The story of Greenland keeps getting greener and scarier. Greenland’s history is unfolding to reveal surprising and concerning findings. A recent study has provided compelling evidence that Greenland’s ice sheet ‘s central region, not just its edges, experienced significant melting in the recent geological past.
As a result, the now-ice-covered island was once home to a lush, green tundra landscape. Upon re-examining sediment from the bottom of a two-mile-deep ice core extracted in 1993, scientists were astounded to find well-preserved willow wood, insect parts, fungi, and even a poppy seed, painting a vivid picture of Greenland’s ancient environment. “These fossils are beautiful,” says Paul Bierman, a scientist at the University of Vermont who co-led the new study with UVM graduate student Halley Mastro and nine other researchers, “but, yes, we go from bad to worse,” in what this implies about the impact of human-caused climate change on the melting of the Greenland ice sheet.
” The recent study provides compelling evidence that Greenland’s ice melted and the island turned green during a previous warm period, likely within the last million years. This suggests that the massive ice sheet is more vulnerable than previously thought. If the center of the island’s ice melted, it is likely that most of the rest of it did too.
According to Bierman, this process would have taken many thousands of years, allowing for soil formation and the establishment of an ent.