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Arctic Ice Sheet

In the delicate science of predicting Arctic changes from global warming, researchers have found yet another factor that must be plugged into their computer models: The impact of two-week tidal cycles.

Tides, it turns out, affect the speed with which gigantic ice sheets slide towards the sea. They move fastest just before spring tides, but ebb and flow on a cycle that changes not just daily but every two weeks. Scientists say this finding shows that the Arctic ice is more sensitive to environmental changes than they imagined.

There is growing concern among climate scientists that global warming is causing the polar ice caps to melt at an accelerated pace, causing sea levels to rise and eroding the earth’s capacity for reflecting the sun’s powerful rays.

The Rutford Ice Stream, in western Antarctica, is sliding closer to the sea at a rate of three feet each day. This enormous sheet of ice is larger than the Netherlands. Researchers still don’t know whether rising sea levels caused by global warming will hasten the demise of the ice sheet even further.

For more information about this story, go to MSNBC.

For information on what you can do to slow global warming, go to www.fightglobalwarming.com.

To read more about this and other environmental health issues, go to: www.environmentalhealthnews.org, www.ourstolenfuture.org, or www.healthandenvironment.org