Ice Ages triggered when tropical islands and continents collide

[OKIsItJustMe]

https://news.berkeley.edu/2019/04/11/ice-ages-triggered-when-tropical-islands-and-continents-collide/

Ice Ages triggered when tropical islands and continents collide

By Robert Sanders, Media relations | April 11, 2019

University of California scientists think they know why Earth’s generally warm and balmy climate over the past billion years has occasionally been interrupted by cold snaps that enshroud the poles with ice and occasionally turn the planet into a snowball.

The key trigger, they say, is mountain formation in the tropics as continental land masses collide with volcanic island arcs, such as the Aleutian Islands chain in Alaska.

Earth’s climate is, to a large degree, driven by the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, which traps heat and warms the planet. While fossil fuel burning since the Industrial Revolution has driven CO₂ levels to heights not seen in 3 million years, CO₂ levels have been even higher in Earth’s past, coinciding with warm periods when no major ice sheets existed.

In fact, Earth’s default climate seems to be warm and balmy. Periods with no glaciers dominated for three-quarters of the past 1 billion years.

…

https://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.aav5300

[mn9driver]

1. The last time the earth had no ice sheets, it also had no humans

By the time the ice sheets disappear again in a geologic blink of an eye with no tectonic plate collisions required, there will be over 8 billion of us here, depending on a global economy of something larger than $110 trillion. This could be a problem.

Interesting article, though.