Maven Mapper's

 OK, here's the skinny as best as I can unravel the science.  The phenomenon that is melting the polar ice caps at either end, you can it call global warming if you like or what ever it seems to be occurring, is resulting in two different things.

1.  The Arctic melt it is melting ice that's already in the Arctic Ocean.  That means it's not going to raise sea levels, because it's already in the sea.  However decreasing the ice will increase the amount of heat that it absorbed into the ocean.  This will decrease the salinity of the ocean as natural water melts and will reinforce the heating effect around the globe.

The Antarctic melt is melting ice that sits on land, very similar to a glacier melting.  That ice is going to run off the Antarctic and into the sea.  That will increase ocean levels.

One recent report indicates that the Arctic in particular seems to be on a one-way path towards continually decreasing and might reach a day when it will be permanently unfrozen in the near future.

"While the Arctic is losing a great deal of ice in the summer months, it now seems that it also is regenerating less ice in the winter,"

So if you hear the argument about either of these areas will know which ones are contributing to the rise in the ocean levels and which one is contributing to the rise in the Ernst temperature.

In the meantime the real estate market is going topsy-turvy, and if you're looking for a goodbye here's a future tool that might help you find a home in the right spot!

Its brought to you by flood.firetree.net and its basically a Google map overlaid with technology to show you where the ocean levels will be with every 1 m increase in water.  Now I used to live in Boca Raton on a block or so away from the beach, and our elevation was 7 feet above sea level.  In trying to model out I can tell you that it's a little bit inaccurate.  It's an accurate for the perspective that it doesn't flood areas fast enough.  I had to crank the model up to 9 m to show my old house going underwater when I know that it's only 2 1/2 meters above sea level. 

So as you look at it keep in mind that it seems to have a glass as half-full sort of attitude, or maybe that the glass half empty?  a glass half empty would be better global warming?

Oh and happy Monday!

 Source: iTWire - Arctic triggered climate change may have reached tipping point: study