今日のテキスト NASA: ANTARCTICA GAINING ICE

A new NASA study challenges the theory that global warming is causing ice in Antarctica to melt. It says the continent is actually gaining ice.
NASA researchers say satellite data since 1992 show the ice cover decreasing in the west of Antarctica but increasing elsewhere, resulting in overall accumulation. They say snowfall there has been rising for 10,000 years and that the snow has been compressed into ice.
The scientists attribute rising sea levels not to the melting of Antarctic ice, but to unexpected thawing elsewhere. But they add that the rate of gain in the ice sheet has dropped in recent years. Between 1992 and 2001, the ice sheet grew by 112 billion tons a year, but that slowed to 82 billion tons between 2003 and 2008. NASA researchers suggest that Antarctic ice may start decreasing in the future.