Melting ice sheets

A recently published study led by scientists in Bangor shows that today's melting ice sheets could have a profound effect on the tides and the climate in the coming decades and centuries.

The study by a team of scientists from Bangor University's School of Ocean Sciences, in collaboration with Harvard and Oregon universities in the United States, and McGill University in Canada, used supercomputing power to number crunch data, and explore the consequences of the melting of the Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets. The results show that the change in tides due to the ice sheets disappearing is not uniform around the coasts, and, for example would mean the tidal range in South Wales would be reduced, but in North Wales it would increase.

Adam is joined by Dr Sophie-Berenice Wilmes, who studied for her PhD in Bangor, but is now a lecturer in Oregon State University in the USA. Also in the studio is Professor Tom Rippeth of Bangor School of Ocean Sciences. They explain the details of the study including how changes to the tides will have implications for the climate.

We also hear from Professor Neil Glasser of Aberystwyth University's Department of Geography and Earth Sciences. He explains how a huge iceberg was calved from the Larsen C ice shelf in Antarctica last summer. It was a quarter the size of Wales and weighed at least a trillion tonnes. This is the latest in a series of break ups of the massive Larsen shelf.