“Engineers might be able to protect Arctic ice by coating it with tiny glass bubbles. Should they?”
No.
No.
Betteridge's law (of headlines) is an adage that states "Any headline that ends in a question mark can be answered by the word no."Given how all data trends point to how we are pretty much going to fail at stopping global warming, the glass bubbles are 100% worth considering EVEN when you consider the potential negative side effects.
Before 2100. Estimates on that site say as close as 2040.
It's mostly because this problem lacks visibility because we haven't been hit with the brunt of it yet. Hard to care about it when it's just some hypothetical impending problem for Florida real estate.
Well before the ice caps completely melt, when the problem is evident we will likely turn to drastic solutions like this to change things regardless of the current opinion right now.
There’s plenty to be concerned about with climate change without making unfounded breathless claims.
The 230 feet sea level rise as a result of complete melt down of polar ice caps is from OTHER sources. I can certainly provide that as well:
https://www.usgs.gov/faqs/how-would-sea-level-change-if-all-....
https://sealevel.nasa.gov/understanding-sea-level/global-sea... (more than 160m)
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2020/oct/... (all ice caps melted by 2035)
These are not obscure pieces of data they aren't even close to unfounded they are in google and roughly the first search results. What I don't understand is the hostility here. Look up the facts yourself because you obviously didn't. It is illogical to be hostile towards something you didn't look up.
I'm sure there's contradictory evidence too, but you obviously didn't dig for that because you offered nothing to counter the evidence I presented.
For the sea level to rise 230’, all of the Antarctic ice would need to melt which will take hundreds or likely thousands of years. [1]
So no, there will not be 230’ of sea level rise in the next 75 years. That being said, the melt in Antarctica could raise sea levels by several feet by the end of the century, which would absolutely impact every coastal city on earth.
[0] https://nsidc.org/news-analyses/news-stories/melting-floatin...
[1] https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2023/03/antarctic-ice-sheet-i...
Here's a better solution than glass bubbles or whatever geo-engineering stunt people come up with: how about we adjust our culture and attitude to value the biosphere instead of feeding it into a meatgrinder; to encourage companies to make things that last instead of making things that break and need to be thrown away; to look at our energy use and just stop using so much of it.
How about that?
oh sweet flower child
If you cant do that how can you do it for the world? Idealistic pipe dream solutions won't happen. We have to mitigate our oil addiction with stop gap unideal solutions.
> In the next 2,000 years the sea level is predicted to rise > by 2–3 m (6–10 ft) if the temperature rise peaks at 1.5 °C (2.7 °F), > by 2–6 m (6–19 ft) if it peaks at 2 °C (3.6 °F) and > by 19–22 m (62–72 ft) if it peaks at 5 °C (9.0 °F)
Additionally
> If temperature rise stops at 2 °C (3.6 °F) or at 5 °C (9.0 °F), the sea level would still continue to rise for about 10,000 years. In the first case it will reach 8–13 m (26–42 ft) above pre-industrial level, and in the second 28–37 m (92–12 ft).
It is over 2000 years though. By 2100 the absolute worst case scenarios have sea level rise at about 2m
(note: I rounded down halves of ft to make it more readable, but the metres are unchanged)
Given multiple sources saying different things, It's hard to predict. Though what we are seeing are feedback loops that are causing exponential effects. I would say although we don't know... before 2100 is a realistic and viable possibility.
Gambling solely on 2000 years because it's a more convenient prediction would be unwise.
Either way, even if we don't know, now if sea levels do rise at a pace that will occur before 2100 we would eventually see it and adjust our reaction speed accordingly.
> Gambling solely on 2000 years because it's a more convenient prediction would be unwise.
I agree with both of these things. It's all so unpredictable.
But I do think there's a sort of terror-cult around climate change which is not very helpful. The extreme doom scenarios are easier for people to reject and disbelieve and they make people sceptical of changes that are actually, demonstrably happening already.