NASA's former lead climate scientist James Hansen has released a new study, along with 16 co-authors, that says oceans could rise a helluva lot more than we've been led to believe - possibly ten feet in the next 50 years. The report is now undergoing peer review and other scientists are already questioning Hansen's conclusions. The study says melting in Antarctica and Greenland will occur ten times faster than predicted. The increased melting could flood the oceans with cold fresh water, which would push saltier water beneath the ice, leading to even more melting - what's called a "feedback loop."

In my novel, seas have risen fifteen feet in the year 2117. When I was writing The Shade Ring, I thought that was actually far beyond how much oceans would rise in a hundred years. But the more I read about warming oceans and accelerating melting, the more concerned I am that I might not have been as far off the mark as I thought.