Firstly, as the planet gets hotter, the water in the oceans warms and it expands.These waters then take up more volume, and this makes the level of the seas rise.
 Secondly, ice from the polar caps and glaciers is melting and feeding more water into the oceans. Sea ice in the Arctic is disappearing rapidly and the Arctic’s summer sea ice could disappear completely by 2040. An area of ice 10 times the size of the UK has disappeared since the 1980s.
In the Antartica, which holds most of the planets ice, scientists believe the ice sheets are no longer stable and some are already collapsing.
 Rising sea levels will completely swamp some small, low-lying islands and costal regions and put millions of people at risk. This might not worry us if we live in the middle of a country or on high ground. But think about the people who live in low-lying countries like the Netherlands or Bangladesh (where 17 million people live less than one metre above sea level), or on a low-lying island where their homes may possibly disappear.
Inhabitants of the Carteret islands in the South Pacific have already had to be evacuated and it is predicted that there will be millions more climate change refugees in the years to come.
Some of Britain’s best-loved beaches and coastal attractions could also disappear if sea levels continue to rise as a result of climate change. |
