The pace of glacial melting is accelerating alarmingly, and the world’s poor will be the first to suffer, but too few are naming capitalism as the cause, argues John Clarke

Switzerland and Italy are redrawing the portion of their common border that traverses the Matterhorn alpine peak because of glacial melting. This jarring development is indicative of a situation where glaciers across the world are in retreat and face complete destruction due to the impacts of global heating.

A statement by the Swiss government notes that significant ‘sections of the border are defined by the watershed or ridge lines of glaciers, firn or perpetual snow … These formations are changing due to the melting of glaciers.’ It is the impact of this process on the Zermatt ski resort that has driven the decision to modify the border, but the implications of what is taking place are considerably more serious and far-reaching than the disruption of tourism and recreation.

So dramatic is the impact of climate change that ‘Swiss glaciers lost 4% of their volume in 2023, the second-biggest annual decline on record, according to the Swiss Academy of Sciences. The largest decline was 6% in 2022.’ Moreover, experts ‘have stopped measuring the ice on some Swiss glaciers because there is none left.’ Last year, the remains of a German climber who had died crossing a glacier in the area four decades previously were suddenly exposed by the retreating ice. It is suggested that the Marmolada glacier, the largest in the area, could melt completely by 2040.

Global phenomenon

Last year, Welternährung reported that in ‘the Hindu Kush-Himalayan region, record temperatures are causing glaciers to melt.’ The previous year, spring ‘came early in the high mountains of Gilgit-Baltistan, a remote border region of Pakistan. Record temperatures in March and April hastened melting of the Shisper Glacier, creating a lake that swelled and, on May 7, burst through an ice dam. A torrent of water and debris flooded the valley below, damaging fields and houses, wrecking two power plants, and washing away parts of the main highway and a bridge connecting Pakistan and China.’

The scale of the disaster that is unfolding is clear. ‘Depending on the level of global warming, studies project that at least another third, and as much as two-thirds, of the region’s glaciers could vanish by the end of the century.’ The impacts of this melting process on people over a much wider area is also easy to discern. There will be ‘consequences for hazard risk and food and water security in a heavily populated region. A billion people rely on the Indus, Ganges, and Brahmaputra river systems, which are partly fed by snow and glacial melt from the Hindu Kush Himalaya region, known as the world’s “Third Pole” because it contains so much ice.’

In 2018, a report from the Canadian outlet, Global News, quoted David Hik, an ecology professor at Simon Fraser University, who suggested that ‘probably 80 per cent of the mountain glaciers in Alberta and B.C. will disappear in the next 50 years.’ He noted that the ‘Peyto Glacier in the Rocky Mountains and part of Banff National Park has lost about 70 per cent of its mass in the last 50 years.’ Moreover, the ‘rates of melting are similar to what is seen in the European Alps and the Andes.’

Scientific American reported in May of this year that ‘Slovenia and Venezuela are the first two countries to lose their last-standing glaciers in a period of climate change induced by people — but they won’t be the last.’ At the same time, ‘Mexico’s last glacier, Gran Norte, is expected to lose its status sometime between 2026 and 2033 and be completely gone by 2045. Its runoff has provided downstream communities with water for centuries.’

These developments constitute ‘a clear and resounding warning for the rest of Latin America. The consequences of the inevitable loss of the glaciers of Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia will have a social impact much greater than that of Venezuela, due to the dependence of much larger populations on water sources dependent on these glaciers.’

According to Iberdrola, ‘the University of Zurich revealed that glacial melting has accelerated internationally over the last three decades. This loss of ice has already reached 335 tonnes per year, which is 30% of the current rate of ocean growth.’ If the process of glacial melting is completed on a global scale, ‘the world’s glaciers contain enough ice — about 170,000 cubic kilometres — to raise sea levels by nearly half a metre.’

Glaciers cover some 10% of the planet’s land surface and contain 70% of its supply of freshwater. According to a 2021 article in CarbonBrief, a study using satellite technology that was conducted during that year showed that almost all of the 200,000 glaciers across the world are now ‘retreating at an unprecedented rate.’

At the earth’s poles, the intensifying process of global heating has led to the melting of both glaciers and sea ice on a massive scale. The World Wildlife Fund points out that today, ‘the Arctic is warming twice as fast as anywhere on earth, and the sea ice there is declining by more than 10% every 10 years. As this ice melts, darker patches of ocean start to emerge, eliminating the effect that previously cooled the poles, creating warmer air temperatures and in turn disrupting normal patterns of ocean circulation.’

Climate injustice

It isn’t hard to appreciate that vulnerability to the impacts of glacial melting is not evenly divided across the planet. It will be the poorest people, living in low-lying and densely populated areas who will experience the greatest levels of threat and hardship. Indeed, these effects are already being felt. The Royal Geographic Society points to several places that are at especially high risk, including Bangladesh, which is ‘a terribly vulnerable country, with much of its land close to sea level on the Ganges delta, where the land is naturally sinking and subsiding in any case.’

The Society notes that the coming decades are likely to produce mass migrations, as entire regions of the earth become flooded or otherwise uninhabitable. However, faced with this dreadful situation, it can only rather weakly acknowledge that it ‘is unknown where the world’s poorest people will migrate to in order to escape rising sea levels and what the consequences of this movement will be.’

This note of perplexity and helplessness pervades much of the governmental and academic commentary on glacial melting and the broader effects of climate change. There is a clear understanding of how serious the situation is and how much worse it is likely to get, but the crisis is generally attributed to a vague notion of ‘human activity’.

An article last year in CU Boulder, a publication connected to the University of Colorado Boulder, asserted that ‘we know the loss of glacier ice is deeply connected to human-caused warming. We understand the sources of that warming very well, which include burning fossil fuels, changes in land use, methane emissions and food waste.’ However, in response to the ‘human-caused’ problem, the article rather pathetically suggested that ‘talking with others about concerns and shared solutions are really important ways to move forward as we continue with the climate crisis.’

The world’s glaciers are most certainly melting at an intensifying rate and this is but one of a wide range of climate impacts that threaten all life on this planet. However, this dire situation simply can’t be explained in terms of some ill-defined ‘human activity’.

The reckless emission of carbon and other destructive activity has brought us to this point and, left unchecked, will lead to complete catastrophe. We can’t possibly challenge this process or create a society that can function on a sustainable basis unless we understand and act upon the reality that it is the profit-driven drive to accumulate, something that is fundamental to capitalism, that is generating this crisis for humanity.