Washington -- U.S. scientists say the entire ice mass of Greenland could disappear if temperatures rise by as little as 4 degrees F, with severe worldwide consequences.
Richard Alley, a geosciences professor at Pennsylvania State University, said Greenland shed its largest chunk of ice in nearly half a century last week and faces an even grimmer future, Britain's The Guardian newspaper said.
"Sometime in the next decade we may pass that tipping point which would put us warmer than temperatures that Greenland can survive," Alley told a briefing in Congress, saying a rise in the range of 4 to 12 degrees Fahrenheit would mean the obliteration of Greenland's ice sheet.