Our Changing Climate in Action: the Risk of Global Warming and the Environmental Damage from the Rising Ocean Water Table | Sustainable Seas Enquiry

Written evidence submitted by Veli Albert Kallio, FRGS (SSI0121) | Ordered to be published 23 May 2018 by the House of Commons.

Recently NATURE published a discussion on construction of sills in attempt to prevent or slow melting glaciers that are discharging ice into the ice fjords. Several further papers promptly followed publication of this essentially erroneous article in a respected NATURE magazine. Here it is pointed out that there is a discrepancy of several magnitudes thus excluding a long-term viability to manage the edges of ice fjords or continental ice shelves/sheets due to a phenomenon known as the mega-erratics. These are blocks of hard rocks that are several kilometres in size that have been dislocated by a warmed and wet edges of glacier/ice sheet/ice shelf. This Parliament evidence points out the error that was not apparent to the peer-reviewers at the time and in subsequent papers that followed. The Parliament was shown evidence that large enough obstacles cannot be possibly made to prevent ice discharges due to a progression of melting, that softens and lubricates glaciers, ice caps and ice sheets. The forces unleashed by the ice front exceeds several magnitudes from the conceived objects that sills were proposed. The only, and very only effect is temporary and limited to prevention of warm water incursion where these methods will work for a while in a cold, dry, and relatively stable ice formations. A long-term projections suggested to prevent warmed and water-infested glaciers from discharging ice into the ocean cannot be made as the forces of ice exceed many magnitudes of the sills and levies that can be made of concrete blocks, aggregates or other materials. Thus the prevention of sea level rise by this method for centuries or millennia is not functional one and thus the mitigation and prevention of rubbish gyros in ocean, the supply of housing, nuclear and food production security must be looked at as solution by the ocean littoral states. Several examples of various types of risk to the sustainability of oceans have been presented in addition to the above exposed misconception. This comes with much regret as it appears that one 'hoped-for-solution' to manage the future climate change impacts has largely foundered on the issue that the sills cannot be made strong enough to contain most important, warmed glaciers or edges of unstable ice shelves. However, for a short-term this may offer small-scale solutions provided that costs remain sufficiently small. Aggressively melting ice formations with darkened surfaces, wide spread melt water ponds, or water filled crevasses it does not offer much, if any, prolonged ice stability. (The document is best viewed as a .pdf file due to the lay-out of graph and legends.)

https://www.academia.edu/37157851/Our_Changing_Climate_in_Action_the_Risk_of_Global_Warming_and_the_Environmental_Damage_from_the_Rising_Ocean_Water_Table_Sustainable_Seas_Enquiry_Written_evidence_submitted_by_Veli_Albert_Kallio_FRGS_SSI0121_Ordered_to_be_published_23_May_2018_by_the_House_of_Commons