A NASA study published in the latest issue of the Journal of Glaciology found that the overall mass of the Antarctic region is gaining, instead of losing, ice. Certain regions have been shown to feature increases in ice, where the snow is accumulating faster than the glaciers are thinning.
Scientists measured the surface height of the glaciers and found that East Antarctica, as well as the interior of West Antarctica, are gaining ice. The study, led by Jay Zwally, found that the extra snowfall that has been occurring for the past 10,000 years has been slowly accumulating on the ice sheet, thickening the region by 1.7 centimetres per year.
Snow that accumulates on thin ice can push the ice downward, which allows cold ocean water to flood the snow, leading to a mixture that freezes in the cold temperate and adds to the thickness of the ice. In 2014, the National Snow and Ice Data Center found that sea ice extent exceeded 7.72 million square miles. This is the first time since 1979 that the ice extent has reached such high numbers. The overall gains of ice outweigh the losses of fast-flowing glaciers from different parts of the continent.
However, the IPCC reported that Antarctica contributes 0.27 millimeters of the rising sea level per year. This NASA study contradicts the reports of Antarctica losing ice, which means that there is some other contribution to rising sea levels that is not accounted for. This increase in ice opposes the overall trend of ice loss.