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Having trouble seeing the effects of Global Warming on rising sea levels? Well then…

Over the past 18,000 years of Earth’s history sea levels have risen approximately 120 meters (the length of a soccer field, or, about 394 feet)

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This chart, created by Robert A. Rohde, shows sea levels haven’t increased over the past 4,000 years, when plotted in meters (1 meter equals 39.37 inches). And, the past 100 years of Earth’s history is represented roughly by the tiny dot on the line next to the “0″ on the right side of the plot.

Let’s take a closer look at that tiny dot on the extreme right side of the plot:

According to the following chart, between 1920 and 2020 the oceans have risen approximately 2.46 millimeters per year, or about 9.68 inches over the past 100 years:

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Now, look very closely at the two photos of the Statue of Liberty and see if you can pick out a change in water level of about 10 inches. Perhaps Lady Liberty isn’t too good at science?

Credits:

• Figure “Post-Glacial Sea Level Rise” prepared by Robert A. Rohde is from published data, and is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 (CC SA 3.0)
• Figure “Global Sea Level Change, 1880-2020″ published in “Impact of Artificial Reservoir Water Impoundment on Global Sea Level“, B. F. Chao,* Y. H. Wu, Y. S. Li, DOI: 10.1126/science.1154580 (2008), Figure 4.

Thanks for Reading!