, the principal author, who has done much of her data work at UNM under the direction of Asmerom and Polyak.
"Limiting models of sea-level rise due to increased global warming depends to a large extent on actual sea level measurements in the past," says Polyak. "This study provides sea-level measurements very robustly during the Pliocene.
"We can use the knowledge we have gained from past warm periods to fine-tune ice sheet models which are then used to predict the future response of the ice sheet to current global warming," says Bogdan Onac, professor at the USF Department of Geosciences.
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Changes Can Be Seen In Artà Cave, Mallorca
The project centralises on cave deposits known as phreatic overgrowths on speleothems. Every time ancient caves were flooded by rising sea levels, you could see the phreatic excesses at the interface.
"Changes in sea level in Artà Cave can be caused by the melting and growth of the ice sheets or by the elevation or subsidence of the island itself," says Columbia University Assistant Professor Jacky Austermann, a member of the research team. She used numerical and statistical models to carefully analyse how much increase or decrease may have occurred since the Pliocene and subtracted it from the height of the formations studied.
Artà Cave, Mallorca
"Given current melting patterns, this degree of sea-level rise would most likely be caused by a meltdown of both Greenland and the Western Antarctic Ice Sheets," said Dumitru.
The writers also measured sea level at 23.5 meters higher than about four million years ago during the Pliocene Climate Optimum, when global average temperatures were up to four °C higher than pre-industrial levels."This is a possible scenario if no active and aggressive reduction of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere is undertaken," said Asmerom. We need to do something, to diminish sea level rise.
These aragonite crystals formed 4.39 million years ago inside an overgrowth on a cave feature in the Theater Room in Spain’s Artà Caves. The locations and ages of such growths helps researchers track past sea levels
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What Can We Do To Help?
Global warmth is unstoppable, but if we emit less CO2 worldwide, it will slow down. We can make some changes in our home. Avoid food waste. We waste a lot of food, and it is not necessary. You did not have to buy the food that disappears into your trash can unused. After all, you did not need it. By purchasing food wisely, storing it well and cooking it to size, you can prevent food from being wasted. You can save up to 210 kilos of CO2 per person per year. Also, if you eat less meat that will help as well. Travel by train instead of plane or car to your holiday destination. Read more about global warmth and CO2-emission to see how you can help the Earth.
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