Did you know that earthquakes due to global warming are increasing?

Question

Traditional earthquakes are mainly due to plate tektonics or volcanic processes. Generally that's all happening too deep to be affected by small changes in temperature and any minor thermal expansion on the earth's surface.

However, tremors up to magnitude 5.0 on the Richter scale can be caused by movement of glaciers, and those quakes are increasing in frequency:

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn8889-glacial-earthquakes-rock-greenland-ice-sheet.html

Ekström reports that quakes ranged from six to 15 per year from 1993 to 2002, then jumped to 20 in 2003, 23 in 2004, and 32 in the first 10 months of 2005 – matching an increase in Greenland temperatures.

http://search.yahoo.com/search?ei=utf-8&fr=slv8-&p=ice%20quake&type=

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Anyone seen data from 2006 & 2007?

Yes, I did assume that increasing flow and increasing tremors attributed to increasing meltwater would imply that the glacier was warming, as the scientists studying the process believed.

Even the publically reluctant Bush administration seems to now thoroughly endorse the carbon cycle anthropogenic global warming theory, and I've found no reason to disbelieve the latest research as presented by ten federal agencies here:

http://www.carboncyclescience.gov/news.php

Ah, the Senator James M. Inhofe EPW Press Blog... Why do you suppose he would he publish material opposing GW theory? Do you suppose it could have anything to do with him being given over $500,000 by the two industries most threatened by global warming?

The top industries supporting James M. Inhofe are:
1 Oil & Gas $319,958
2 Electric Utilities $195,907
http://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/indus.asp?CID=N00005582&cycle=2006

You don't need a postgraduate degree in climatology to understand that math!

This country desperately needs campaign finance reform.

Yes, Gray, Lindzen, etc. were included in the IPCC process and they're upset that the summary did not reflect their skeptical opinions, just as scientists on the other end of the specturm are mad that the IPCC softened their dire warnings. That compromise is a valuable part of the consensus process:

"Achieving consensus requires serious treatment of every group member's considered opinion.... A close equivalent phrase might be the "collective disagreement" of a group, keeping in mind that a high degree of variation is still possible among individuals."

Consensus does not mean agreement, it means that disagreement is considered and the group makes the best possible decision having considered opposing views. Thus the claim that skeptical scientific views were not considered in the IPCC process are not only groundless, but are probably disingenuous.

For anyone inclined to rant without actually reading the articles:

"He discovered the glacial quakes three years ago, when looking for unusual earthquakes, and traced them to slips within the ice. And the quakes can be substantial: a 10-metre slip of an ice slab roughly the size of Manhattan Island, and as tall as the Empire State building, causes a magnitude-5 quake on the Richter scale."

"The finding adds to evidence that the Greenland ice sheet is far more vulnerable to temperature increases than had been thought. Models that treated glaciers like giant ice cubes had predicted very slow melting. But recent studies of Greenland glaciers have shown much faster effects when meltwater causes glaciers to slip easily over rock."

"...in a single area of north-western Greenland scientists recorded just one quake between 1993 and 1999. But they monitored more than two dozen quakes between 2000 and 2005."

Pretty straightforward.

Answer 1

CHOCOLAHOMA - Put these two pieces of information together.

"The latest seismic study, published today in the journal Science, found that in a single area of north-western Greenland scientists recorded just one quake between 1993 and 1999. But they monitored more than two dozen quakes between 2000 and 2005."

http://environment.independent.co.uk/article353302.ece

"the flow rate, or the speed at which the constantly travelling glaciers move, has doubled in two years."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/south_west/4680680.stm

100% proof? No. "More likely than not"? You betcha.

Answer 2

did u ever know that in 10-20 years a big earthquake and tsunami will happen in Oregon, Southern Washington and California, its called the Cascadia subduction zone its happens every 300-500 years and the earthquake can be up to 8 or 9 magnitude which will cause an enormous earthquake here you could read about then believe me its really scary.....http://gsc.nrcan.gc.ca/geodyn/cascadia_e.php here is something else you should totally read ...http://www.livescience.com/environment/050103_cascadia_tsunami.html

Answer 3

Stop feeding into the lies, what annoys me about the young generation is they will fallow anyone off the cliff. Just because someone said scientist "THINK" global warming can cause more frequent earthquakes doesn't make it a fact. I'm pretty sure we weren't monitoring as many places in 1994 as we are today. besides haven't glaciers been moving back and forth for thousands of years? shouldn't that increase the amount?

Don't believe the hype, question things no matter what.

Do you know how much money 1st world countries are making with the whole global warming hype?

here in America we have to pay say a $1 per certain amount of electricity. in Africa they have to pay $3 per the same amount of electricity. why? because we're supporting going green and we make them use solar panels and other sources of electricity while we the #1 green house gas emitting country in the world sit here and burn our coal to produce our electricity.

Answer 4

Car wrecks due to global warming are also on the rise.

Not to mention hair cuts caused by global warming.

Global warming knows no bounds.

Answer 5

I am not surprised in the least and I will go on record in saying that global warming is somewhat manmade; maybe not directly , but indirectly.

P.S. Merry Christmas

Answer 6

Global Warming causes all weather abnormalities.

Answer 7

It's just amazing. GW can cause anything. How can that possibly be happening if the glaciers are at an all time low as far as number and size, and still be a danger. Nice try. Hey if the earth keeps getting warmer, could we be the second sun in the solar system?

Answer 8

Oh brother, and I thought it was only a joke. It is a joke that someone would actually believe it. Isostatic rebound is not spontaneous and the assumption that humans caused melting could cause it is so far into the ridiculous that the scientist that conned Congress for the funds should be put in jail for fraud.

Answer 9

How about the Skeptics read this:

Universality in solar flare and earthquake occurrence
http://arxiv.org/PS_cache/cond-mat/pdf/0602/0602208v1.pdf

"Earthquakes and solar flares are phenomena involving huge and rapid releases of energy characterized by complex temporal occurrence. By analyzing available experimental catalogs, we show
that the stochastic processes underlying these apparently different phenomena have universal properties. Namely both problems exhibit the same distributions of sizes, inter-occurrence times and
the same temporal clustering: we find afterflare sequences with power law temporal correlations as
the Omori law for seismic sequences. The observed universality suggests a common approach to the
interpretation of both phenomena in terms of the same driving physical mechanism."

Now skeptics can see the huge releases of CO2 from the real source - earth's mantel

Answer 10

Global warming is awesome.

Answer 11

I reject the very premise.

There is no way to determine which, if any earthquakes are caused by glacial action.

Glaciers are always in motion, either advancing or retreating, so what would make any earthquake caused by a glacier necessarily be associated with global warming?