[Pil-pc-oceania] CLIMATE NEWS: Glacial melting faster than ever

[pacific-edge]

Last Update: Monday, January 29, 2007. 11:13pm (AEDT).

Thirty reference glaciers lost about 66cm in thickness on average in 2005.
(Reuters)
    
Glaciers melting at increasing speed: UN

New data shows the melting of mountain glaciers worldwide is accelerating, a
clear sign that climate change is also picking up, the UN environmental
agency and scientists say.

Thirty reference glaciers, monitored by the Swiss-based World Glacier
Monitoring Service, lost about 66 centimetres in thickness on average in
2005, the UN Environment Programme said in a statement.

"The new data confirms the trend in accelerated loss during the past two and
half decades," it added.

The set of glaciers located around the world have thinned by about 10.5
metres on average since 1980, according to the data supplied by the
Monitoring Service in Zurich.

They melted on average about 1.6 times faster annually this decade compared
with the 1990s, and about six times faster than in the 1980s.

The glacier surface area is also much smaller than in the 1980s, said
Michael Zemp, a glaciologist at the Monitoring Service.

"The recent increase in the rates of ice loss over reducing glacier surface
areas leaves no doubt about the accelerated change in climatic conditions,"
Mr Zemp added.

UNEP executive director Achim Steiner said the findings confirm the science
of human-induced climate change.

"[The data provides] confirmation that will be further underlined when the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change unveil their next report on
February 2," he said.

The world's top climate experts began a four-day meeting of the UN panel on
Monday in Paris, where they are set to launch a long-awaited update about
the scientific evidence for global warming later this week.

The melting of the mountain ice floes is expected to show up in 2006 data
because it was one of the warmest years in many parts of the world.

- AFP