VOA常速英语:南极洲冰川融化不可阻挡

Western Antarctica is melting slowly but surely. Right now, the most important thing to note is the slowly part.
西部南极洲正缓慢而确实地消融着。现在，最重要的是要注意缓慢的部分。

97% of the Antarctica peninsular is still covered by ice, so it’s not that it’s all melting, it’s all gonna go away like that.
南极半岛的97%仍然被冰覆盖着，所以并不是说一切都融化了，一切都会像那样消失。

But little by little the 30 million cubic kilometers of ice that covered Antarctica is seeping into the ocean.
但是渐渐地，覆盖着南极洲的3000万立方公里的冰正在渗入海洋。

A small amount that ice melting is enough to make a significant contribution to the water going into the ocean which makes significant contribution to sea level rise.
少量的冰川融化足以导致大量的水进入海洋，而这又进一步导致海平面上升。

NASA estimate that since 2004 Antarctica has been dripping 118 billion metric tons of ice to the ocean every year, much faster than scientists predicted.
美国宇航局估计，自2004以来，南极洲每年向海里滴下的冰达1180亿公吨，这比科学家预测的要快得多。

And one the biggest challenges globally from all of this warming, this melt is that a lot of human population lives near sea level, a lot of big cities, a lot of agricultural land, a lot of vulnerable coastline.
这是全球变暖带来的最大挑战之一，很多人口都生活在海平面附近，还有许多大城市，农业用地，变得脆弱的海岸线都是导致冰川融化的原因。

Those changes directly tie the human impacted climate change are making the continent greener, quicker.
这些变化直接来源于人类影响下的气候变化，使得南极大陆变得更温暖，融化的更快。

As we know, Antarctica has been the place that has registered the biggest increases in temperature. We’ve had approximately an increase of 3 degree in the last 50 years.
据我们所知，南极是气温上升最快的地方。在过去的50年里，大约增加了3度。

Researchers say the upshot of all this melting if we do not change things, it’s that sea levels could rise over 3 meters sometime the next 200 years.
研究人员说，如果我们还不有所改变，结果将会是，海平面会在未来200年的某个时候上升至少3米。

Kevin Enochs, VOA News.
美国之音，凯文. 伊诺克斯报道。