World Glacier Disbursement Sets A Record Due To Global Temperature Increase

Glacier in Iceland. (Wikimedia Commons/Sarah1990)

JAKARTA - Glaciers around the world are melting faster than ever, with the past three years witnessing the mass loss of the largest glacier ever recorded, UNESCO reported on Friday.

9,000 ice gigatons have been missing from glaciers since 1975 roughly the equivalent of a "Germany-sized ice block 25 meters thick," said Michael Zemp, director of the Swiss-based World Glacier Monitoring Service, during a press conference announcing the report at UN headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland.

The dramatic disappearance of ice, from the Arctic to the Alps, from South America to the Tibetan Heights is expected to be accelerating due to climate change, caused by fossil fuel fires, driving global temperatures higher. This is likely to worsen economic, environmental and social problems around the world as sea levels rise and this major water source shrinks.

The report coincided with a UNESCO summit in Paris marking World Glacier Day first, urging global action to protect glaciers around the world.

Zemp said five of the last six years recorded the largest glacier loss, with glaciers losing 450 gigatons of mass by 2024 alone.

The accelerated loss has made the mountain glacier one of the biggest contributors to sea level rise, which puts millions of people at risk of catastrophic flooding and damages waterways that are the mainstay of billions of people for hydroelectric and agricultural energy.

Stefan Uhlenbrook, director of water and cryosphere at the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) said about 275,000 glaciers remain worldwide, along with Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets, cover about 70 percent of the world's fresh water.

"We need to advance our scientific knowledge, we need to progress through a better observational system, through better forecasts, and a better early warning system for planets and humans," Uhlenbrook said.

About 1.1 billion people live in mountain communities, which suffer the most direct impact of the loss of glaciers, due to the increasing risk of natural disasters and unreliable water sources. Remote locations and difficult terrain also make cheap improvements difficult to obtain.

Rising temperatures are expected to exacerbate drought in areas that depend on a layer of snow for freshwater, while increasing disaster severity and frequency levels such as landslides, landslides, flash floods, and floods of glacial lakes (GLOFs).

A Peruvian farmer living downstream of the melting glacier has brought the matter to court, suing German energy giant RWE for some of its lavaal lake flood defenses comparable to its historical global emissions.

"The changes we saw on the pitch were heartbreaking," Glaciologist Aidi Sevestre told Reuters outside the UNESCO headquarters, Paris on Wednesday.

"Things in some areas are actually happening much faster than we expected," added Sevestre, noting the recent trip to the Rwenzori Mountains, located in Uganda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo in East Africa, where glaciers are expected to disappear by 2030.

Sevestre has worked with the Bakonzo indigenous peoples in the region who believe the god named Kitasamba lives on the glacier.

"Can you imagine the deep spiritual relationship, the strong attachment they have to glaciers and what does it mean for them that their glaciers disappear?" Sevestre said.

According to a new UNESCO report, glacier disbursement in East Africa has led to increased local conflicts over water, and despite its impact on global scales at least, melting glacier flows around the world have had multiple impacts.

Between 2000 and 2023, the melting of mountain glaciers has caused a global sea level rise of 18 millimeters, about 1 mm per year. According to the World Glacier Monitoring Service, each millimeter can cause up to 300,000 people to be exposed to annual flooding.

"Billions of people are connected to glaciers, whether they notice it or not, and it will take billions of people to protect it," Sevestre said.