Question:

Why would sea levels rise if the north pole ice melts?

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The laws of physics teach us that a body floating in a liquid displaces a volume of liquid equal to the weight of the floating body. I understand that the north pole (unlike the south pole) has no land mass, but comprises floating ice. If so, how is it that melting of all this north polar ice would lead to a rise in sea level? The volume of sea now being displaced by the floating ice would simply be filled by an equal volume of water that would be created by the melted ice. Hence, no sea level rise when the ice melts.

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  1. Yes, There is also a lot of ice above the water.


  2. Because alot of the ice is actually above the water.

  3. Correct, you can be taught!

  4. You are correct, the amount of water displaced is equivalent to the ENTIRE weight of the floating body. Archimedes discovered the principle of buoyancy while taking a bath.

    However, as some other writers have noted there is significant amount of ice/snow that currently is located on land. If this were to melt then it would add to the total volume of water and the sea levels would rise.  

  5. it wouldnt if it were just the floating ice, but there is land mass near the north pole, Greenland and lots of northern russia, that would be affected.

    the biggest problem would be the reduction in saline ratio in the north atlantic, bringing very cold weather the north west europe due to loss of the gulf stream.

  6. Ice floats on water. When ice melts the water level rises. It ain't rocket science.

  7. In theory you are correct

    firstly for your reasoning about the ice floating and thus when melted will produce no rise in sea level.

    however even though some ice is on land - when that melts you would expect a rise in sea level - however once melted the land would be subject to isostatic recovery and it too would rise in time, so that it would experience a net FALL in sea level.  Unfortunatey the rest of the world would get flooded.

    moral of this story

    Buy a house in Greenland.

  8. 1) There IS land at the North Pole

    2) The majority of ice is above sea level - hence icebergs sticking out of the sea.

  9. You have answered yourself, there would be no rise in sea level.

  10. You got the statement in your question wrong. A body FULLY SUBMERGED in a liquid displaces a volume... etc. A lot of ice is above water, and when that melts, the resulting sea levels will be higher.

  11. You are completely right, floating ice does not cause any rise in sea level when it melts for the reasons you state.  Folk that say that the floating ice above the water level causes sea level to rise when it melts are wrong.  This is because as you state "a body floating in a liquid displaces a volume of liquid equal to the WEIGHT of the floating body".  It's something that gets drummed into students studying this at university level!

    However as other folk have pointed out there is a lot of land ice in the Arctic, mainly the Greenland ice cap.  As this is land-based ice it will cause sea level rise when it enters the sea.

    Another factor is that as global temperatures increase sea water expands (just as air expands when it gets warmer).  This also causes sea level to rise.

    And on a related note, ice is very reflective, known as having a high albedo.  This means it reflects a high proportion of the incoming solar radiation back into space.  As the ice melts it reveals either rock or sea which both have a lower albedo meaning they reflect less of the suns radiation, therefore absorbing more.  This is then released and heats the atmosphere, causing air temperatures to rise further, which causes more ice to melt, which exposes more rock or sea, which causes more solar radiation to heat the atmosphere... and so on.

    There's a lot of very complicated feedbacks within the climate system and we don't understand them all!  Hope this helps, you're spot on with your physics.

  12. There would be no rise in sea level since the North Pole is ALL ocean. Since ice is less dense than water it tends to float above it. As of now a lot of the ice melts everyear and since I live next to the ocean I assure you that the sea level stays the same.

  13. I'm not sure but I think that only the mass of ice below the surface displaces its weight. But this sounds like an interesting thing to test with some ice cubes and a bowl of water.  

    The biggest problem for the planet regarding the melting ice caps is the effect of a mass of cold water drifting into the gulf stream which could provoke massive climate change.

    I think this is an interesting question and it has made me curious to test it.

  14. heres a simple experiment for you to try.. get a cup of water and place in some ice cubes then mark a line where the water is on the glass. get a hairdryer and then melt the icecubes and you will notice that although he cubes have melted, the water has not rose any higher. this is the same with the polar ice caps. BUT all the ice thats currently not in the water when that falls into the sea and melts then the water raises a little but the main reason for making the sea rise is when water warms up, it expands and because theres more water in the sea due to polar melt, the sea rises.

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