While there is a consensus in the scientific community that icebergs are melting and breaking away increasingly so because of climate change, and are therefore releasing CO2 into the atmosphere, the breaking away of icebergs may not be as detrimental as they were once thought of to be. In fact, these icebergs that are breaking away are helping to reduce amounts of CO2 in the air. Like CO2, minerals like iron are trapped in the icebergs, and when they break away and melt, it fertilizes the ocean, allowing for algae blooms to occur, reducing carbon emissions by 10 to 40 million tons a year, similar to the greenhouse gas emissions by Sweden and New Zealand. But without these icebergs, there will be a greater increase in carbon emissions, from 2% each year to 2.2% each year. In addition, while the effects of these melting icebergs are for a few years, it is difficult to tell if the carbon released by the melting and breaking icebergs would outweigh that extracted by the algae.
This piece of information means many things. For one, it shows how little we actually know about our planet. Secondly, it shows that there are positive feedback loops/positive negative feedback loops that could reduce the effects of climate change. While this information might detract from the push to reduce and prevent further effects of climate change, it may provide useful information about dealing with current climate change as well as provide for new information regarding the use of algae and the extraction of carbon dioxide.