The ability to accurately quantify and predict sea level contributions from polar ice sheets is vital for UK planning. This knowledge and understanding helps inform future planning and mitigation strategies for climate changes and sea level rise in a variety of ways.

CPOM lead on ISMIP6 alongside NASA, a scientific collaboration where researchers from all over the world worked together to understand ice sheets better. ISMIP (Ice Sheet Model Intercomparison Project) helps the world to understand ice sheets, sea level rise, and their connection to climate change.

CPOM also lead on the UK development of the BISICLES Ice Sheet Model a state of the art, high performance parallel ice sheet model. It has been integrated in the UKESM (UK Earth System Model) is a partnership project across 8 NERC centres and The Met Office, which develops and uses advanced Earth Systems Models to support UK and international efforts to understand and tackle climate change, focusing on components including interactive land ice sheets.

By working in partnerships with key agencies, such as the European Space Agency, NASA and the Met Office, CPOM play an important part in producing projections of ice loss and sea level rise, that Government’s can use to inform mitigation and contingency plans so we can adapt for a changing future.