Imagine a future in which sea level rise is so severe that apocalyptic floods are a regular occurrence. Hundreds of millions are displaced as their coastal regions become uninhabitable, and as humanity struggles to survive, the map of the Earth's southernmost region gets radically redrawn. According to a recent study by the British Antarctic Society, climate change has passed a crucial tipping point for the West Antarctic Ice Sheet. There is simply no way for this massive natural wonder to avoid massive melting.
"We find that rapid ocean warming, at approximately triple the historical rate, is likely committed over the twenty-first century, with widespread increases in ice-shelf melting, including in regions crucial for ice-sheet stability," the authors write. "These results suggest that mitigation of greenhouse gases now has limited power to prevent ocean warming that could lead to the collapse of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet."
