Title: Tracking sea level rise ... and fall | National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
Headings: Tracking sea level rise ... and fall
Tracking sea level rise ... and fall
What is sea level?
Is sea level changing?
How do we measure sea level?
The majority of scientists agree that global sea level change is directly related to a changing climate.

Content: Global sea level is rising from two primary causes: the expansion of ocean water as it warms; and increased melting of land-based ice, like glaciers and ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica and other “upland” areas. Rising temperatures are changing processes that control the buildup and melt of snowpack, the growth or decline of glaciers, and the timing and quantity of streamflow in the Arctic. ( NOAA)
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As the ocean and the atmosphere continue to warm, water levels will continue to rise. How much depends mostly on the amount of heat-trapping greenhouse gases, including carbon dioxide, emitted into the atmosphere and the subsequent warming. How fast depends mostly on the rate of glacier and ice sheet melting. From the 1970s through the early 2000s, melting ice and the ocean’s expansion contributed equally to the observed sea level rise. Over the past decade, the amount of sea level rise due to land-based ice melting has almost doubled that of ocean expansion. Scientists determined their relative contributions by taking many measurements.