What would happen if the ice caps all melted?

If all the ice covering Antarctica , Greenland, and in mountain glaciers around the world were to melt, sea level would rise about 70 meters (230 feet). The ocean would cover all the coastal cities. And land area would shrink significantly. Scientists are studying exactly how ice caps disappear.

Does water expand when ice melts?

When you heat ice, the molecules gain kinetic energy, and the ice expands until it melts. But once all the ice has turned to water and the temperature starts rising again, expansion stops. Between 32 and 40 degrees Fahrenheit (0 and 4 degrees Celsius), the melted water actually contracts as the temperature rises.

Why does water rise when ice melts?

Figure 2: When the freshwater ice melts, it raises the water level. Freshwater is not as dense as saltwater; so the floating ice cube displaced less volume than it contributed once it melted. When ice on land slides into the ocean, it displaces ocean water and causes sea level to rise.

What would happen if you freeze water and then turn it into ice?

So, to answer the initial question, if you froze water inside a container so strong it couldn’t turn into ice, it would still turn into ice, just a slightly different type of ice in terms of scientific classification and its internal structure. Science!

What happens to the volume of water added to melted ice?

Since mass is conserved, the mass of ice that has melted has been turned into an equivalent mass of water. The volume of such water added to the cup is thus: That is, the height the water has increased due to the melted ice is exactly the same as the height increase due to buoyancy before the ice had melted.

Why do water molecules take up more space when they freeze?

When water freezes, the molecules get themselves into the most stable configurations or positions that have the minimum amount of energy in the resulting ice crystal. It so happens that the arrangement of water molecules that best satisfies this requirement is one that takes up even more space.

Does freezing lower the water level in a tank?

8 Answers. It does, it lowers it. Frozen water takes up more space that liquid water (you’ll notice it floats -that is because there is less mass per volume). As it melts it takes less space per area thus the water level goes down.