EnvironmentGlaciers

How to Prevent Glaciers from Melting?

How to Stop the Polar Ice Caps From Melting?

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Glaciers and polar ice caps are the most significant sources of drinking water for human beings.

Besides, these white masses prevent our earth from overheating. In other words, we can say the two primary ice sheets of the planet protect us from the worst scenario due to global warming.

However, the rapid industrialization, increased population, and advanced anthropogenic activities, causing the global temperature to rise at a rate that our polar ice masses cannot cancel the effects.

Instead, these activities influence all forms of snow deposits, causing them to melt faster than ever.

Sea ice helps to increase albedo — the transmission of sun rays without absorbing it. Due to a global temperature rise of 2° C in the last decades, the melting of glaciers and polar ice caps has been six times faster.

This ultimately warms the oceans causing more ice sheets to melt, and therefore an increase in sea level occurs.

These are not casual things to take lightly, but these indicate the beginning of all types of natural disasters that must not be neglected.

That’s the reason, here in this article, we will discuss how to prevent our glaciers and ice caps from melting. So, let’s dig deeper.

How to Prevent Glaciers and Polar Ice Caps From Melting?

After knowing the causes of the melting of our cooling system of earth, we must understand how to stop glaciers and ice caps in the polar hemisphere (and other parts of the world) from melting.

Our most significant snow deposits include Antarctica in the south pole and Greenland in the North pole.

As Antarctica is a protected environment and due to less landmass availability, the Northern hemisphere is more prone to get influenced by human-made climate change.

That’s the reason we are going to lose all the ice from Greenland till 3000, according to ongoing surveys.

Although Antarctica was protected in 1991 by the “Protocol on Environmental Protection to the Antarctic treaty,” still there is melting of ice sheets going on due to several other reasons.

These instances show the urge to take action against protecting our valuable resources from becoming invisible. And the principal ways to prevent glaciers and polar ice caps from melting are as follows:

To take action to reduce the carbon footprint per individual. Reducing the carbon footprint per individual is the leading way to diminish the impact of climate change.

An increased population has an advanced influence on releasing a considerable quantity of CO2 into the atmosphere.

That causes broad issues like global warming and climate change. Each anthropogenic activity is directly or indirectly linked to these problems.

There are so many effects, including increased natural disasters and the current topic, i.e., melting of snow from the cryospheres.

Therefore, taking individual action is a must in order to save our earth from further damage. We can take part in saving our ice sheets from vanishing in the following ways:

How can we prevent glaciers from melting?

  • Using electricity and water wisely.
  • To swap from energy produced by fossil fuels to clean energy sources such as wind and solar energy.
  • Driving less and walking more or taking the public transportation system.
  • Or replacing Combustion engines with hybrid engines.
  • Practicing ecotourism.
  • Planting more trees wherever possible.
  • By saying no to plastics.
  • Applying 3R’s strategy to manage waste.
  • Keeping our environment clean.
  • Utilizing organic wastes as biomass in order to reduce the extent of methane in the atmosphere.
  • Conserving our natural resources.
  • Spreading awareness for protecting our glaciers and polar ice caps from melting.

Besides, there are hundreds of ways to conserve water, electricity, fossil fuels, and all other forms of natural resources per person.

Let’s apply these techniques to reduce our carbon footprint as much as possible.

Further, government agencies and international organizations must take strict actions against reducing pollution, deforestation, usage of fossil fuels, and mining activities in order to protect our ice sheets from vanishing entirely.

Preventing the Antarctic region from the interference of invasive species.

Several studies indicate that the sensitive ecosystems of Antarctica are influenced by the transport of non-native invasive species.

And the good news here is the ban of any kind of invasive organisms, including ship rats, dogs, reindeer, horses, ponies, etc.

This must be sustained in order to protect the glaciers from melting through the interference of such transportation.

To take measures against damage by tourists and researchers.

Based on a recent survey by UNWTO (World Tourism Organisation) and ITF (International Transport Forum), it is known that the emission of CO2 regarding transport in tourism will be 5.3% in 2030 rather than the estimated 5% in 2016. 

There are several other ecological consequences of tourism to a natural destination. However, glaciers and ice caps are more popular for several ice adventures. Then it’s obvious how much effects tourism has on the melting of ice shelves and glaciers.

Besides, tourism-related climate impact on polar hemispheres, further, research and development also cause an interruption in their natural environment.

Thus, it is essential to take strict actions for regulating the impact of tourists and researchers on that particular place.

Implementation of advanced technologies.

On the previous point, we grasp that researchers also have an impact on the melting of glaciers. However, research and development are crucial in order to protect the glaciers and ice caps from melting.

According to a review published in a journal, The Cryosphere, it is understood that we can stop the flooding issues regarding sea level rise by applying geoengineering to stop ice sheets from vanishing.

There is a 30% probability of getting success from this project by either carbon removal or by solar radiation management.

The building of an artificial barrier under the sea to prevent warm water from reaching the ice sheets in an unstable condition is the future planning for protecting our precious glaciers and polar ice caps from melting.

Conclusion

When our activities become the reason behind our mother earth’s destruction, we human beings are needed to raise voice along with actionable steps to undo the effects.

However, ignoring as a mass responsibility will not change anything. And if we are expecting our nature to be cured, we must take individual steps.

Only this can protect our glaciers and ice caps from melting, and further, we will get sustained earth free from all disasters.

So, will you contribute to stop our polar ice caps from melting? Comment down below!

Source
www.theguardian.comindianexpress.com

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