Proceedings of the 14 th International Conference on Environmental Science and Technology Rhodes, Greece, 3-5 September 2015 CEST2015_01430 EFFECT OF GLOBAL WARMING ON THE ICE CAP MELTING OF POLES EL-MELIGI A.A. AMA International University Bahrain, Natural Sciences and Math Dept., Kingdom of Bahrain ABSTRACT This study invistigates the effect of global warming on the ice caps melting of poles. Data about ice caps melting was collected from the professional organizations and research institutions, National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC), and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA). The data shows an increasing in the melting of the ice caps in different areas of the world. The ice glaciers of Arctic decrease by about 10 % in the past 30 years. The ice loss in Antarctica and Greenland together contributes approximately 12 % of the rise in sea levels. The thickness of the ice caps will be decreased. The potential energy of the ice cover will be converted into kinetic energy. The coastal and islands areas of the world are vulnerable to the climate change and will be affected by the ice caps melting. The sea levels could rise about 50 cm by 2100. This level seems that it is not a significant increase but this rise would cause many effects. It could fast the erosion and would increase the evacuation of the coastal areas in the world. Reducing the green house gases is a crucial need to control global warming. Based on the JAXA data, the sea ice extent in 2013 is higher than the extents of 2012, 2007, and 2011. It means that there is an improvement in the world climate by decreasing the green house gases. Keywords: Ice Caps Melting, Earth Poles, Green house Gases, Islands 1. Introduction We need to save the environment and to decrease environmental pollution. The environmental pollution impacts on the humans, animals, plants, oceans, seas, rivers, ice caps of south and north poles. The pollution increases due to increasing industrial activities. These activities increase the emission of pollutant gases or greenhouse gases, carbon dioxide, chloroflorocarbon (CFC), and other gases (Jerry, 2007). These gases increase the earth temperature. Nowadays, there is an international awareness towards this problem (Rodríguez-Camino, 2010). The United Nation (UN) has an annual summit to chase industrial countries to decrease the greenhouse gases emission. On the other hand, cars emissions, chemicals fumes, and smoke from factories are considered air pollution. The ice cap of polar is defined as a region planet, which is covered in ice. The formation of ice cap is due to two factors: high elevations of the ice cap and sun radiation are rare. South Pole forms the main ice cap on the earth, with about 90 % of the ice in the world. The ice covers Antarctica has average of 2.133 kilometers thick. Environmental pollution, mainly greenhouse gases, increases the earth temperature. The increase of temperature will affect the polar ice cap melting, especially South Pole, which form 90% of the ice in the world. The ice caps melting have melted faster in last twenty years than in the last thousands of years. As confirmed by scientists, the ice caps melting accelerate the rate of rising sea levels. Times international newspaper reported that "the ice caps are melting so fast that the world's oceans are rising more than twice as fast as they were in the 1970s (TIN, 2013)." As noticed by scientists, the sea ice skin of the Arctic Ocean shrinks. The satellites show this behavior and present important matters within the images, especially, some physical properties of the ice, such as the way of entrance of the marine water into the ice skin (Witze and Alexandra, 2010). The physical properties of the sea ice have not fully investigated. Therefore, scientists are working to study more about the physical properties of the ice cap. They would like to know more about the fate of the polar ice cap. The research of international research institutes presents that thermal water expansion has an effect on ice cap melting (Cazenave, 2010). Cazenave stated that by 2100, the Thames River in London could rise by 8 to 35 inches. The data collected by a researcher