The article, published in the journal Science on Thursday, gave a best-case scenario of half of all the 215,000 inland glaciers melting by 2100, with five out of six doomed at the extreme end of the scale.
The consequent release of between 38.7 trillion and 64.4 trillion metric tons of fresh water would see global sea levels rise by between 90 and 166 millimetres, meaning 10 million more people would find their homes by the high-tide line.
The study’s lead author David Rounce, a glaciologist and engineering professor at Carnegie Mellon University, said it was just a matter of how many glaciers would melt away — and that was mankind’s choice.
“No matter what, we’re going to lose a lot of the glaciers,” Rounce said. “But we have the ability to make a difference by limiting how many glaciers we lose.”
Rounce said the world was facing an average temperature rise of 2.7-degree Celsius since pre-industrial times, 250 years ago.
Co-author Regine Hock, a glaciologist at the University of Alaska Fairbanks and the University of Oslo in Norway, also blamed man-made climate change for the predicted deluge.
“For many small glaciers it is too late,” Hock said. “However, globally our results clearly show that every degree of global temperature matters to keep as much ice as possible locked up in the glaciers.”