New data released today by the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Program says that by 2010 ocean levels are expected to rise by 0.5 to 1.5 meters.

That is more than double the amount predicted in the 2007 report published the UN Inter governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

The IPCC predicted that ocean levels would rise by 18-59 centimeters in 2100. According to the Danish daily Politiken, the climate panel underlined that the estimate did not include rises caused by the disintegration of Greenland and Antarctica ice sheets.

Today's bid is that by 2100, ocean levels are expected to rise by 0.5 to 1.5 meters. It is a dramatic increase in sea level rising over the next 100 years, and it is something that upsets us all, writes Professor Dorthe Dahl-Jensen with the Niels Bohr Institute at the University of Copenhagen.

Scientists blamed global warming, which has raised temperature twice as fast in the Arctic Ocean and as elsewhere.

Polar scientists said the latest date suggest a 75 percent chance the entire polar ice cap will melt in summer within the next five to seven years.

Recent measurements show that both surface melting and iceberg discharge have increased considerably.

Climate change Earth Global warming