Almost as riveting as pinning down roughly how close to 50/50 America splits into REP/DEM.

this is all great but I think we need more discussion on icebergs

Well maybe I am just poor at explaining. A melting iceberg increases the amount of fluid water which can absorb heat, gets warmer and expands. As long as its solid ice there is just so much heat it can take before it liquidizes. You are right that a melted iceberg doesnt increase the volume at the moment of the melting but what when water gets warmer?

JFC

Ice from land sliding or melting into the sea is bad because it raises sea levels.

Increased sea surface area is bad because it absorbs more heat.

Whether or not a melting iceberg raises ocean temp or sea level by a small amount is completely inconsequential to a climate change discussion and maybe belongs in SMP or something.

Completely agree. Perhaps I shouldn't have engaged the posters who keep bringing it up in climate change threads.

Thermal expansion is no joke though!

http://www.bitsofscience.org/sea-lev...xpansion-7256/

Lotta people just won't care because NYC under water in 2150 doesn't concern them.

Noted young intellectual face of Conservatism does not care about a 50 year time window.

33 degree water that moves to 34 degrees contracts as its doing it

He's right, it doesn't reverse and start expanding until it gets to around 40 degrees. It's just a weird property of water.

Incidentally, the water temp in the arctic circle and antarctic circle never gets that high.

Oh and that's where all the icebergs are too. So all the posters grasping at straws about icebergs and sea level can just stop please. They have zero relevance to any sea level discussion.

Ffs

When discussing the transition between ice and water, (or water and steam), using fahrenheit instead of celcius makes so much sense

New icebergs coming from land ice do.

You're right, I should have said icebergs melting is irrelevant, which is what was being discussed.

When a new iceberg calves off a land glacier and falls in the ocean, the sea level rise is immediate of course. Whether it's glacier meltwater or unmelted chunks, when it hits the ocean the sea level is changed at that instant. Some of that cycles back normally every season (via rain and then refreezing on land) but not all.

Back to the real topic at hand ... (more about melting ice though)

A third of Himalayan ice cap doomed, finds report

...plus more in the linked article

Do you suppose that if the average water temperature at the poles goes up one degree, then the water temperature around the globe also goes up?

Do you suppose there might be other impacts of a one degree rise at the poles besides a change in the sea volume/level?

lol Ben Shapiro. Shocking.

Just curious, how many people have to tell you I'm right before you reconsider?

When you said this, you were wrong and David corrected you.

You agree that when ice melts the volume contracts. What you are missing is that then when the water begins to warm, it continues to contract. Only when it gets above about 4C will it begin to expand with temperature. And in iceberg territory seawater is never that warm.

And we're still arguing about whether melting ice bergs raise sea level, or temperature, or something.

Achievement unlocked.

You complain but dont change the subject so what do you want? OP hasnt even answered anymore since page 2 if I am correct and people already concluded that its impossible to change his mind. So the thread just gets beaten to death by now. Any further discussion could as well take place in the environment thread.

I didn't know this. Maximum density is 4 deg C. It's complicated though. Average surface temperature of the ocean is 17 deg C. I can't find the average overall (maybe it's not really known). It's a lot colder though and seas where ice is melting are colder. And it takes a long long time for surface water to mix with water at depth.

SMP debate though. This is nowhere near the affect of land ice melting or overall thermal expansion of the oceans.

I thought it was clear from context we were talking about what happens outside this narrow range.

The climate change “skeptics” have nothing but conspiracy theories and busted talking points. This thread is going to die off like the other one did because one side is not interested in a good faith discussion.

The average water temperature in the arctic circle is about 0C. Sea water doesn't freeze at that temperature.

I probably have become a pessimist by now. Although there are lots of people who have good intentions and even might say that they want climate change as a problem to be tackled but only as long as it doesnt pushes them out of their comfort zones. The majority will always value jobs over environmental progress. I see it in Germany right now. The fight to end the use of coal is a neverending struggle. The regions who have the biggest industries want a lot of money for quitting coal. For decades industries have come and gone and people had to adapt. Giving up coal is a forced move rather than a clear downfall of an industry. People just cant grasp what happens if we continue on this path so they dont understand that reducing CO2 is necessary. And now that they have a plan people complain about the cost. As if the alternative longterm isnt so much more expensive for everyone. Its a doom loop and it takes so fkn long to get anything underway at all.
Hell I would have a hard time to completely give up on travelling by plane. Just to many parts of the world I want to see.
At this point I honestly think that democracy wont succeed unless they find a way that to save the planet and keep people employed. So might be that UBI has to be a big part of any move forward.

Not only is solar less expensive than coal now, and sometimes less expensive even with storage, for electricity production it already employs more people than oil, coal and gas combined.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/niallmc.../#2ae41f962800

The Trumpian calls to save the coal industry and produce more and more oil are all entirely for the owners and not the workers.