By Anthony Marcusa / Source: Ecorazzi

It’s not just the Himalayas that are in trouble; around the world, glaciers everywhere are retreating at an alarming rate.

That’s according to a new study published in the Journal of Glaciology, declaring the loss of ice is at such a dramatic rate and is “historically unprecedented.”

In Greenland, West Antarctica, coastal mountains in Canada and Alaska, as well as in Europe and the Himalayas, researchers have witnessed rising melt water and retreating glaciers. In Greenland specifically, a river of ice is moving at 46 meters a day, which translates to 17 kilometers a year, a rate double the recorded speed from just 2003.

The World Glacier Monitoring Service out of Zurich, Switzerland has been compiling data for 120 years, and collected measurements and maintaining records for far longer.

“The observed glaciers currently lose between half a metre and one metre of ice thickness every year – this is two to three times more than the corresponding average of the 20th century,” said the study’s lead author, Michael Zemp. “Exact measurements of this ice loss are reported from a few hundred glaciers only. However, these results are qualitatively confirmed from field and satellite observations for tens of thousands of glaciers around the world.”

Ice loss in glaciers leads to rising sea levels, less spring water for irrigation, change in habitats, and trouble for mountain communities reliant on winter tourism. Floods are an imminent threat, and in the case of Washington, D.C., melting ice sheets have relieved pressure on a land bulge, and thus more or less sinking the city.

The future doesn’t look particularly bright, concludes the research. “Glaciers in many regions will very likely suffer further ice loss,” said Zemp. “Even if climate remains stable.”

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