The potential for rapid deglaciation of West
Antarctica remains a primary uncertainty in the Intergovernmental Panel on
Climate Change (IPCC) predictions for 21st Century sea level rise.
The recent and unpredicted collapse of multiple ice shelves and rapid
acceleration of discharge of Antarctic ice suggests that dynamical responses to
warming play a more significant role than is currently understood and captured
in coupled climate-ice sheet models. The RICE Project is an international
partnership seeking to understand past, present, and future changes of the Ross
Ice Shelf, a major drainage pathway of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet.
RICE aims to provide an
annually resolved ice core record for the past 20,000 years and beyond, when
global temperatures increased by 6°C to preindustrial temperatures, global
sea level rose by ~120 m (394 ft), and the Ross Ice Shelf grounding line retreated over
1,000 km (620 miles). Most of the Ross Ice Shelf retreat occurred when global sea level had
already reached modern levels. For this reason, the precise correlation between
increasing air and ocean temperatures, and the velocity and characteristics of
the ice shelf retreat, provides a unique opportunity to determine accurately
the sensitivity of the Ross Ice Shelf to warming.