The global sea level looks set to rise far higher than forecast because of changes in the polar ice-sheets, a team of researchers has suggested.
Scientists at a climate change summit in Copenhagen said earlier UN estimates were too low and that sea levels could rise by a metre or more by 2100.
Melting ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica force UN scientists to issue dramatic warning
Sea levels are predicted to rise twice as fast as was forecast by the United Nations only two years ago, threatening hundreds of millions of people with catastrophe, scientists said yesterday in a dramatic new warning about climate change. Rapidly melting ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica are likely to push up sea levels by a metre or more by 2100, swamping coastal cities and obliterating the living space of 600 million people who live in deltas, low-lying areas and small island states.
Low-lying countries with increasing populations, such as Bangladesh, Burma and Egypt, could see large parts of their surface areas vanish. Experts in Bangladesh estimate that a one-metre rise in sea levels would swamp 17 per cent of the country’s land mass.
Now villagers in Gabura and parts of flood-prone southwest Bangladesh say it might finally be time to leave for good. Dozens of families interviewed along the coast said they have lived the close-knit village life for generations, and they’re familiar with the rhythm of temporarily moving along when things get bad. The difference now, they say, is that brothers, husbands and uncles are leaving for the cities in greater numbers than ever before — and this time, they’re not coming home.
….when it comes to seeing the effects of climate change, Bangladesh has a ringside seat. Average global temperatures have risen in the last 25 years, and 11 of the warmest years on record have been occurred in the past 13 years. Glaciers are melting, and across the world, rates of storm surges in some areas and droughts in others are steadily rising.
New York Times Story - Part 1
A. Hannan Ismail asks what the global North’s lack of commitment to tackling climate problems might mean from a human rights perspective
Bangladeshis have long been known as a mobile people. In fact, you could say that it is in our blood to travel, move and explore. And yet, this wanderlust owes much more to another form of liquid substance: water.
If the G8 and other over-consuming emitters do not sort themselves out soon, then a real age of consequences will be upon us. Tens of millions of Bangladeshis will call upon the traditions of their maritime forebears and make their ways to more clement shores. They will demand their right to live.
And what will we do then?
In the context of the urgency of the climate change challenge, and the uniquely vulnerable situation of Bangladesh, we recognise the efforts of the Bangladeshi government in creating the national Climate Change Strategy and Action Plan and in creating the Climate Change Fund of $45 million/annum to support the implementation of the plan. We also recognise the steps taken by the UK government to support the Plan through a commitment of £75 million as an initial contribution to the Multi Donor Trust Fund. Whilst insufficient in themselves these are positive steps in the right direction.
UK and Bangladeshi civil society appreciative of the steps taken would wish to make the following comments and statement of principles with regard to the creation of the plan and funds following the interaction we had in London after the official UK Bangladesh Climate Change Conference.
More from a paper published by Oxfam
And that’s the problem. A lot has been going on out there in the natural world since 2005. There is three years’ worth of published peer-reviewed evidence, a lot of it from the frontline of the eco-systems most directly affected by climate change. Those whose job it is to take account of all that new evidence (universities, thinktanks, government departments and so on) have a common message to pass on: the vast majority of those studies tell us incontrovertibly that the impact of climate change is more severe and materialising much more rapidly than anything reflected in the fourth assessment report. It’s much worse out there, and it’s getting even worse even faster.
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