To add to the email from Ross: I'm not a climatologist either, but a quick exercise shows us why James' calculations were flawed. The Earth's radius is approximately 6378 km. The average depth of the ocean is appx. 3.7 km. So we might take it that the radius of Earth + ocean is appx. 6381 km. (very approximate since I got this info online). To calculate the ratio of water volume needed for a 40 ft. (0.012192 km.) vs. 1 ft. (0.0003048 km) increase in ocean level, we use the formula:
ratio = (4/3*pi*(6382+0.012192)^3-4/3*pi*6382^3)/(4/3*pi*(6382+0.0003048)^3-4/3*pi*6382^3) = 40.00007 So for a 40 times greater increase in water level, we need approximately 40 times more water. Hardly surprising. This result would be similar even if my radius estimate is a few km off. Also, James seems to have ignored that much of the melting ice is supported by land masses rather than floating in the ocean. Tom Dr. Thomas Raffel Center for Infectious Disease Dynamics Penn State University 208 Mueller Lab, University Park, PA 16802 phone: 814-863-5895 fax: 814-865-9131 -- No virus found in this outgoing message. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.5.446 / Virus Database: 268.18.17/730 - Release Date: 3/22/2007 7:44 AM
