Geoengineering May Slow Greenland Ice Sheet Loss

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One of the many effects of global warming is sea-level rise due to the melting and retreat of the Earth’s ice sheets and glaciers as well as other sources.

One of the many effects of global warming is sea-level rise due to the melting and retreat of the Earth’s ice sheets and glaciers as well as other sources. As the sea level rises, large areas of densely populated coastal land could ultimately become uninhabitable without extensive coastal modification. In order to stave off this possibility, carbon emissions need to reach net negative, a state that is hard to achieve under current circumstances.

There are many proposals to drastically mitigate the effects of climate change, and the most expansive of these involve interventions that will alter aspects of the entire globe—the geoengineering techniques. While they have some promise, we do not understand enough about natural cycles to fully assess how beneficial such interventions will be.

An international team of researchers led by Professor John C. Moore, at the University of Lapland, Rovaniemi, Finland, and Professor Ralf Greve, at the Institute of Low Temperature Sciences, Hokkaido University, has used simulations to examine the potential effects of a geoengineering technique called stratospheric aerosol injection on ice sheet melting. Their findings were published in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Earth Surface.

Read more at: Hokkaido University

Photo Credit: John C. Moore, Ralf Greve et al. Journal of Geophysical Research: Earth Surface. November 27, 2023