By RIA Novosti
St. Petersburg : The collapse of a part of the Wilkins ice shelf in the Antarctica will not cause sea levels to rise, Russian experts have said.
A 41-km iceberg split off from the Wilkins ice shelf in the southwestern part of the Antarctica late February, destroying a large part of the ice shelf’s edge, the Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute in Russia’s second largest city said in a press release.
Scientists said the destruction of the ice shelf is due to a significant rise in temperatures in the area of icy continent, with ground temperatures rising by about 2.5 degrees Celsius over the last 50 years.
However, “there is nothing unusual or catastrophic about it. The Wilkins ice shelf covers an area of 13,700 sq km, and only a small part of it has been destroyed,” the institute said.
The scientists said that a large part of the Larsen ice shelf in the eastern coast of the peninsula was destroyed in 2002.
The majority of climate change experts, environmental groups and organizations say that global warming is caused by greenhouse gas emissions due to human activity, which is causing significant damage to the Earth.