April 21, 2005

scientists respond to news of glacier retreat

The news that glaciers from the Antarctic peninsula are in widespread retreat was published in the journal Science.

Ted Scambos from the National Snow and Ice Data Centre, University of Colorado, said:

“It’s good to see a study that covers many glaciers over an entire region, using the statistics and the older data to get at climate change – not just the occurrence of a change, but the progress of it, in space and time.”

“It is a great bit of insight – the Antarctic Peninsula is in a state of transition due to warming, and what’s happening there is going to be a good indication of what will happen as the larger ice sheets, Greenland and Antarctica proper, begin to warm.”

“I think it’s an outstanding study, a good initial piece of work that’s going to lead to a lot of follow-on studies refining the results. We need more studies like this, ones that use the existing high-quality, older data, to study regional changes in groups of glaciers.”

Vicky Pope, Group Head of the Climate Prediction Programme at the Hadley Centre, said:

“Further work is needed to establish any links with global climate change. However, the observed changes in Antarctic glaciers clearly demonstrate the potential for melting Antarctic ice and consequent rises in sea level if global temperatures continue to rise. Combined with evidence of accelerating melting of glaciers in other regions of the world, in particular Greenland, it is clear that the potential for sea level rise in the future should not be underestimated.”

1. This paper appears in the 22 April, 2005 issue of the journal Science, published by AAAS. Authors: Alison J. Cook, Adrian J. Fox and David G.Vaughan are at British Antarctic Survey in Cambridge, UK. Jane G. Ferrigno is at United States Geological Survey in Reston, VA. The United States Geological Survey provided the funding to carry out this research. For more information about the paper, please speak to Jessica Lawrence-Hurt, +1-202-326-7088 jlawrenc@aaas.org