Ice Volume and Sea Level During the Last Interglacial

@article{Dutton2012IceVA,
  title={Ice Volume and Sea Level During the Last Interglacial},
  author={A. Dutton and Kurt Lambeck},
  journal={Science},
  year={2012},
  volume={337},
  pages={216 - 219}
}
More Melting The last interglacial period, around 125,000 years ago, was 1° to 2°C warmer than the present, and the sea level was thought to be 4 to 6 meters higher. However, Dutton and Lambeck (p. 216), now suggest that sea level was possibly as much as 10 meters above current levels. Such a large excess of seawater would mean that the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets melted much more than previously assumed, which has implications for how much sea-level rise we should expect with… 
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420 Citations

Quantification of the Greenland ice sheet contribution to Last Interglacial sea level rise

During the Last Interglacial period ( 130-115 thousand years ago) the Arctic climate was warmer than to- day, and global mean sea level was probably more than 6.6 m higher. However, there are large…

Sea-level trends across The Bahamas constrain peak last interglacial ice melt

This work compares data and existing LIG sea-level data across the Bahamian archipelago with a suite of 576 GIA model predictions and suggests that LIG GMSL may be lower than previously assumed.

The Greenland Ice Sheet at the peak of warming during the previous Interglacial

The Last Interglacial (LIG or the Eemian) between ca. 130 and 115 kyr BP is probably the best analogue for future climate warming for which increasingly better proxy data are becoming available. The…

Ice sheets, glaciers, and sea level

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It is shown that greater subsurface warming induced by the longer period of reduced AMOC during the penultimate deglaciation can explain the more-rapid sea-level rise compared with the last degl Baciation, which contributed to excess loss from the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets during the LIG, causing global mean sea level to rise at least four metres above modern levels.

Moderate Greenland ice sheet melt during the last interglacial constrained by present-day observations and paleo ice core reconstructions

Abstract. During the last interglacial period (LIG, ~ 130–115 ka before present, ka = 1000 yr) summer temperatures over Greenland were several degrees higher than today. It is likely that the…

Lack of evidence for a substantial sea-level fluctuation within the Last Interglacial

During the Last Interglacial, global mean sea level reached approximately 6 to 9 m above the present level. This period of high sea level may have been punctuated by a fall of more than 4 m, but a…

Last Interglacial climate and sea-level evolution from a coupled ice sheet–climate model

Abstract. As the most recent warm period in Earth's history with a sea-level stand higher than present, the Last Interglacial (LIG,  ∼  130 to 115 kyr BP) is often considered a prime example to study…

Asynchronous Antarctic and Greenland ice-volume contributions to the last interglacial sea-level highstand

Data show that the Antarctic Ice Sheet dominated particularly high levels of sea-level rise during the early Last Interglacial, and a dual substructure within the first highstand suggests temporal variability in the AIS contributions.

Giant boulders and Last Interglacial storm intensity in the North Atlantic

Data and models are presented showing that, under conditions of higher sea level, historically observed hurricanes can explain geologic features previously interpreted as evidence for more intense Last Interglacial storm activity, and showing that with rising sea levels, cliffs and coastal barriers will be subject to significantly greater erosional energy, even without changes in storm intensity.
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References

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It is concluded that the high sea level during the last interglacial period most probably included a large contribution from Greenland meltwater and therefore should not be interpreted as evidence for a significant reduction of the West Antarctic ice sheet.

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