The disappearance of glaciers accelerates and threatens global stability, alerts the UN

The disappearance of glaciers as a result of global warming is accelerating and «threats with an avalanche of consequences in economies, ecosystems and populations,» alerts the UN on the world day on glaciers, born this year to raise awareness about the thaw of masses that store, next to the poles, 70 % of the fresh water of the planet.

Since 1975 the glaciers have lost an ice mass of 9 billion tons, equivalent to a block of the size of all Germany with a thickness of 25 meters, and more than two thirds of that loss has been recorded in this century, according to recent studies.

Only in 2024, the warmest year that is recorded, 450,000 tons were melted, the fourth largest historical brand.

In relative figures, so far this century has lost 5 % of the total mass of glaciers, a percentage that in regions especially affected by the thaw as central Europe rises to 40 %.

The Alps, especially affected

«In the Alps, only in two years, 2022 and 2023, 10 % of the remained ice was melted (…) and the percentage of which is lost annually at a global level already exceeds 1 %,» at the press conference the director of the World Glacier Monitoring Service, Michael Zemp.

«This means that in the current conditions most glaciers cannot reach the end of the century in areas such as Europe, North America, the Caucasus or New Zealand,» he added.

Many countries are losing the scarce glaciers they retained: last year, for example, the last ones that were left in Venezuela and Slovenia disappeared, located in both cases in their highest mountains (the Bolívar Pico and Mount Triglav, respectively).

The United Nations General Assembly declared 2025 as the year for the conservation of glaciers, and also decided that from this exercise these icy masses would be consecrated in danger the day of March 21, coinciding with equinoctial dates in the two hemispheres that symbolize the need for natural balance.

From the high mountain to the ocean

The World Meteorological Organization (OMM) also recalls that between 2000 and 2023 the melting of glaciers has contributed to an increase of 18 millimeters at the level of the oceans, and warns that every millimeter of more exposes between 200,000 and 300,000 new people to possible floods.

The foundry of the icy masses is the second main factor of the increase in the level of the oceans, only behind the rise in temperatures in the marine waters.

«In the United Nations we can negotiate many issues, but not the physical laws, and the meter smelting point is one of them, so the increase in temperatures is bringing dramatic consequences,» summarized the director of the WMO for water and cryiosfera in a press conference, Stefan Uhlenbrook.

According to the expert, the safety in the water supply is at stake «for hundreds of millions of people in regions such as the Himalayas-Hindú Kush», in the heart of Asia, «and in an interconnected global economy, this will impact us all.»

The general secretary of the OMM, Argentina Celeste Saulo, also took advantage of the celebration of the first World Day on glaciers to call on its preservation, highlighting that «it is not only an environmental, economic and social need, but a matter of survival.»