The world’s glaciers are disappearing at an ever faster pace.
Especially the world’s small glaciers are becoming fewer and fewer.
That worries researchers.
– The disappearance of these small glaciers is really a danger signal about what is to come in the future. It should make you aware that something is happening, and that it is not just trifles, says glacier researcher Christoph Mayer at the Bavarian Academy of Sciences and Humanities in Munich to the news agency AP.
– Affects many
Mayer says that if the glaciers disappear, it will have major consequences in a number of different areas. One of these is the German tourism sector.
– At the moment, tourist agencies can advertise with «you can visit some of Germany’s highest mountains with glaciers. You can walk the glaciers ». People living in these regions live off tourism. It will affect many of them if these glaciers disappear, Mayer says.
– Not brave enough
Melting is not just a problem in Germany. In Uganda, the melting of the country’s glaciers is creating problems for power production in the country.
Richard Taylor is researching hydropower at University College London. He says that a lot of meltwater from the glaciers in Uganda now creates problems for the hydropower plants, which account for about half of the country’s energy production.
– The hydroelectric power plants work much better with a steady flow of water, than with large differences at the top and bottom, says Taylor.
A third disappeared
view more
–
In Peru, the glaciers in the mountains are several thousand meters above sea level. In the Cordillera Blanca mountains, about a third of the glacier has disappeared, writes Sky News.
The glaciers are vital for, among others, farmers in the area, who need the water to grow food.
– They melt before our eyes. I cried when I saw how much water flowed from the glacier, says Carlie Good to Sky.
He has been a mountain guide on the glaciers for almost 20 years.
Talljuks creates chaos
– It should really only be a waterfall that comes from that glacier. In November a few years ago, when the sun was almost in the middle of the sky, there were nine streams flowing from it, says Good.
Peruvian glacier researcher Cesar Portocarrero estimates to Sky that all the glaciers will more or less be gone by 2050.
90 percent gone
At Kilimanjaro, Africa’s highest mountain, researchers estimate that as much as 90 percent of the glaciers have already melted. Many of the glaciers have melted so fast that they went straight from ice to steam, which among other things affects the local communities around the foot of the mountain.
Among other things, many of the indigenous communities in the area link the glaciers closely to their gods, and believe, among other things, that the glaciers are the homes of the gods.
– Losing the glaciers will affect the spiritual life in the area, says researcher Rainer Prinz at the University of Innsbruck in Austria.
–
