Glaciation and Climate Change

I think thats it is really important for students to understand that Glaciation is not an event that occurs solely on its own. That it is not affected by anything or affects anything else. I am contentrating on Glaciers and Climate Change, as it probably has the most obvious connection but do not fooled there is connections to a lot of other topics in Geography. Such as:-

• Glaciers and habitats
• Glaciers and Toruism and Economy
• Glaciers and other Hazards

Glaciers and Climate change

Previous eras of change in Climate

Scientists from the round the world use Ice Core to help uncover a long term climate record. They extract ice from Glaciers to analysis data that is stored with the Ice. Especially the particles trapped in the air pockets with the Glaciers, they are literally containing old atomosphere. There are able to aid scientists in constructed  and record changes in past climate and vegetation that would have been there.

Please see link below of a BBc report in 2004 of an Ice core that allowed scientists to gain information from 740,000 years ago.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/3792209.stm

Also in the report it indicates that the carbon dioxided are higher than they have been in 440000 years. This leads nicely on to the next point.

Glaciers and Global Warming

Today scientists are looking at how our climate warms up,whether its natural or man made. Since the Industrial revolvtion our Glaciers have mainly followed a pattern of retreating and increased levels of retreat over the last few years.

'In Europe, the situation is worrying too. Europe’s glaciers are thought to have lost around a quarter of their mass in the last 8 years' (http://www.bbc.co.uk/climate/impact/glaciers.shtml)

'It is believed the situation is so extreme in Alaska that of the 2,000 glaciers observed, 99%of them are retreating' (http://www.bbc.co.uk/climate/impact/glaciers.shtml).

The earth's temperature is on the rise and Glacier retreat is used as evidence that this is ocurring below it a link for a video that explains really well the affects Global warming has on Glaciers. I have also added the website of the National Geographic as there are a lot of video's on the website showing evidence of Global warming.

Video :- http://video.nationalgeographic.com/video/player/environment/global-warming-environment/way-forward-climate.html

Website:- http://video.nationalgeographic.com/video/player/environment/global-warming-environment/


One of the biggest retreats in the last few decades is Franz Josef Glacier in New Zealand. It dramatically retreated in the 20th century, on the link below there is pictures that show the Glacial retreat over 14 years:-

http://nsidc.org/glaciers/gallery/retreating.html.

Not only is the Glacier melting, they are causing a vast amount of meltwater all over the world. This will cause a rise in the level of rivers and oceans,that have worldwide impacts such as flooding low laying land.

There is loads of information on how Glaciers are affected by the changes in climate and are excellent indicators as to the changes in the Climate. I could have gone into far more detail, however I just wanted to illustrate that all topics are inter linked.

Resources
http://nsidc.org/glaciers/questions/climate.html

http://www.bbc.co.uk/climate/impact/glaciers.shtml

http://nsidc.org/glaciers/gallery/retreating.html

http://www.nationalgeographic.com/