# Four Decades of Satellite Data Reveal Massive Ice Loss from Polar Regions
Between 1979 and 2023, the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets lost approximately 11,309 billion tons of ice—enough frozen water to blanket the entire continental United States with a layer five feet deep. This finding emerges from a comprehensive scientific assessment published in the journal *Scientific Data*, combining data from 27 satellite missions spanning nearly half a century.
remove this sentence By incorporating early NASA satellite data, researchers extended the observational record back to 1972 for Greenland and 1979 for Antarctica.
This has contributed approximately one inch to global sea level rise since 1979—added to other climate-related factors driving ocean height increases. According to lead author Ines Otosaka, an ice scientist at Northumbria University, every additional centimeter of sea level rise exposes 2 to 3 million more people to annual flooding events.
The data reveals that ice sheet behavior remained relatively stable through the 1970s, 1980s, and into the 1990s. Then melting accelerated dramatically, with losses intensifying particularly during the 2010s. Of the total ice lost, 84 percent resulted from glaciers flowing faster into the ocean—a dynamic process driven primarily by warmer waters eating away at ice from below and the sides. Surface melting and related processes accounted for the remaining 16 percent.
Antarctica's losses centered predominantly in West Antarctica, where the rate climbed from 29 billion tons per year in the 1980s to 163 billion tons per year in the 2010s. The Antarctic Peninsula experienced losses four times greater in the 2000s than in the 1990s. However, between 2020 and 2023, record snowfall in East Antarctica temporarily offset continued losses elsewhere, reducing Antarctica's overall rate of ice loss by more than two-thirds compared to the 2010s.
Greenland, nearly balanced in the 1970s, began losing ice in subsequent decades. Mass loss tripled from the 1990s to the 2000s, reaching 192 billion tons per year. The 2010s marked a significant shift: it became the first decade in which ice losses from reduced surface mass balance exceeded those from ice flow dynamics. Between 2020 and 2023, surface-driven losses dropped to half the 2010s level as extreme summer melt events subsided, though dynamic ice losses continued at similar rates.
All told, Greenland shed 6,215 billion tons of ice between 1972 and 2023, with 67 percent caused by increased glacier discharge and 33 percent by reduced surface mass balance. Antarctica lost 4,780 billion tons between 1979 and 2023, with all losses attributed to ice dynamics. The combined contribution has raised global sea levels by 31.4 millimeters.
The apparent slowdown from 2020 to 2023 reflects short-term weather variability rather than a reversal of long-term trends, according to study co-author Andrew Shepherd, also of Northumbria University. "The changes are tracking decades behind global warming, which means we can expect them to continue for decades more—even if we are able to stop heating the planet," Shepherd stated.
Eric Rignot, a co-author and ice scientist at the University of California, Irvine, noted that the Jakobshavn glacier in Greenland now retreats up to 164 feet daily. He emphasized that five-sixths of the total melt stems not from warmer air but from ocean-driven processes—dynamics that concern researchers because they may trigger abrupt "tipping points."
The researchers employed three distinct measurement approaches: tracking ice velocity with radar and optical sensors, measuring volume changes with radar and laser altimeters, and monitoring Earth's gravitational field variations with microwave ranging instruments. They standardized and combined these independent datasets, along with climate models assessing surface processes, to produce the consensus estimate.
Otosaka noted that while the study concluded with 2023 data, subsequent measurements indicate the accelerating trend has resumed following the brief 2020–2023 pause. The dataset provides a foundation for constraining projections of future sea level rise and tracking ongoing changes in Earth's polar regions.
**Sources:**
https://phys.org/news/2026-09-satellites-earth-lost-trillion-tons.html
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41597-026-08088-0