Question: what will happen when all the ice in the world melts

Gavin Coleman answered on 10 Nov 2016:

As far as we currently understand it, the water currently locked up in polar ice, or on mountains etc will flow towards the sea, causing a rise in sea levels. You may hear in documentaries about how the sea may rise several metres, and this is a big problem as a huge proportion of human civilisation lives near the water, meaning destroyed homes, businesses, livelihoods!
On top of this, the ice acts as a water storage and slow cooling for the planet’s weather. While we’re still working very hard to understand climate systems (they are incredibly complicated), we know for definite that a lack of ice will lead to chaotic effects on the weather. We can try and predict what will happen, and how each area of the earth will be affected, but in general, it’ll be very bad, to put it lightly. Watch Leonardo diCaprio’s new doc on youtube for free, it’s really informative!