NASA Reviels Antarctica Is Growing, Not Shrinking

Environmentalists have been arguing for ages that global warming is causing the Antarctic ice sheet to melt. However, a recent study by NASA tells a different story.

According to satellite measurements that calculate changes in the surface height of the ice, the Antarctic sheet showed a net gain of 112 billion tons of ice a year from 1992 to 2001. That net gain slowed to 82 billion tons of ice per year between 2003 and 2008.

This data is considered to be more reliable as previous studies have largely been based on guesswork because the continent is so vast and inhospitable.

Furthermore, what they showed is that the amount of ice lost by glaciers collapsing into the sea has been exceeded by the gain in ice mass from accumulated snow.

The US space agency research claims an increase in Antarctic snow accumulation that began 10,000 years ago is “currently adding enough ice to the continent to outweigh the increased losses from melting glaciers,” concluding that Antarctica has been thickening for a very long timeThe spokesman added: “This small thickening, sustained over thousands of years and spread over the vast expanse of these sectors of Antarctica, corresponds to a very large gain of ice – enough to outweigh the losses from fast-flowing glaciers in other parts of the continent and reduce global sea level rise.”

Global warming may not be affecting the Antarctic as much as we thought it would, but it is still very real.