The Aug. 2 Salt Lake Tribune article “Greenland sees massive ice melt in heat wave” stated that “More than 10 billion tons (11 billion U.S. tons) of ice were lost to the oceans by surface melt on Wednesday alone, creating a net mass ice loss of some 197 billion tons (217 billion U. S. tons) from Greenland in July.”

It has also been reported, here and elsewhere, that glaciers are disappearing globally. That Earth’s total sea ice is melting (especially in the Arctic) and that ice core samples now show CO2 levels hitting 415 ppm for first time in 3 million years.

These reports may be open to honest debate, but while all the political, economic and scientific institutions have been arguing the pluses and minuses of the matter, nature has been stubbornly displaying one plainly observable and empirical fact: The only thing that can cause massive amounts of ancient ice to begin melting is a commensurately massive, and relatively recent, surplus of heat.

Steven Richard Linton, Murray

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