Greenland Ice Sheet Mass Balance

Science.gov (United States)

Reeh, N.

1984-01-01

Mass balance equation for glaciers; areal distribution and ice volumes; estimates of actual mass balance; loss by calving of icebergs; hydrological budget for Greenland; and temporal variations of Greenland mass balance are examined.

Balance Velocities of the Greenland Ice Sheet

Science.gov (United States)

Joughin, Ian; Fahnestock, Mark; Ekholm, Simon; Kwok, Ron

1997-01-01

We present a map of balance velocities for the Greenland ice sheet. The resolution of the underlying DEM, which was derived primarily from radar altimetry data, yields far greater detail than earlier balance velocity estimates for Greenland. The velocity contours reveal in striking detail the location of an ice stream in northeastern Greenland, which was only recently discovered using satellite imagery. Enhanced flow associated with all of the major outlets is clearly visible, although small errors in the source data result in less accurate estimates of the absolute flow speeds. Nevertheless, the balance map is useful for ice-sheet modelling, mass balance studies, and field planning.

Revised estimates of Greenland ice sheet thinning histories based on ice-core records

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Lecavalier, B.S.; Milne, G.A.; Fisher, D.A.

2013-01-01

-based reconstructions and, to some extent, the estimated elevation histories. A key component of the ice core analysis involved removing the influence of vertical surface motion on the dO signal measured from the Agassiz and Renland ice caps. We re-visit the original analysis with the intent to determine if the use...... of more accurate land uplift curves can account for some of the above noted discrepancy. To improve on the original analysis, we apply a geophysical model of glacial isostatic adjustment calibrated to sea-level records from the Queen Elizabeth Islands and Greenland to calculate the influence of land...... in this selection is further complicated by the possible influence of Innuitian ice during the early Holocene (12-8 ka BP). Our results indicate that a more accurate treatment of the uplift correction leads to elevation histories that are, in general, shifted down relative to the original curves at GRIP, NGRIP, DYE...

Greenland and Antarctica Ice Sheet Mass Changes and Effects on Global Sea Level

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Forsberg, René; Sørensen, Louise Sandberg; Simonsen, Sebastian Bjerregaard

2017-01-01

Thirteen years of GRACE data provide an excellent picture of the current mass changes of Greenland and Antarctica, with mass loss in the GRACE period 2002–2015 amounting to 265 ± 25 GT/year for Greenland (including peripheral ice caps), and 95 ± 50 GT/year for Antarctica, corresponding to 0.......72 and 0.26 mm/year average global sea level change. A significant acceleration in mass loss rate is found, especially for Antarctica, while Greenland mass loss, after a corresponding acceleration period, and a record mass loss in the summer of 2012, has seen a slight decrease in short-term mass loss trend....... The yearly mass balance estimates, based on point mass inversion methods, have relatively large errors, both due to uncertainties in the glacial isostatic adjustment processes, especially for Antarctica, leakage from unmodelled ocean mass changes, and (for Greenland) difficulties in separating mass signals...

Balance velocities of the Greenland ice sheet

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Joughin, I.; Fahnestock, M.; Ekholm, Simon

1997-01-01

We present a map of balance velocities for the Greenland ice sheet. The resolution of the underlying DEM, which was derived primarily from radar altimetery data, yields far greater detail than earlier balance velocity estimates for Greenland. The velocity contours reveal in striking detail......, the balance map is useful for ice-sheet modelling, mass balance studies, and field planning....

Mountain glaciers vs Ice sheet in Greenland - learning from a new monitoring site in West Greenland

Science.gov (United States)

Abermann, Jakob; van As, Dirk; Wacker, Stefan; Langley, Kirsty

2017-04-01

Only 5 out of the 20.000 peripheral glaciers and ice caps surrounding Greenland are currently monitored due to logistical challenges and despite their significance for sea level rise. Large spatial coast-to-icesheet mass and energy balance gradients limit simple upscaling methods from ice-sheet observations, which builds the motivation for this study. We present results from a new mass and energy balance time series at Qasigiannguit glacier (64°09'N; 51°21'W) in Southwest Greenland. Inter-annual variability is discussed and the surface energy balance over two summers is quantified and a ranking of the main drivers performed. We find that short-wave net radiation is by far the most dominant energy source during summer, followed by similar amounts of net longwave radiation and sensible heat, respectively. We then relate these observations to synchronous measurements at similar latitude on an outlet glacier of the ice sheet a mere 100 km away. We find very pronounced horizontal surface mass balance gradients, with generally more positive values closer to the coast. We conclude that despite minor differences of atmospheric parameters (i.e. humidity, radiation, and temperature) the main reason for the strongly different signal is a pronounced winter precipitation gradient that translates in a different duration of ice exposure and through that an albedo gradient. Modelled energy balance gradients converted into mass changes show good agreement to measured surface mass balance gradients and we explore a latitudinal signal of these findings.

Greenland Radar Ice Sheet Thickness Measurements

Data.gov (United States)

National Aeronautics and Space Administration — Two 150-MHz coherent radar depth sounders were developed and flown over the Greenland ice sheet to obtain ice thickness measurements in support of PARCA...

Contrasting evidence of Holocene ice margin retreat, south-western Greenland

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Levy, L. B.; Larsen, N. K.; Davidson, T. A.

2017-01-01

Constraining the Greenland Ice Sheet's (GrIS) response to Holocene climate change provides calibrations for ice sheet models that hindcast past ice margin fluctuations. Ice sheet models predict enhanced ice retreat in south-western Greenland during the middle Holocene; however, few geological...... observations corroborating the extensive retreat are available. We present new data from lake sediment cores from the Isua region, south-western Greenland, which provide constraints on Holocene fluctuations of the GrIS margins. Our data indicate that the main GrIS margin was 30 km west of its present...

Sharply increased mass loss from glaciers and ice caps in the Canadian Arctic Archipelago.

Science.gov (United States)

Gardner, Alex S; Moholdt, Geir; Wouters, Bert; Wolken, Gabriel J; Burgess, David O; Sharp, Martin J; Cogley, J Graham; Braun, Carsten; Labine, Claude

2011-05-19

Mountain glaciers and ice caps are contributing significantly to present rates of sea level rise and will continue to do so over the next century and beyond. The Canadian Arctic Archipelago, located off the northwestern shore of Greenland, contains one-third of the global volume of land ice outside the ice sheets, but its contribution to sea-level change remains largely unknown. Here we show that the Canadian Arctic Archipelago has recently lost 61 ± 7 gigatonnes per year (Gt yr(-1)) of ice, contributing 0.17 ± 0.02 mm yr(-1) to sea-level rise. Our estimates are of regional mass changes for the ice caps and glaciers of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago referring to the years 2004 to 2009 and are based on three independent approaches: surface mass-budget modelling plus an estimate of ice discharge (SMB+D), repeat satellite laser altimetry (ICESat) and repeat satellite gravimetry (GRACE). All three approaches show consistent and large mass-loss estimates. Between the periods 2004-2006 and 2007-2009, the rate of mass loss sharply increased from 31 ± 8 Gt yr(-1) to 92 ± 12 Gt yr(-1) in direct response to warmer summer temperatures, to which rates of ice loss are highly sensitive (64 ± 14 Gt yr(-1) per 1 K increase). The duration of the study is too short to establish a long-term trend, but for 2007-2009, the increase in the rate of mass loss makes the Canadian Arctic Archipelago the single largest contributor to eustatic sea-level rise outside Greenland and Antarctica.

TopoGreenland: crustal structure in central-eastern Greenland along a new refraction profile

Science.gov (United States)

Shulgin, Alexey; Thybo, Hans; Field Team TopoGreenland

2013-04-01

We present the seismic structure in the interior of Greenland based on the first measurements by the seismic refraction/wide angle reflection method. Previous seismic surveys have only been carried out offshore and near the coast of Greenland, where the crustal structure is affected by oceanic break-up and may not be representative of the interior of the island. Acquisition of geophysical data in onshore Greenland is logistically complicated by the presence of an up to 3.4 km thick ice sheet, permanently covering most of the land mass. The seismic data was acquired by a team of six people during a two-month long experiment in summer of 2011 on the ice cap in the interior of central-eastern Greenland. The EW-trending profile extends 310 km inland from the approximate edge of the stable ice cap near Scoresby Sund across the center of the ice cap. The planned extension of the profile by use of OBSs and air gun shooting in Scoresbysund Fjord to the east coast of Greenland was unfortunately canceled, because navigation was prevented by ice drift. 350 Reftek Texan receivers recorded high-quality seismic data from 8 equidistant shots along the profile. Explosive charge sizes were 1 ton at the ends and ca. 500 kg along the profile, loaded with about 125 kg at 35-85 m depth in individual boreholes. Two-dimensional velocity model based on tomographic inversion and forward ray tracing modeling shows a decrease of crustal thickness from 47 km below the center of Greenland in the western part to 40 km in the eastern part of the profile. Earlier studies show that crustal thickness further decreases eastward to ca. 30 km below the fjord system, but details of the changes are unknown. Relatively high lower crustal velocities (Vp 6.8 - 7.3) in the western part of the TopoGreenland profile may indicate past collision tectonics or may be related or to the passage of the Iceland mantle plume. The origin of the pronounced circum-Atlantic mountain ranges in Norway and eastern Greenland

Hydrologic Outlets of the Greenland Ice Sheet

Data.gov (United States)

National Aeronautics and Space Administration — The Hydrologic Outlets of the Greenland Ice Sheet data set contains GIS point shapefiles that include 891 observed and potential hydrologic outlets of the Greenland...

Greenland Ice Sheet: High-Elevation Balance and Peripheral Thinning.

Science.gov (United States)

Krabill; Abdalati; Frederick; Manizade; Martin; Sonntag; Swift; Thomas; Wright; Yungel

2000-07-21

Aircraft laser-altimeter surveys over northern Greenland in 1994 and 1999 have been coupled with previously reported data from southern Greenland to analyze the recent mass-balance of the Greenland Ice Sheet. Above 2000 meters elevation, the ice sheet is in balance on average but has some regions of local thickening or thinning. Thinning predominates at lower elevations, with rates exceeding 1 meter per year close to the coast. Interpolation of our results between flight lines indicates a net loss of about 51 cubic kilometers of ice per year from the entire ice sheet, sufficient to raise sea level by 0.13 millimeter per year-approximately 7% of the observed rise.

Destabilization of the Northeast Greenland Ice Stream

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Korsgaard, N. J.; Khan, Shfaqat Abbas; Kjaer, K. H.

. Here, we reveal that the Northeast Greenland Ice Stream (NEGIS), which extends more than 600 km into the interior of the ice sheet, is now undergoing dynamic thinning after more than a quarter of a century of stability. This sector of the GrIS is of particular interest in sea level projections, because...... the glacier flows into a large submarine basin with a negative bed slope near the grounding line. Our findings unfold the next step in mass loss of the GrIS as we show a heightened risk of rapid sustained loss from Northeast Greenland on top of the thinning in Southeast and Northwestern Greenland....

Sea ice and pollution-modulated changes in Greenland ice core methanesulfonate and bromine

Science.gov (United States)

Maselli, Olivia J.; Chellman, Nathan J.; Grieman, Mackenzie; Layman, Lawrence; McConnell, Joseph R.; Pasteris, Daniel; Rhodes, Rachael H.; Saltzman, Eric; Sigl, Michael

2017-01-01

Reconstruction of past changes in Arctic sea ice extent may be critical for understanding its future evolution. Methanesulfonate (MSA) and bromine concentrations preserved in ice cores have both been proposed as indicators of past sea ice conditions. In this study, two ice cores from central and north-eastern Greenland were analysed at sub-annual resolution for MSA (CH3SO3H) and bromine, covering the time period 1750-2010. We examine correlations between ice core MSA and the HadISST1 ICE sea ice dataset and consult back trajectories to infer the likely source regions. A strong correlation between the low-frequency MSA and bromine records during pre-industrial times indicates that both chemical species are likely linked to processes occurring on or near sea ice in the same source regions. The positive correlation between ice core MSA and bromine persists until the mid-20th century, when the acidity of Greenland ice begins to increase markedly due to increased fossil fuel emissions. After that time, MSA levels decrease as a result of declining sea ice extent but bromine levels increase. We consider several possible explanations and ultimately suggest that increased acidity, specifically nitric acid, of snow on sea ice stimulates the release of reactive Br from sea ice, resulting in increased transport and deposition on the Greenland ice sheet.

Electrical conductivity measurements from the GISP2 and GRIP Greenland ice cores

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Dahl-Jensen, Dorthe; Clausen, Henrik Brink; Taylor, K. C.

1993-01-01

. Here we present electrical conductivity records for the Greenland Ice Sheet Project 2 (GISP2) and Greenland Ice-core Project (GRIP) ice cores, drilled 28 km apart to enable direct comparison of the results. The upper parts of both records are consistent with previous evidence from other Greenland cores...

Greenland Ice Shelves and Ice Tongues

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Reeh, Niels

2017-01-01

literature and physical properties are reviewed. There exists a difference between: (1) Floating glaciers in northern Greenland (>77°N) which experience bottom melting as their dominant ablation mechanism and calve relatively thin, but large (km-sized) tabular icebergs (‘ice islands’), and (2) Grounded...... glaciers further south (iceberg calving provides the dominant ablation mechanism. The relatively smaller iceberg discharge in northern Greenland is closely related to the occurrence of extended floating glacier sections, allowing bottom melting estimated at up to 10 m year−1 for locations...

A Synthesis of the Basal Thermal State of the Greenland Ice Sheet

Science.gov (United States)

Macgregor, J. A.; Fahnestock, M. A.; Catania, G. A.; Aschwanden, A.; Clow, G. D.; Colgan, W. T.; Gogineni, S. P.; Morlighem, M.; Nowicki, S. M. J.; Paden, J. D.;

Crustal structure of the Central-Eastern Greenland: results from the TopoGreenland refraction profile

Science.gov (United States)

Shulgin, Alexey; Thybo, Hans

2014-05-01

Until present, seismic surveys have only been carried out offshore and near the coasts of Greenland, where the crustal structure is affected by oceanic break-up. We present the deep seismic structure of the crust of the interior of Greenland, based on the new and the only existing so far seismic refraction/wide-angle reflection profile. The seismic data was acquired by a team of six people during a two-month long experiment in summer of 2011 on the ice cap in the interior of central-eastern Greenland. The presence of an up to 3.4 km thick ice sheet, permanently covering most of the land mass, made acquisition of geophysical data logistically complicated. The profile extends 310 km inland in E-W direction from the approximate edge of the stable ice cap near the Scoresby Sund across the center of the ice cap. 350 Reftek Texan receivers recorded high-quality seismic data from 8 equidistant shots along the profile. Explosive charge sizes were 1 ton at the ends and ca. 500 kg along the profile, loaded with about 125 kg at 35-85 m depth in individual boreholes. Given that the data acquisition was affected by the thick ice sheet, we questioned the quality of seismic records in such experiment setup. We have developed an automatic routine to check the amplitudes and spectra of the selected seismic phases and to check the differences/challenges in making seismic experiments on ice and the effects of ice on data interpretation. Using tomographic inversion and forward ray tracing modelling we have obtained the two-dimensional velocity model down to a 50 km depth. The model shows a decrease of crustal thickness from 47 km below the centre of Greenland in the western part of the profile to 40 km in its eastern part. Relatively high lower crustal velocities (Vp 6.8 - 7.3 km/s) in the western part of the TopoGreenland profile may result from past collision tectonics or, alternatively, may be related to the speculated passage of the Iceland mantle plume. Comparison of our results

Mountain building and the initiation of the Greenland Ice Sheet

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Solgaard, Anne Munck; Bonow, Johan; Langen, Peter Lang

2013-01-01

The effects of a new hypothesis about mountain building in Greenland on ice sheet initiation are investigated using an ice sheet model in combination with a climate model. According to this hypothesis, low-relief landscapes near sea level characterised Greenland in Miocene times until two phases...... superimposed by cold and warm excursions. The modelling results show that no ice initiates in the case of the low-lying and almost flat topography prior to the uplifts. However, the results demonstrate a significant ice sheet growth in response to the orographically induced increase in precipitation....... Under conditions that are colder than the present, the ice can overcome the Föhn effect, flow into the interior and form a coherent ice sheet. The results thus indicate that the Greenland Ice Sheet of today is a relict formed under colder conditions. The modelling results are consistent...

Eemian interglacial reconstructed from a Greenland folded ice core

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Dahl-Jensen, Dorthe; Albert, M. R.; Aldahan, A.

2013-01-01

Efforts to extract a Greenland ice core with a complete record of the Eemian interglacial (130,000 to 115,000 years ago) have until now been unsuccessful. The response of the Greenland ice sheet to the warmer-than-present climate of the Eemian has thus remained unclear. Here we present the new No...

Early Holocene climate oscillations recorded in three Greenland ice cores

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Rasmussen, Sune Olander; Vinther, Bo Møllesøe; Clausen, Henrik Brink

2007-01-01

around 9.3 ka before present, and the Preboreal Oscillation during the first centuries of the Holocene. For each of these sections, we present a d18O anomaly curve and a common accumulation signal that represents regional changes in the accumulation rate over the Greenland ice cap....... and accumulation anomalies that are common to the three cores in the Early Holocene (7.9–11.7 ka before present). Three time periods with significant and synchronous anomalies in the d18O and accumulation signals stand out: the well-known 8.2 ka event, an event of shorter duration but of almost similar amplitude...

Possible evidence for non-Newtonian gravity in the Greenland ice gap

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Ander, M.E.

1988-01-01

An Airy-type geophysical experiment was conducted down a 2 km deep hole in the Greenland ice cap in order to test for possible violations of Newton's inverse square law by making gravity measurements over a range of 213 m to 1460 m. A significant departure from Newtonian gravity was observed. This result can be explained by the existence of an attractive non-Newtonian component of gravity with a strength of about 3.4% that of Newtonian gravity at a scale of 1460 m. Unfortunately, we cannot completely, unambiguously attribute it to a breakdown of Newtonian gravity because we have shown that lateral density variations in the bedrock beneath the ice can cause such apparent departures. If such variations existed, they would have to be rather unusual but certainly no impossible. 8 refs

Algae Drive Enhanced Darkening of Bare Ice on the Greenland Ice Sheet

Science.gov (United States)

Stibal, Marek; Box, Jason E.; Cameron, Karen A.; Langen, Peter L.; Yallop, Marian L.; Mottram, Ruth H.; Khan, Alia L.; Molotch, Noah P.; Chrismas, Nathan A. M.; Calı Quaglia, Filippo; Remias, Daniel; Smeets, C. J. P. Paul; van den Broeke, Michiel R.; Ryan, Jonathan C.; Hubbard, Alun; Tranter, Martyn; van As, Dirk; Ahlstrøm, Andreas P.

2017-11-01

Surface ablation of the Greenland ice sheet is amplified by surface darkening caused by light-absorbing impurities such as mineral dust, black carbon, and pigmented microbial cells. We present the first quantitative assessment of the microbial contribution to the ice sheet surface darkening, based on field measurements of surface reflectance and concentrations of light-absorbing impurities, including pigmented algae, during the 2014 melt season in the southwestern part of the ice sheet. The impact of algae on bare ice darkening in the study area was greater than that of nonalgal impurities and yielded a net albedo reduction of 0.038 ± 0.0035 for each algal population doubling. We argue that algal growth is a crucial control of bare ice darkening, and incorporating the algal darkening effect will improve mass balance and sea level projections of the Greenland ice sheet and ice masses elsewhere.

Spaceborne measurement of Greenland ice sheet changes: the ESA Greenland CCI project

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Forsberg, René; Sørensen, Louise Sandberg; Meister, Rakia

The ESA “Greenland_ice_sheet_cci” project is currently making past and present space measurements of Greenland ice sheet changes available for use by scientists, stakeholders and the general public. The data are part of a large set of ECV’s (Essential Climate Variables) made available by the ESA...... Climate Initiative, as a contribution to the global Climate Observing System. The ECV data produced for the Greenlandice sheet include detailed grids of elevation changes and ice flow velocities, as well as line data of grounding lines and calving front locations for major outlet glaciers. The “ice_sheets......_cci” goal is to generate a consistent, validated, long-term and timely set of ECV’s, a.o. to improve the impact of satellite data on climate research and coupled ice sheet/climate models. Special focus is on use of data from ESA missions such as ERS, Envisat and the new Sentinel missions, but in the 2nd...

Improved ice loss estimate of the northwestern Greenland ice sheet

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Kjeldsen, K.K.; Khan, S.A.; van den Broeke, M.R.; van Angelen, J.H.

2013-01-01

We estimate ice volume change rates in the northwest Greenland drainage basin during 2003–2009 using Ice, Cloud and land Elevation Satellite (ICESat) laser altimeter data. Elevation changes are often reported to be largest near the frontal portion of outlet glaciers. To improve the volume change

MIS-11 duration key to disappearance of the Greenland ice sheet

Science.gov (United States)

Robinson, Alexander; Alvarez-Solas, Jorge; Calov, Reinhard; Ganopolski, Andrey; Montoya, Marisa

2017-07-01

Palaeo data suggest that Greenland must have been largely ice free during Marine Isotope Stage 11 (MIS-11). However, regional summer insolation anomalies were modest during this time compared to MIS-5e, when the Greenland ice sheet likely lost less volume. Thus it remains unclear how such conditions led to an almost complete disappearance of the ice sheet. Here we use transient climate-ice sheet simulations to simultaneously constrain estimates of regional temperature anomalies and Greenland's contribution to the MIS-11 sea-level highstand. We find that Greenland contributed 6.1 m (3.9-7.0 m, 95% credible interval) to sea level, ~7 kyr after the peak in regional summer temperature anomalies of 2.8 °C (2.1-3.4 °C). The moderate warming produced a mean rate of mass loss in sea-level equivalent of only around 0.4 m per kyr, which means the long duration of MIS-11 interglacial conditions around Greenland was a necessary condition for the ice sheet to disappear almost completely.

Greenland Ice sheet mass balance from satellite and airborne altimetry

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Khan, Shfaqat Abbas; Bevis, M. G.; Wahr, J. M.

Ice loss from the Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS) is dominated by loss in the marginal areas. Dynamic induced ice loss and its associated ice surface lowering is often largest close to the glacier calving front and may vary from rates of tens of meters per years to a few meters per year over relatively...... short distances. Hence, high spatial resolution data are required to accurately estimate volume changes. Here, we estimate ice volume change rate of the Greenland ice sheet using data from Ice, Cloud and land Elevation Satellite (ICESat) laser altimeter during 2003-2009 and CryoSat-2 data during 2010...

Self-inhibiting growth of the Greenland Ice Sheet

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Langen, Peter Lang; Solgaard, Anne Munck; Hvidberg, Christine Schøtt

2012-01-01

The build-up of the Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS) from ice-free conditions is studied in an ice sheet model (ISM) driven by fields from an atmospheric general circulation model (GCM) to demonstrate the importance of coupling between the two components. Experiments where the two are coupled off-line...... are augmented by one where an intermediate ice sheet configuration is coupled back to the GCM. Forcing the ISM with GCM fields corresponding to the ice-free state leads to extensive regrowth which, however, is halted when the intermediate recoupling step is included. This inhibition of further growth is due...... to a Föhn effect of moist air parcels being lifted over the intermediate ice sheet and arriving in the low-lying Greenland interior with high temperatures. This demonstrates that two-way coupling between the atmosphere and the ice sheet is essential for understanding the dynamics and that large scale...

A novel multispectral glacier mapping method and its performance in Greenland

Science.gov (United States)

Citterio, M.; Fausto, R. S.; Ahlstrom, A. P.; Andersen, S. B.

2014-12-01

Multispectral land surface classification methods are widely used for mapping glacier outlines. Significant post-classification manual editing is typically required, and mapping glacier outlines over larger regions remains a rather labour intensive task. In this contribution we introduce a novel method for mapping glacier outlines from multispectral satellite imagery, requiring only minor manual editing.Over the last decade GLIMS (Global Land Ice Measurements from Space) improved the availability of glacier outlines, and in 2012 the Randolph Glacier Inventory (RGI) attained global coverage by compiling existing and new data sources in the wake of the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC AR5). With the launch of Landsat 8 in 2013 and the upcoming ESA (European Space Agency) Sentinel 2 missions, the availability of multispectral imagery may grow faster than our ability to process it into timely and reliable glacier outline products. Improved automatic classification methods would enable a full exploitation of these new data sources.We outline the theoretical basis of the proposed classification algorithm, provide a step by step walk-through from raw imagery to finished ice cover grids and vector glacier outlines, and evaluate the performance of the new method in mapping the outlines of glaciers, ice caps and the Greenland Ice Sheet from Landsat 8 OLI imagery. The classification output is compared against manually digitized ice margin positions, the RGI vectors, and the PROMICE (Programme for Monitoring of the Greenland Ice Sheet) aerophotogrammetric map of Greenland ice masses over a sector of the Disko Island surge cluster in West Greenland, the Qassimiut ice sheet lobe in South Greenland, and the A.P. Olsen ice cap in NE Greenland.

Devon island ice cap: core stratigraphy and paleoclimate.

Science.gov (United States)

Koerner, R M

1977-04-01

Valuable paleoclimatic information can be gained by studying the distribution of melt layers in deep ice cores. A profile representing the percentage of ice in melt layers in a core drilled from the Devon Island ice cap plotted against both time and depth shows that the ice cap has experienced a period of very warm summers since 1925, following a period of colder summers between about 1600 and 1925. The earlier period was coldest between 1680 and 1730. There is a high correlation between the melt-layer ice percentage and the mass balance of the ice cap. The relation between them suggests that the ice cap mass balance was zero (accumulation equaled ablation) during the colder period but is negative in the present warmer one. There is no firm evidence of a present cooling trend in the summer conditions on the ice cap. A comparison with the melt-layer ice percentage in cores from the other major Canadian Arctic ice caps shows that the variation of summer conditions found for the Devon Island ice cap is representative for all the large ice caps for about 90 percent of the time. There is also a good correlation between melt-layer percentage and summer sea-ice conditions in the archipelago. This suggests that the search for the northwest passage was influenced by changing climate, with the 19th-century peak of the often tragic exploration coinciding with a period of very cold summers.

How much can Greenland melt? An upper bound on mass loss from the Greenland Ice Sheet through surface melting

Science.gov (United States)

Liu, X.; Bassis, J. N.

2015-12-01

With observations showing accelerated mass loss from the Greenland Ice Sheet due to surface melt, the Greenland Ice Sheet is becoming one of the most significant contributors to sea level rise. The contribution of the Greenland Ice Sheet o sea level rise is likely to accelerate in the coming decade and centuries as atmospheric temperatures continue to rise, potentially triggering ever larger surface melt rates. However, at present considerable uncertainty remains in projecting the contribution to sea level of the Greenland Ice Sheet both due to uncertainty in atmospheric forcing and the ice sheet response to climate forcing. Here we seek an upper bound on the contribution of surface melt from the Greenland to sea level rise in the coming century using a surface energy balance model coupled to an englacial model. We use IPCC Representative Concentration Pathways (RCP8.5, RCP6, RCP4.5, RCP2.6) climate scenarios from an ensemble of global climate models in our simulations to project the maximum rate of ice volume loss and related sea-level rise associated with surface melting. To estimate the upper bound, we assume the Greenland Ice Sheet is perpetually covered in thick clouds, which maximize longwave radiation to the ice sheet. We further assume that deposition of black carbon darkens the ice substantially turning it nearly black, substantially reducing its albedo. Although assuming that all melt water not stored in the snow/firn is instantaneously transported off the ice sheet increases mass loss in the short term, refreezing of retained water warms the ice and may lead to more melt in the long term. Hence we examine both assumptions and use the scenario that leads to the most surface melt by 2100. Preliminary models results suggest that under the most aggressive climate forcing, surface melt from the Greenland Ice Sheet contributes ~1 m to sea level by the year 2100. This is a significant contribution and ignores dynamic effects. We also examined a lower bound

Hydrologic Outlets of the Greenland Ice Sheet, Version 1

Data.gov (United States)

National Aeronautics and Space Administration — The Hydrologic Outlets of the Greenland Ice Sheet data set contains GIS point shapefiles that include 891 observed and potential hydrologic outlets of the Greenland...

The extreme melt across the Greenland ice sheet in 2012

Science.gov (United States)

Nghiem, S. V.; Hall, D. K.; Mote, T. L.; Tedesco, M.; Albert, M. R.; Keegan, K.; Shuman, C. A.; DiGirolamo, N. E.; Neumann, G.

2012-10-01

The discovery of the 2012 extreme melt event across almost the entire surface of the Greenland ice sheet is presented. Data from three different satellite sensors - including the Oceansat-2 scatterometer, the Moderate-resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer, and the Special Sensor Microwave Imager/Sounder - are combined to obtain composite melt maps, representing the most complete melt conditions detectable across the ice sheet. Satellite observations reveal that melt occurred at or near the surface of the Greenland ice sheet across 98.6% of its entire extent on 12 July 2012, including the usually cold polar areas at high altitudes like Summit in the dry snow facies of the ice sheet. This melt event coincided with an anomalous ridge of warm air that became stagnant over Greenland. As seen in melt occurrences from multiple ice core records at Summit reported in the published literature, such a melt event is rare with the last significant one occurring in 1889 and the next previous one around seven centuries earlier in the Medieval Warm Period. Given its rarity, the 2012 extreme melt across Greenland provides an exceptional opportunity for new studies in broad interdisciplinary geophysical research.

Interannual Variability of the Sea-Ice-Induced Salt Flux in the Greenland Sea

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Pedersen, Leif Toudal; Coon, M.D.

2001-01-01

The Greenland Sea is one of the few places in the World Ocean where deep convection takes place. The convection process is initiated by a density increase originating from rapid cooling and/or a salt flux to the upper layer of the ocean due to brine rejection from ice formation (Rudels, 1990......; Visbeck and others, 1995). The predominant ice types in the Greenland Sea arc frazil/grease ice and pancake ice. A numerical model has been developed relating ice formation and decay of these ice types as observed by the SMMR and SSM/I microwave radiometers and evaluating their contribution to salt...... redistribution in the Greenland Sea. The model has been used to calculate spatial distribution of the annual integrated net salt flux to the Greenland Sea from ice production and advection for the period 1979-97....

An ice flow modeling perspective on bedrock adjustment patterns of the Greenland ice sheet

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

M. Olaizola

2012-11-01

Full Text Available Since the launch in 2002 of the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE satellites, several estimates of the mass balance of the Greenland ice sheet (GrIS have been produced. To obtain ice mass changes, the GRACE data need to be corrected for the effect of deformation changes of the Earth's crust. Recently, a new method has been proposed where ice mass changes and bedrock changes are simultaneously solved. Results show bedrock subsidence over almost the entirety of Greenland in combination with ice mass loss which is only half of the currently standing estimates. This subsidence can be an elastic response, but it may however also be a delayed response to past changes. In this study we test whether these subsidence patterns are consistent with ice dynamical modeling results. We use a 3-D ice sheet–bedrock model with a surface mass balance forcing based on a mass balance gradient approach to study the pattern and magnitude of bedrock changes in Greenland. Different mass balance forcings are used. Simulations since the Last Glacial Maximum yield a bedrock delay with respect to the mass balance forcing of nearly 3000 yr and an average uplift at present of 0.3 mm yr⁻¹. The spatial pattern of bedrock changes shows a small central subsidence as well as more intense uplift in the south. These results are not compatible with the gravity based reconstructions showing a subsidence with a maximum in central Greenland, thereby questioning whether the claim of halving of the ice mass change is justified.

Towards an assessment of the balance state of the Greenland Ice Sheet

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Boeggild, C.E.; Mayer, C.; Podlech, S.; Taurisano, A.; Nielsen, S.

2004-07-01

The climate of Europe is strongly influenced by heat transport by ocean currents flowing from equatorial regions towards the Arctic. During recent years, research has been increasingly focused on factors affecting this circulation, e.g. the freshwater budget of the Arctic that is influenced by glacial melt water from north and East Greenland outlet glaciers. Furthermore, the climate is affected by snow cover, which, apart from its contribution to the freshwater budget, provides feedback effects in that it reflects most of the solar radiation. Apart from Arctic sea-ice cover, the Greenland Ice Sheet is the largest permanent ice- and snow-covered area in the northern hemisphere, with an area of 1.67 x 10{sup 6} km{sup 2} and by far the largest storage of ice with a volume of 2.93 x 10{sup 6} km{sup 3}. Most of the mass loss from the Greenland Ice Sheet occurs in the marginal region of the ice sheet, which is also the area where the largest changes in albedo occur. The Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland (GEUS) has for many years carried out research along the Greenland Ice Sheet margin to monitor changes of mass balance and melt conditions. (BA)

Ice age plant refugia in East Greenland

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Funder, Svend Visby

1979-01-01

From the distribution of plants it has been inferred by some botanists that ice-free areas existed in East Greenland accommodating a flora which survived one or several ice ages in the area. Comparing this evidence with recent information on the chronology of glaciations and post-glacial vegetation...

Albedo decline on Greenland's Mittivakkat Gletscher in a warming climate

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Mernild, Sebastian H; Malmros, Jeppe K.; Yde, Jacob Clement

2015-01-01

Albedo is one of the parameters that govern energy availability for snow and ice surface ablation, and subsequently the surface mass balance conditions of temperate glaciers and ice caps (GIC). Here, we document snow and ice albedo changes for Mittivakkat Gletscher (MG) in Southeast Greenland (20...

Spatiotemporal Variability of Meltwater Refreezing in Southwest Greenland Ice Sheet Firn

Science.gov (United States)

Rennermalm, A. K.; Hock, R.; Tedesco, M.; Corti, G.; Covi, F.; Miège, C.; Kingslake, J.; Leidman, S. Z.; Munsell, S.

2017-12-01

A substantial fraction of the summer meltwater formed on the surface of the Greenland ice sheet is retained in firn, while the remaining portion runs to the ocean through surface and subsurface channels. Refreezing of meltwater in firn can create impenetrable ice lenses, hence being a crucial process in the redistribution of surface runoff. To quantify the impact of refreezing on runoff and current and future Greenland surface mass balance, a three year National Science Foundation funded project titled "Refreezing in the firn of the Greenland ice sheet: Spatiotemporal variability and implications for ice sheet mass balance" started this past year. Here we present an overview of the project and some initial results from the first field season in May 2017 conducted in proximity of the DYE-2 site in the percolation zone of the Southwest Greenland ice sheet at elevations between 1963 and 2355 m a.s.l.. During this fieldwork two automatic weather stations were deployed, outfitted with surface energy balance sensors and 16 m long thermistor strings, over 300 km of ground penetrating radar data were collected, and five 20-26 m deep firn cores were extracted and analyzed for density and stratigraphy. Winter snow accumulation was measured along the radar tracks. Preliminary work on the firn-core data reveals increasing frequency and thickness of ice lenses at lower ice-sheet elevations, in agreement with other recent work in the area. Data collected within this project will facilitate advances in our understanding of the spatiotemporal variability of firn refreezing and its role in the hydrology and surface mass balance of the Greenland Ice Sheet.

Ice flow Modelling of the Greenland Ice Sheet

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Nielsen, Lisbeth Tangaa

Models of ice flow have a range of application in glaciology, including investigating the large-scale response of ice sheets to changes in climate, assimilating data to estimate unknown conditions beneath the ice sheet, and in interpreting proxy records obtained from ice cores, among others. In t...... a steady state with respect to the reference climate at the end of the simulation and that the mass balance of the ice sheet at this time was more sensitive to recent climate fluctuations than the temperature forcing in the early or mid-Holocene.......Models of ice flow have a range of application in glaciology, including investigating the large-scale response of ice sheets to changes in climate, assimilating data to estimate unknown conditions beneath the ice sheet, and in interpreting proxy records obtained from ice cores, among others....... In this PhD project, the use of ice flow models for the interpretation of the age-structure of the Greenland ice sheet, i.e. the depth within the ice, at which ice deposited at given times are found at present day. Two different observational data sets of this archive were investigated. Further, paleo...

Greenland ice sheet mass balance: a review

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Khan, Shfaqat Abbas; Aschwanden, Andy; Bjørk, Anders A.

2015-01-01

Over the past quarter of a century the Arctic has warmed more than any other region on Earth, causing a profound impact on the Greenland ice sheet (GrIS) and its contribution to the rise in global sea level. The loss of ice can be partitioned into processes related to surface mass balance...

Clouds enhance Greenland ice sheet mass loss

Science.gov (United States)

Van Tricht, Kristof; Gorodetskaya, Irina V.; L'Ecuyer, Tristan; Lenaerts, Jan T. M.; Lhermitte, Stef; Noel, Brice; Turner, David D.; van den Broeke, Michiel R.; van Lipzig, Nicole P. M.

2015-04-01

Clouds have a profound influence on both the Arctic and global climate, while they still represent one of the key uncertainties in climate models, limiting the fidelity of future climate projections. The potentially important role of thin liquid-containing clouds over Greenland in enhancing ice sheet melt has recently gained interest, yet current research is spatially and temporally limited, focusing on particular events, and their large scale impact on the surface mass balance remains unknown. We used a combination of satellite remote sensing (CloudSat - CALIPSO), ground-based observations and climate model (RACMO) data to show that liquid-containing clouds warm the Greenland ice sheet 94% of the time. High surface reflectivity (albedo) for shortwave radiation reduces the cloud shortwave cooling effect on the absorbed fluxes, while not influencing the absorption of longwave radiation. Cloud warming over the ice sheet therefore dominates year-round. Only when albedo values drop below ~0.6 in the coastal areas during summer, the cooling effect starts to overcome the warming effect. The year-round excess of energy due to the presence of liquid-containing clouds has an extensive influence on the mass balance of the ice sheet. Simulations using the SNOWPACK snow model showed not only a strong influence of these liquid-containing clouds on melt increase, but also on the increased sublimation mass loss. Simulations with the Community Earth System Climate Model for the end of the 21st century (2080-2099) show that Greenland clouds contain more liquid water path and less ice water path. This implies that cloud radiative forcing will be further enhanced in the future. Our results therefore urge the need for improving cloud microphysics in climate models, to improve future projections of ice sheet mass balance and global sea level rise.

Little Ice Age Fluctuations of Quelccaya Ice Cap, Peru

Science.gov (United States)

Stroup, J. S.; Kelly, M. A.; Lowell, T.

2009-12-01

A record of the past extents of Quelccaya Ice Cap (QIC) provides valuable information about tropical climate change from late glacial to recent time. Here, we examine the timing and regional significance of fluctuations of QIC during the Little Ice Age (LIA; ~1300-1850 AD). One prominent set of moraines, known as the Huancane I moraines, is located ~1 km from the present-day western ice cap margin and provides a near-continuous outline of the most recent advance of QIC. This moraine set was radiocarbon dated (~298 ± 134 and 831 ± 87 yr BP) by Mercer and Palacios (1977) and presented as some of the first evidence for cooling in the tropics during the Little Ice Age. Recent field investigations in the QIC region focused on refining the chronology of the Huancane I moraines. In 2008, new stratigraphic sections exposed by local lake-flooding events revealed multiple layers of peat within the Huancane I moraines. In both 2008 and 2009, samples were obtained for 10Be dating of boulders on Huancane I moraines. A combination of radiocarbon and 10Be ages indicate that the Huancane I moraines were deposited by ice cap expansion after ~3800 yr BP and likely by multiple advances at approximately 1000, 600, 400, and 200 yr BP. Radiocarbon and 10Be chronologies of the Huancane I moraines are compared with the Quelccaya ice core records (Thompson et al., 1985; 1986; 2006). Accumulation data from the ice core records are interpreted to indicate a significant wet period at ~1500-1700 AD followed by a significant drought at ~1720-1860 AD. We examine ice marginal fluctuations during these times to determine influence of such events on the ice cap extent.

Elastic uplift in southeast Greenland due to rapid ice mass loss

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Khan, Shfaqat Abbas; Van dam, Tonie; Hamilton, Gordon S.

2007-01-01

The rapid unloading of ice from the southeastern sector of the Greenland ice sheet between 2001 and 2006 caused an elastic uplift of 35 mm at a GPS site in Kulusuk. Most of the uplift results from ice dynamic-induced volume losses on two nearby outlet glaciers. Volume loss from Helheim Glacier...... between 62N and 66N. Citation: Khan, S. A., J. Wahr, L. A. Stearns, G. S. Hamilton, T. van Dam, K. M. Larson, and O. Francis (2007), Elastic uplift in southeast Greenland due to rapid ice mass loss....

Movements of female polar bears (Usrus maritimus) in the East Greenland pack ice

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Wiig, Øystein; Born, Erik W.; Pedersen, Leif Toudal

2003-01-01

The movements of two adult female polar bears (Ursus maritimus) in East Greenland and the Greenland Sea area were studied by use of satellite telemetry between the fall of 1994 and the summer of 1998. One female was tracked for 621 days, the other for 1,415 days. During this time the females used...... for a closer monitoring of the effects of this change on the East Greenland polar bear population....... movement rates varied between 0.32 and 0.76km/h. Both bears had very large home ranges (242,000 and 468,000 km(2)) within the dynamic pack ice of the Greenland Sea. The facts that the bears made extensive use of the offshore sea ice and that there is a marked reduction of the Greenland Sea ice call...

Estimating the future ice sheet hydropower potential in Paakitsoq, Ilulissat, West Greenland

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Ahlstrøm, Andreas P.; Mottram, R.H.; Nielsen, C.

2008-01-01

sheet has emphasized the risk of sudden changes in catchment supply. In this study, we present a thorough investigation of hydropower feasibility at the Paakitsoq basin, near Ilulissat in West Greenland. The catchment is completely dominated by the Greenland ice sheet which provides large quantities...... of meltwater during the summer season. However, geometrical changes in the ice sheet, for example due to a retreat or an advance of the ice sheet margin, could change the hydrological catchment within the ice sheet. Such a change would have a devastating economical impact as a hydropower plant is a significant...... long-term investment for an Arctic community of modest population. Here we present a new bedrock and surface map of the Paakitsoq/Swiss Camp part of the Greenland ice sheet and a prediction of the future discharge up to 2080 AD using regional climate model output, dynamic ice sheet modelling...

Greenland coastal air temperatures linked to Baffin Bay and Greenland Sea ice conditions during autumn through regional blocking patterns

Science.gov (United States)

Ballinger, Thomas J.; Hanna, Edward; Hall, Richard J.; Miller, Jeffrey; Ribergaard, Mads H.; Høyer, Jacob L.

2018-01-01

Variations in sea ice freeze onset and regional sea surface temperatures (SSTs) in Baffin Bay and Greenland Sea are linked to autumn surface air temperatures (SATs) around coastal Greenland through 500 hPa blocking patterns, 1979-2014. We find strong, statistically significant correlations between Baffin Bay freeze onset and SSTs and SATs across the western and southernmost coastal areas, while weaker and fewer significant correlations are found between eastern SATs, SSTs, and freeze periods observed in the neighboring Greenland Sea. Autumn Greenland Blocking Index values and the incidence of meridional circulation patterns have increased over the modern sea ice monitoring era. Increased anticyclonic blocking patterns promote poleward transport of warm air from lower latitudes and local warm air advection onshore from ocean-atmosphere sensible heat exchange through ice-free or thin ice-covered seas bordering the coastal stations. Temperature composites by years of extreme late freeze conditions, occurring since 2006 in Baffin Bay, reveal positive monthly SAT departures that often exceed 1 standard deviation from the 1981-2010 climate normal over coastal areas that exhibit a similar spatial pattern as the peak correlations.

Sustained mass loss of the northeast Greenland ice sheet triggered by regional warming

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Khan, Shfaqat Abbas; Kjaer, Kurt H.; Bevis, Michael

2014-01-01

The Greenland ice sheet has been one of the largest contributors to global sea-level rise over the past 20 years, accounting for 0.5 mm yr(-1) of a total of 3.2 mm yr(-1). A significant portion of this contribution is associated with the speed-up of an increased number of glaciers in southeast...... and northwest Greenland. Here, we show that the northeast Greenland ice stream, which extends more than 600 km into the interior of the ice sheet, is now undergoing sustained dynamic thinning, linked to regional warming, after more than a quarter of a century of stability. This sector of the Greenland ice sheet...... is of particular interest, because the drainage basin area covers 16% of the ice sheet (twice that of Jakobshavn Isbrae) and numerical model predictions suggest no significant mass loss for this sector, leading to an under-estimation of future global sea-level rise. The geometry of the bedrock and monotonic trend...

Greenland Ice Sheet Surface Temperature, Melt, and Mass Loss: 2000-2006

Science.gov (United States)

Hall, Dorothy K.; Williams, Richard S., Jr.; Luthcke, Scott B.; DiGirolamo, Nocolo

2007-01-01

Extensive melt on the Greenland Ice Sheet has been documented by a variety of ground and satellite measurements in recent years. If the well-documented warming continues in the Arctic, melting of the Greenland Ice Sheet will likely accelerate, contributing to sea-level rise. Modeling studies indicate that an annual or summer temperature rise of 1 C on the ice sheet will increase melt by 20-50% therefore, surface temperature is one of the most important ice-sheet parameters to study for analysis of changes in the mass balance of the ice-sheet. The Greenland Ice Sheet contains enough water to produce a rise in eustatic sea level of up to 7.0 m if the ice were to melt completely. However, even small changes (centimeters) in sea level would cause important economic and societal consequences in the world's major coastal cities thus it is extremely important to monitor changes in the ice-sheet surface temperature and to ultimately quantify these changes in terms of amount of sea-level rise. We have compiled a high-resolution, daily time series of surface temperature of the Greenland Ice Sheet, using the I-km resolution, clear-sky land-surface temperature (LST) standard product from the Moderate-Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS), from 2000 - 2006. We also use Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) data, averaged over 10-day periods, to measure change in mass of the ice sheet as it melt and snow accumulates. Surface temperature can be used to determine frequency of surface melt, timing of the start and the end of the melt season, and duration of melt. In conjunction with GRACE data, it can also be used to analyze timing of ice-sheet mass loss and gain.

Greenland ice core evidence for spatial and temporal variability of the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Chylek, P.; Folland, C.K.; Frankcombe, L.M.; Dijkstra, H.A.; Lesins, G.; Dubey, M.

2012-01-01

[1] The Greenland δ18O ice core record is used as a proxy for Greenland surface air temperatures and to interpret Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO) variability. An analysis of annual δ18O data from six Arctic ice cores (five from Greenland and one from Canada's Ellesmere Island) suggests a

The effect of signal leakage and glacial isostatic rebound on GRACE-derived ice mass changes in Iceland

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Sørensen, Louise Sandberg; Jarosch, Alexander H.; Adalgeirsdottir, Gudfinna

2017-01-01

Monthly gravity field models from the GRACE satellite mission are widely used to determine ice mass changes of large ice sheets as well as smaller glaciers and ice caps. Here, we investigate in detail the ice mass changes of the Icelandic ice caps as derived from GRACE data. The small size...... of the Icelandic ice caps, their location close to other rapidly changing ice covered areas and the low viscosity of the mantle below Iceland make this especially challenging. The mass balance of the ice caps is well constrained by field mass balance measurements, making this area ideal for such investigations. We...... the Little Ice Age (∼ 1890 AD). To minimize the signal that leaks towards Iceland from Greenland, we employ an independent mass change estimate of the Greenland Ice Sheet derived from satellite laser altimetry. We also estimate the effect of post Little Ice Age glacial isostatic adjustment, from knowledge...

Radiation Climatology of the Greenland Ice Sheet Derived from Greenland Climate Network Data

Science.gov (United States)

Steffen, Konrad; Box, Jason

2003-01-01

The magnitude of shortwave and longwave dative fluxes are critical to surface energy balance variations over the Greenland ice sheet, affecting many aspects of its climate, including melt rates, the nature of low-level temperature inversions, the katabatic wind regime and buoyant stability of the atmosphere. Nevertheless, reliable measurements of the radiative fluxes over the ice sheet are few in number, and have been of limited duration and areal distribution (e.g. Ambach, 1960; 1963, Konzelmann et al., 1994, Harding et al., 1995, Van den Broeke, 1996). Hourly GC-Net radiation flux measurements spanning 1995-2001 period have been used to produce a monthly dataset of surface radiation balance components. The measurements are distributed widely across Greenland and incorporate multiple sensors

An ice sheet model validation framework for the Greenland ice sheet

Science.gov (United States)

Price, Stephen F.; Hoffman, Matthew J.; Bonin, Jennifer A.; Howat, Ian M.; Neumann, Thomas; Saba, Jack; Tezaur, Irina; Guerber, Jeffrey; Chambers, Don P.; Evans, Katherine J.; Kennedy, Joseph H.; Lenaerts, Jan; Lipscomb, William H.; Perego, Mauro; Salinger, Andrew G.; Tuminaro, Raymond S.; van den Broeke, Michiel R.; Nowicki, Sophie M. J.

2017-01-01

We propose a new ice sheet model validation framework - the Cryospheric Model Comparison Tool (CmCt) - that takes advantage of ice sheet altimetry and gravimetry observations collected over the past several decades and is applied here to modeling of the Greenland ice sheet. We use realistic simulations performed with the Community Ice Sheet Model (CISM) along with two idealized, non-dynamic models to demonstrate the framework and its use. Dynamic simulations with CISM are forced from 1991 to 2013, using combinations of reanalysis-based surface mass balance and observations of outlet glacier flux change. We propose and demonstrate qualitative and quantitative metrics for use in evaluating the different model simulations against the observations. We find that the altimetry observations used here are largely ambiguous in terms of their ability to distinguish one simulation from another. Based on basin-scale and whole-ice-sheet-scale metrics, we find that simulations using both idealized conceptual models and dynamic, numerical models provide an equally reasonable representation of the ice sheet surface (mean elevation differences of framework demonstrates that our proposed metrics can distinguish relatively better from relatively worse simulations and that dynamic ice sheet models, when appropriately initialized and forced with the right boundary conditions, demonstrate a predictive skill with respect to observed dynamic changes that have occurred on Greenland over the past few decades. An extensible design will allow for continued use of the CmCt as future altimetry, gravimetry, and other remotely sensed data become available for use in ice sheet model validation.

Seasonal ice dynamics of the Northeast Greenland Ice Stream

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Vijay, Saurabh; Khan, Shfaqat Abbas; Simonsen, Sebastian Bjerregaard

2018-01-01

and temporal details. This study focus on the Northeast Greenland Ice Stream (NEGIS), which consists of three main outlets, 79 North glacier (79N), Zachariae Isstrøm (ZI) and Storstrømmen Glacier (SG). While both 79 North and Storstrømmen have floating tongues, Zachariae Isstrøm is mostly grounded...

Surface Energy and Mass Balance Model for Greenland Ice Sheet and Future Projections

Science.gov (United States)

Liu, Xiaojian

The Greenland Ice Sheet contains nearly 3 million cubic kilometers of glacial ice. If the entire ice sheet completely melted, sea level would raise by nearly 7 meters. There is thus considerable interest in monitoring the mass balance of the Greenland Ice Sheet. Each year, the ice sheet gains ice from snowfall and loses ice through iceberg calving and surface melting. In this thesis, we develop, validate and apply a physics based numerical model to estimate current and future surface mass balance of the Greenland Ice Sheet. The numerical model consists of a coupled surface energy balance and englacial model that is simple enough that it can be used for long time scale model runs, but unlike previous empirical parameterizations, has a physical basis. The surface energy balance model predicts ice sheet surface temperature and melt production. The englacial model predicts the evolution of temperature and meltwater within the ice sheet. These two models can be combined with estimates of precipitation (snowfall) to estimate the mass balance over the Greenland Ice Sheet. We first compare model performance with in-situ observations to demonstrate that the model works well. We next evaluate how predictions are degraded when we statistically downscale global climate data. We find that a simple, nearest neighbor interpolation scheme with a lapse rate correction is able to adequately reproduce melt patterns on the Greenland Ice Sheet. These results are comparable to those obtained using empirical Positive Degree Day (PDD) methods. Having validated the model, we next drove the ice sheet model using the suite of atmospheric model runs available through the CMIP5 atmospheric model inter-comparison, which in turn built upon the RCP 8.5 (business as usual) scenarios. From this exercise we predict how much surface melt production will increase in the coming century. This results in 4-10 cm sea level equivalent, depending on the CMIP5 models. Finally, we try to bound melt water

Meltwater storage in low-density near-surface bare ice in the Greenland ice sheet ablation zone

Science.gov (United States)

Cooper, Matthew G.; Smith, Laurence C.; Rennermalm, Asa K.; Miège, Clément; Pitcher, Lincoln H.; Ryan, Jonathan C.; Yang, Kang; Cooley, Sarah W.

2018-03-01

We document the density and hydrologic properties of bare, ablating ice in a mid-elevation (1215 m a.s.l.) supraglacial internally drained catchment in the Kangerlussuaq sector of the western Greenland ice sheet. We find low-density (0.43-0.91 g cm-3, μ = 0.69 g cm-3) ice to at least 1.1 m depth below the ice sheet surface. This near-surface, low-density ice consists of alternating layers of water-saturated, porous ice and clear solid ice lenses, overlain by a thin (sheet ablation zone surface. A conservative estimate for the ˜ 63 km2 supraglacial catchment yields 0.009-0.012 km3 of liquid meltwater storage in near-surface, porous ice. Further work is required to determine if these findings are representative of broader areas of the Greenland ice sheet ablation zone, and to assess the implications for sub-seasonal mass balance processes, surface lowering observations from airborne and satellite altimetry, and supraglacial runoff processes.

Evidence for ephemeral middle Eocene to early Oligocene Greenland glacial ice and pan-Arctic sea ice.

Science.gov (United States)

Tripati, Aradhna; Darby, Dennis

2018-03-12

Earth's modern climate is defined by the presence of ice at both poles, but that ice is now disappearing. Therefore understanding the origin and causes of polar ice stability is more critical than ever. Here we provide novel geochemical data that constrain past dynamics of glacial ice on Greenland and Arctic sea ice. Based on accurate source determinations of individual ice-rafted Fe-oxide grains, we find evidence for episodic glaciation of distinct source regions on Greenland as far-ranging as ~68°N and ~80°N synchronous with ice-rafting from circum-Arctic sources, beginning in the middle Eocene. Glacial intervals broadly coincide with reduced CO 2 , with a potential threshold for glacial ice stability near ~500 p.p.m.v. The middle Eocene represents the Cenozoic onset of a dynamic cryosphere, with ice in both hemispheres during transient glacials and substantial regional climate heterogeneity. A more stable cryosphere developed at the Eocene-Oligocene transition, and is now threatened by anthropogenic emissions.

High-resolution Greenland Ice Core data show abrupt climate change happens in few years

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Steffensen, Jørgen Peder; Andersen, Katrine Krogh; Bigler, Matthias

2008-01-01

The last two abrupt warmings at the onset of our present warm interglacial period, interrupted by the Younger Dryas cooling event, were investigated at high temporal resolution from the North Greenland Ice Core Project ice core. The deuterium excess, a proxy of Greenland precipitation moisture...... source, switched mode within 1 to 3 years over these transitions and initiated a more gradual change (over 50 years) of the Greenland air temperature, as recorded by stable water isotopes. The onsets of both abrupt Greenland warmings were slightly preceded by decreasing Greenland dust deposition...

History of the Greenland Ice Sheet: paleoclimatic insights

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Alley, Richard B.; Andrews, John Thomas; Brigham-Grette, Julia

2010-01-01

Paleoclimatic records show that the Greenland Ice Sheet consistently has lost mass in response to warming, and grown in response to cooling. Such changes have occurred even at times of slow or zero sea-level change, so changing sea level cannot have been the cause of at least some of the ice-shee...

North and northeast Greenland ice discharge from satellite radar interferometry

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Rignot, E.J.; Gogineni, S.P.; Krabill, W.B.

1997-01-01

Ice discharge from north and northeast Greenland calculated from satellite radar interferometry data of 14 outlet glaciers is 3.5 times that estimated from iceberg production. The satellite estimates, obtained at the grounding line of the outlet glaciers, differ from those obtained at the glacier...... front, because basal melting is extensive at the underside of the floating glacier sections. The results suggest that the north and northeast parts of the Greenland ice sheet may be thinning and contributing positively to sea-level rise....

Improved ice loss estimate of the northwestern Greenland ice sheet

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Kjeldsen, Kristian Kjellerup; Khan, Shfaqat Abbas; Wahr, J.

2013-01-01

We estimate ice volume change rates in the northwest Greenland drainage basin during 2003–2009 using Ice, Cloud and land Elevation Satellite (ICESat) laser altimeter data. Elevation changes are often reported to be largest near the frontal portion of outlet glaciers. To improve the volume change...... estimate, we supplement the ICESat data with altimeter surveys from NASA's Airborne Topographic Mapper from 2002 to 2010 and NASA's Land, Vegetation and Ice Sensor from 2010. The Airborne data are mainly concentrated along the ice margin and thus have a significant impact on the estimate of the volume...... change. Our results show that adding Airborne Topographic Mapper and Land, Vegetation and Ice Sensor data to the ICESat data increases the catchment-wide estimate of ice volume loss by 11%, mainly due to an improved volume loss estimate along the ice sheet margin. Furthermore, our results show...

Chinese mineral dust and anthropogenic aerosol inter-continental transport: a Greenland perspective

Science.gov (United States)

Bory, A.; Abouchami, W.; Galer, S.; Svensson, A.; Biscaye, P.

2012-04-01

Impurities contained in snow and ice layers in Greenland provide a record of the history of atmospheric dustiness and pollution in the Northern Hemisphere. The source of the particles deposited onto the ice cap may be investigated using specific intrinsic tracers. Provenance discrimination may then provide valuable constraints for the validation of atmospheric transport models as well as for the monitoring of natural and anthropogenic aerosols emissions at a global scale. Clay mineralogy combined with the strontium and neodymium isotope composition of the insoluble particles extracted from recent snow deposits at NorthGRIP (75.1°N, 042.3°W), for instance, enabled us to demonstrate that the Taklimakan desert of North-western China was the main source of mineral dust reaching central Greenland at present [Bory et al., EPSL, 2002 ; GRL, 2003a]. Here we report the lead isotopic signature of these snow-pit samples, covering the 1989-1995 and 1998-2001 time periods. Unradiogenic lead isotopic composition of our Greenland samples, compared to Asian dust isotopic fingerprints, implies that most of the insoluble lead reaching the ice cap is of anthropogenic origin. Lead isotopes reveal likely contributions from European/Canadian and, to a lesser extent, US sources, as well as a marked overprinted signature typical of Chinese anthropogenic lead sources. The relative contribution of the latter appears to have been increasing steadily over the last decade of the 20th century. Quantitative estimates suggest that, in addition to providing most of the dust, China may have already become the most important supplier of anthropogenic lead deposited in Greenland by the turn of the 20th to the 21st century. The close timing between dust and anthropogenic particles deposition onto the ice cap provides new insights for our understanding of Chinese aerosols transport to Greenland.

Ice Caps and Ice Belts: The Effects of Obliquity on Ice−Albedo Feedback

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Rose, Brian E. J. [Department of Atmospheric and Environmental Sciences, University at Albany (State University of New York), 1400 Washington Avenue, Albany, NY 12222 (United States); Cronin, Timothy W. [Program in Atmospheres, Oceans, and Climate, Massachusetts Institute of Technology 77 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge, MA 02139 (United States); Bitz, Cecilia M., E-mail: brose@albany.edu [Department of Atmospheric Sciences, MS 351640, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195-1640 (United States)

2017-09-01

Planetary obliquity determines the meridional distribution of the annual mean insolation. For obliquity exceeding 55°, the weakest insolation occurs at the equator. Stable partial snow and ice cover on such a planet would be in the form of a belt about the equator rather than polar caps. An analytical model of planetary climate is used to investigate the stability of ice caps and ice belts over the widest possible range of parameters. The model is a non-dimensional diffusive Energy Balance Model, representing insolation, heat transport, and ice−albedo feedback on a spherical planet. A complete analytical solution for any obliquity is given and validated against numerical solutions of a seasonal model in the “deep-water” regime of weak seasonal ice line migration. Multiple equilibria and unstable transitions between climate states (ice-free, Snowball, or ice cap/belt) are found over wide swaths of parameter space, including a “Large Ice-Belt Instability” and “Small Ice-Belt Instability” at high obliquity. The Snowball catastrophe is avoided at weak radiative forcing in two different scenarios: weak albedo feedback and inefficient heat transport (favoring stable partial ice cover), or efficient transport at high obliquity (favoring ice-free conditions). From speculative assumptions about distributions of planetary parameters, three-fourths to four-fifths of all planets with stable partial ice cover should be in the form of Earth-like polar caps.

Mass loss of Greenland from GRACE, IceSat and CryoSat

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Forsberg, René; Sørensen, Louise Sandberg; Fredenslund Levinsen, Joanna

2013-01-01

CryoSat data over the Greenland Ice Sheet are used to continue elevation height change data over the Greenland ice sheet, following a decade of detailed monitoring of ice sheet changes with GRACE and IceSat. The combination and validation of the different data for measuring changes is quantified...... by using available airborne lidar data from IceBridge and CryoVEx. There is a special challenge of using CryoSat as fill-in between EnviSat and Sentinel-3 for the longterm measurements of surface elevation changes, a key essential climate variable in the ESA Climate Change Initiative. Another challenge...... is the joint utilization of both altimetry and gravity field change measurements for consistent estimates of regional change patterns. In the paper we analyze GRACE, IceSat and CryoSat data since 2003, and present consistent estimates of overall mass changes with average values around -220 GT/year, showing...

A synthesis of the basal thermal state of the Greenland Ice Sheet

Science.gov (United States)

MacGregor, Joseph A; Fahnestock, Mark A; Catania, Ginny A; Aschwanden, Andy; Clow, Gary D.; Colgan, William T.; Gogineni, Prasad S.; Morlighem, Mathieu; Nowicki, Sophie M .J.; Paden, John D; Price, Stephen F.; Seroussi, Helene

2016-01-01

The basal thermal state of an ice sheet (frozen or thawed) is an important control upon its evolution, dynamics and response to external forcings. However, this state can only be observed directly within sparse boreholes or inferred conclusively from the presence of subglacial lakes. Here we synthesize spatially extensive inferences of the basal thermal state of the Greenland Ice Sheet to better constrain this state. Existing inferences include outputs from the eight thermomechanical ice-flow models included in the SeaRISE effort. New remote-sensing inferences of the basal thermal state are derived from Holocene radiostratigraphy, modern surface velocity and MODIS imagery. Both thermomechanical modeling and remote inferences generally agree that the Northeast Greenland Ice Stream and large portions of the southwestern ice-drainage systems are thawed at the bed, whereas the bed beneath the central ice divides, particularly their west-facing slopes, is frozen. Elsewhere, there is poor agreement regarding the basal thermal state. Both models and remote inferences rarely represent the borehole-observed basal thermal state accurately near NorthGRIP and DYE-3. This synthesis identifies a large portion of the Greenland Ice Sheet (about one third by area) where additional observations would most improve knowledge of its overall basal thermal state.

A synthesis of the basal thermal state of the Greenland Ice Sheet.

Science.gov (United States)

MacGregor, Joseph A; Fahnestock, Mark A; Catania, Ginny A; Aschwanden, Andy; Clow, Gary D; Colgan, William T; Gogineni, S Prasad; Morlighem, Mathieu; Nowicki, Sophie M J; Paden, John D; Price, Stephen F; Seroussi, Hélène

2016-08-10

The basal thermal state of an ice sheet (frozen or thawed) is an important control upon its evolution, dynamics and response to external forcings. However, this state can only be observed directly within sparse boreholes or inferred conclusively from the presence of subglacial lakes. Here we synthesize spatially extensive inferences of the basal thermal state of the Greenland Ice Sheet to better constrain this state. Existing inferences include outputs from the eight thermomechanical ice-flow models included in the SeaRISE effort. New remote-sensing inferences of the basal thermal state are derived from Holocene radiostratigraphy, modern surface velocity and MODIS imagery. Both thermomechanical modeling and remote inferences generally agree that the Northeast Greenland Ice Stream and large portions of the southwestern ice-drainage systems are thawed at the bed, whereas the bed beneath the central ice divides, particularly their west-facing slopes, is frozen. Elsewhere, there is poor agreement regarding the basal thermal state. Both models and remote inferences rarely represent the borehole-observed basal thermal state accurately near NorthGRIP and DYE-3. This synthesis identifies a large portion of the Greenland Ice Sheet (about one third by area) where additional observations would most improve knowledge of its overall basal thermal state.

Mass balance and surface movement of the Greenland Ice Sheet at Summit, Central Greenland

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Hvidberg, C.S.; Keller, K.; Gundestrup, N.S.

1997-01-01

During the GRIP deep drilling in Central Greenland, the ice sheet topography and surface movement at Summit has been mapped with GPS. Measurements of the surface velocity are presented for a strain net consisting of 13 poles at distances of 25-60 km from the GRIP site. Some results are: The GRIP...... site is located approximately 2 km NW of the topographic summit; the surface velocity at the GISP 2 site is 1.7 m/yr in the W direction. The present mass balance at Summit is calculated to be -0.03+/-0.04 m/yr, i.e. close to steady state. This result is the best now available for Summit. A small...... thinning rate might be a transient response of the Greenland Ice Sheet due to the temperature increase at the Wisconsin-Holocene transition....

Improving volume loss estimates of the northwestern Greenland Ice Sheet 2002-2010

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Korsgaard, Niels Jákup; Khan, Shfaqat Abbas; Kjeldsen, Kristian Kjellerup

Studies have been carried out using various methods to estimate the Greenland ice sheet mass balance. Remote sensing techniques used to determine the ice sheet volume includes airborne and satellite radar and laser methods and measurements of ice flow of outlet glaciers use InSAR satellite radar......) does not work on sloping surfaces and is affected by radar penetration into the snow. InSAR estimates require knowledge of outlet glacier thickness. GRACE has limited spatial resolution and is affected by mass variations not just from ice changes, but also from hydrologic and ocean mass variability...... and mass redistribution within the solid Earth. The accuracy of ice mass and ice volume estimates can be assessed by comparing results from different techniques. Here, we focus on volume loss estimates from ICESat, ATM and LVIS data. We estimate catchment-wide ice volume change in northwest Greenland...

GREENLAND ICE SHEET CHANGES FROM SPACE USING LASER, RADAR AND

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Sørensen, Louise Sandberg; Stenseng, Lars; Simonsen, Sebastian Bjerregaard

2010-01-01

The Greenland cryosphere is undergoing rapid changes, and these are documented by remote sensing from space. In this paper, an inversion scheme is used to derive mass changes from gravity changes observed by GRACE, and to derive the mean annual mass loss for the Greenland Ice Sheet, which...... is estimated to be 204 Gt/yr for the period 2002-2010. NASA’s laser altimetry satellite ICESat has provided elevation estimates of the ice sheet since January 2003. In order to be able to compare GRACE and ICESat derived results, the ICESat volume change must be converted into a mass change estimate. Therefore...

Assessing the accuracy of Greenland ice sheet ice ablation measurements by pressure transducer

Science.gov (United States)

Fausto, R. S.; van As, D.; Ahlstrøm, A. P.

2012-04-01

In the glaciological community there is a need for reliable mass balance measurements of glaciers and ice sheets, ranging from daily to yearly time scales. Here we present a method to measure ice ablation using a pressure transducer. The pressure transducer is drilled into the ice, en-closed in a hose filled with a liquid that is non-freezable at common Greenlandic temperatures. The pressure signal registered by the transducer is that of the vertical column of liquid over the sensor, which can be translated in depth knowing the density of the liquid. As the free-standing AWS moves down with the ablating surface and the hose melts out of the ice, an increasingly large part of the hose will lay flat on the ice surface, and the hydrostatic pressure from the vertical column of liquid in the hose will get smaller. This reduction in pressure provides us with the ablation rate. By measuring at (sub-) daily timescales this assembly is well-suited to monitor ice ablation in remote regions, with clear advantages over other well-established methods of measuring ice ablation in the field. The pressure transducer system has the potential to monitor ice ablation for several years without re-drilling and the system is suitable for high ablation areas. A routine to transform raw measurements into ablation values will also be presented, including a physically based method to remove air pressure variability from the signal. The pressure transducer time-series is compared to that recorded by a sonic ranger for the climatically hostile setting on the Greenland ice sheet.

Preservation of a Preglacial Landscape Under the Center of the Greenland Ice Sheet

Science.gov (United States)

Bierman, Paul R.; Corbett, Lee B.; Graly, Joseph A.; Neumann, Thomas Allen; Lini, Andrea; Crosby, Benjamin T.; Rood, Dylan H.

2014-01-01

Continental ice sheets typically sculpt landscapes via erosion; under certain conditions, ancient landscapes can be preserved beneath ice and can survive extensive and repeated glaciation. We used concentrations of atmospherically produced cosmogenic beryllium-10, carbon, and nitrogen to show that ancient soil has been preserved in basal ice for millions of years at the center of the ice sheet at Summit, Greenland. This finding suggests ice sheet stability through the Pleistocene (i.e., the past 2.7 million years). The preservation of this soil implies that the ice has been non-erosive and frozen to the bed for much of that time, that there was no substantial exposure of central Greenland once the ice sheet became fully established, and that preglacial landscapes can remain preserved for long periods under continental ice sheets

Ice_Sheets_CCI: Essential Climate Variables for the Greenland Ice Sheet

Science.gov (United States)

Forsberg, R.; Sørensen, L. S.; Khan, A.; Aas, C.; Evansberget, D.; Adalsteinsdottir, G.; Mottram, R.; Andersen, S. B.; Ahlstrøm, A.; Dall, J.; Kusk, A.; Merryman, J.; Hvidberg, C.; Khvorostovsky, K.; Nagler, T.; Rott, H.; Scharrer, M.; Shepard, A.; Ticconi, F.; Engdahl, M.

2012-04-01

As part of the ESA Climate Change Initiative (www.esa-cci.org) a long-term project "ice_sheets_cci" started January 1, 2012, in addition to the existing 11 projects already generating Essential Climate Variables (ECV) for the Global Climate Observing System (GCOS). The "ice_sheets_cci" goal is to generate a consistent, long-term and timely set of key climate parameters for the Greenland ice sheet, to maximize the impact of European satellite data on climate research, from missions such as ERS, Envisat and the future Sentinel satellites. The climate parameters to be provided, at first in a research context, and in the longer perspective by a routine production system, would be grids of Greenland ice sheet elevation changes from radar altimetry, ice velocity from repeat-pass SAR data, as well as time series of marine-terminating glacier calving front locations and grounding lines for floating-front glaciers. The ice_sheets_cci project will involve a broad interaction of the relevant cryosphere and climate communities, first through user consultations and specifications, and later in 2012 optional participation in "best" algorithm selection activities, where prototype climate parameter variables for selected regions and time frames will be produced and validated using an objective set of criteria ("Round-Robin intercomparison"). This comparative algorithm selection activity will be completely open, and we invite all interested scientific groups with relevant experience to participate. The results of the "Round Robin" exercise will form the algorithmic basis for the future ECV production system. First prototype results will be generated and validated by early 2014. The poster will show the planned outline of the project and some early prototype results.

Understanding Greenland ice sheet hydrology using an integrated multi-scale approach

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Rennermalm, A K; Moustafa, S E; Mioduszewski, J; Robinson, D A; Chu, V W; Smith, L C; Forster, R R; Hagedorn, B; Harper, J T; Mote, T L; Shuman, C A; Tedesco, M

2013-01-01

Improved understanding of Greenland ice sheet hydrology is critically important for assessing its impact on current and future ice sheet dynamics and global sea level rise. This has motivated the collection and integration of in situ observations, model development, and remote sensing efforts to quantify meltwater production, as well as its phase changes, transport, and export. Particularly urgent is a better understanding of albedo feedbacks leading to enhanced surface melt, potential positive feedbacks between ice sheet hydrology and dynamics, and meltwater retention in firn. These processes are not isolated, but must be understood as part of a continuum of processes within an integrated system. This letter describes a systems approach to the study of Greenland ice sheet hydrology, emphasizing component interconnections and feedbacks, and highlighting research and observational needs. (letter)

Ancient Biomolecules from Deep Ice Cores Reveal a Forested Southern Greenland

Science.gov (United States)

Willerslev, Eske; Cappellini, Enrico; Boomsma, Wouter; Nielsen, Rasmus; Hebsgaard, Martin B.; Brand, Tina B.; Hofreiter, Michael; Bunce, Michael; Poinar, Hendrik N.; Dahl-Jensen, Dorthe; Johnsen, Sigfus; Steffensen, Jørgen Peder; Bennike, Ole; Schwenninger, Jean-Luc; Nathan, Roger; Armitage, Simon; de Hoog, Cees-Jan; Alfimov, Vasily; Christl, Marcus; Beer, Juerg; Muscheler, Raimund; Barker, Joel; Sharp, Martin; Penkman, Kirsty E.H.; Haile, James; Taberlet, Pierre; Gilbert, M. Thomas P.; Casoli, Antonella; Campani, Elisa; Collins, Matthew J.

2009-01-01

One of the major difficulties in paleontology is the acquisition of fossil data from the 10% of Earth’s terrestrial surface that is covered by thick glaciers and ice sheets. Here we reveal that DNA and amino acids from buried organisms can be recovered from the basal sections of deep ice cores and allow reconstructions of past flora and fauna. We show that high altitude southern Greenland, currently lying below more than two kilometers of ice, was once inhabited by a diverse array of conifer trees and insects that may date back more than 450 thousand years. The results provide the first direct evidence in support of a forested southern Greenland and suggest that many deep ice cores may contain genetic records of paleoenvironments in their basal sections. PMID:17615355

The future sea-level rise contribution of Greenland’s glaciers and ice caps

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Machguth, H.; Rastner, P.; Bolch, T.

2013-01-01

We calculate the future sea-level rise contribution from the surface mass balance of all of Greenland's glaciers and ice caps (GICs, ~90 000 km2) using a simplified energy balance model which is driven by three future climate scenarios from the regional climate models HIRHAM5, RACMO2 and MAR...... experiments suggest that mass loss could be higher by 20–30% if a strong lowering of the surface albedo were to take place in the future. It is shown that the sea-level rise contribution from the north-easterly regions of Greenland is reduced by increasing precipitation while mass loss in the southern half...... feedback mechanisms are considered. The mass loss of all GICs by 2098 is calculated to be 2016 ± 129 Gt (HIRHAM5 forcing), 2584 ± 109 Gt (RACMO2) and 3907 ± 108 Gt (MAR). This corresponds to a total contribution to sea-level rise of 5.8 ± 0.4, 7.4 ± 0.3 and 11.2 ± 0.3 mm, respectively. Sensitivity...

Greenland Ice Sheet Monitoring Network (GLISN): Contributions to Science and Society

Science.gov (United States)

Anderson, K. R.; Bonaime, S.; Clinton, J. F.; Dahl-Jensen, T.; Debski, W. M.; Giardini, D.; Govoni, A.; Kanao, M.; Larsen, T. B.; Lasocki, S.; Lee, W. S.; McCormack, D. A.; Mykkeltveit, S.; Nettles, M.; Stutzmann, E.; Strollo, A.; Sweet, J. R.; Tsuboi, S.; Vallee, M.

2017-12-01

The Greenland Ice Sheet Monitoring Network (GLISN) is a broadband, multi-use seismological network, enhanced by selected geodetic observations, designed with the capability to allow researchers to understand the changes currently occurring in the Arctic, and with the operational characteristics necessary to enable response to those changes as understanding improves. GLISN was established through an international collaboration, with 10 nations coordinating their efforts to develop the current 34-station observing network during the last eight years. All of the data collected are freely and openly available in near-real time. The network was designed to transform the community capability for recording, analysis, and interpretation of seismic signals generated by discrete events in Greenland and the Arctic, as well as those traversing the region. Data from the network support a wide range of uses, including estimation of the properties of the solid Earth that control isostatic adjustment rates and set key boundary conditions for ice-sheet evolution; analysis of tectonic earthquakes throughout Greenland and the Arctic; study of the seismic signals associated with large calving events and changing glacier dynamics; and variations in ice and snow properties within the Greenland Ice Sheet. Recordings from the network have also provided invaluable data for rapid evaluation and understanding of the devastating landslide and tsunami that occurred near Nuugaatsiaq, Greenland, in June, 2017. The GLISN strategy of maximizing data quality from a network of approximately evenly distributed stations, delivering data in near-real time, and archiving a continuous data stream easily accessible to researchers, allows continuous discovery of new uses while also facilitating the generation of data products, such as catalogs of tectonic and glacial earthquakes and GPS-based estimates of snow height, that allow for assessment of change over time.

Accelerated mass loss from Greenland ice sheet : Links to atmospheric circulation in the North Atlantic

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Seo, Ki-Weon; Waliser, Duane E.; Lee, Choon-Ki; Tian, Baijun; Scambos, Ted; Kim, Baek-Min; van Angelen, Jan H.; van den Broeke, Michiel R.

Understanding the mechanisms that drive the mass imbalance of the Greenland ice sheet (GrIS) is critical to the accurate projection of its contribution to future sea level rise. Greenland's ice mass loss has been accelerating recently. Using satellite Earth-gravity and regional climate model data,

Late-glacial and Holocene history of changes in Quelccaya Ice Cap, Peru

Science.gov (United States)

Kelly, M. A.; Lowell, T. V.; Schaefer, J. M.; Finkel, R. C.

2008-12-01

Quelccaya Ice Cap in the southeastern Peruvian Andes (~13-14° S latitude) is an icon for climate change. Its rapidly receding outlet, Qori Kalis Glacier, has been monitored since the 1970's. Cores from Quelccaya Ice Cap provide high-resolution information about temperature and precipitation during the past 1,500 years. We extend the understanding of past changes in Quelccaya Ice Cap based on mapping and dating of glacial moraines and associated deposits. Our results include fifty 10Be ages of moraines and bedrock as well as twenty-nine 14C ages of organic material associated with moraines. These results form the basis of a chronology of changes in Quelccaya Ice Cap from ~16,000 yr BP to late Holocene time. Results from 10Be and 14C dating indicate that Quelccaya Ice Cap experienced a significant advance at 12,700-11,400 yr BP. Subsequent to this advance, the ice margin deposited at least three recessional moraine sets. Quelccaya Ice Cap receded to near its present-day margin by ~10,000 yr BP. Neoglacial advances began by ~3,000 yr BP and culminated with a maximum advance during the Little Ice Age. This chronology fits well with prior work which indicates a restricted Quelccaya Ice Cap during middle Holocene time. Moreover, the overlap between moraine and ice core data for the last 1,500 years provides a unique opportunity to assess the influences of temperature and precipitation on past ice cap extents.

Limited Impact of Subglacial Supercooling Freeze-on for Greenland Ice Sheet Stratigraphy

Science.gov (United States)

Dow, Christine F.; Karlsson, Nanna B.; Werder, Mauro A.

2018-02-01

Large units of disrupted radiostratigraphy (UDR) are visible in many radio-echo sounding data sets from the Greenland Ice Sheet. This study investigates whether supercooling freeze-on rates at the bed can cause the observed UDR. We use a subglacial hydrology model to calculate both freezing and melting rates at the base of the ice sheet in a distributed sheet and within basal channels. We find that while supercooling freeze-on is a phenomenon that occurs in many areas of the ice sheet, there is no discernible correlation with the occurrence of UDR. The supercooling freeze-on rates are so low that it would require tens of thousands of years with minimal downstream ice motion to form the hundreds of meters of disrupted radiostratigraphy. Overall, the melt rates at the base of the ice sheet greatly overwhelm the freeze-on rates, which has implications for mass balance calculations of Greenland ice.

Mass balance of the Greenland ice sheet (2003-2008) from ICESat data

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Sørensen, Louise Sandberg; Simonsen, Sebastian Bjerregaard; Nielsen, Karina

2011-01-01

ICESat has provided surface elevation measurements of the ice sheets since the launch in January 2003, resulting in a unique dataset for monitoring the changes of the cryosphere. Here, we present a novel method for determining the mass balance of the Greenland ice sheet, derived from ICESat...... studies of the Greenland ice sheet mass balance, based on different remote-sensing techniques....... altimetry data. Three different methods for deriving elevation changes from the ICESat altimetry dataset are used. This multi-method approach provides a method to assess the complexity of deriving elevation changes from this dataset. The altimetry alone can not provide an estimate of the mass balance...

Design and results of the ice sheet model initialisation initMIP-Greenland: an ISMIP6 intercomparison

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

H. Goelzer

2018-04-01

Full Text Available Earlier large-scale Greenland ice sheet sea-level projections (e.g. those run during the ice2sea and SeaRISE initiatives have shown that ice sheet initial conditions have a large effect on the projections and give rise to important uncertainties. The goal of this initMIP-Greenland intercomparison exercise is to compare, evaluate, and improve the initialisation techniques used in the ice sheet modelling community and to estimate the associated uncertainties in modelled mass changes. initMIP-Greenland is the first in a series of ice sheet model intercomparison activities within ISMIP6 (the Ice Sheet Model Intercomparison Project for CMIP6, which is the primary activity within the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 (CMIP6 focusing on the ice sheets. Two experiments for the large-scale Greenland ice sheet have been designed to allow intercomparison between participating models of (1 the initial present-day state of the ice sheet and (2 the response in two idealised forward experiments. The forward experiments serve to evaluate the initialisation in terms of model drift (forward run without additional forcing and in response to a large perturbation (prescribed surface mass balance anomaly; they should not be interpreted as sea-level projections. We present and discuss results that highlight the diversity of data sets, boundary conditions, and initialisation techniques used in the community to generate initial states of the Greenland ice sheet. We find good agreement across the ensemble for the dynamic response to surface mass balance changes in areas where the simulated ice sheets overlap but differences arising from the initial size of the ice sheet. The model drift in the control experiment is reduced for models that participated in earlier intercomparison exercises.

Advancing land-terminating ice margin in North Greenland - characteristics, evolution, and first field measurements

Science.gov (United States)

Steiner, J. F.; Prinz, R.; Abermann, J.

2017-12-01

More than 40% of the ice sheet in North Greenland terminate on land, however the characteristics of this ice margin and response to a changing climate have so far received little attention. While land-terminating ice cliffs are a feature commonly found and studied in other regions, detailed investigations in Greenland were only carried out more than six decades ago in the Thule area (Red Rock, Northwest Greenland). These studies showed a continuous advance at one location over multiple years, while the local mass balance was reported negative. The purpose of our study is to revisit the location previously studied and extend the analysis to the complete Northern ice margin employing newly available high-resolution digital terrain models (Arctic DEM). First results show that the advance at Red Rock is indeed long-term, continuing unabated today at rates of up to several meter per year. Similar magnitudes were found for large other stretches along the ice margin. With our study we aim to show (a) the main characteristics of the land-terminating ice margin in Northern Greenland, namely its slope and aspect distribution and comparison to spatial datasets of flow velocity and mass balance and (b) to provide further explanations of physical processes driving the advance. We have therefore mapped the complete ice margin and present the first results of this analysis. First field work provides new data on energy fluxes and ice temperatures at the Red Rock site as well as high resolution DEMs obtained with the use of UAVs.

Annual accumulation over the Greenland ice sheet interpolated from historical and newly compiled observation data

Science.gov (United States)

Shen, Dayong; Liu, Yuling; Huang, Shengli

2012-01-01

The estimation of ice/snow accumulation is of great significance in quantifying the mass balance of ice sheets and variation in water resources. Improving the accuracy and reducing uncertainty has been a challenge for the estimation of annual accumulation over the Greenland ice sheet. In this study, we kriged and analyzed the spatial pattern of accumulation based on an observation data series including 315 points used in a recent research, plus 101 ice cores and snow pits and newly compiled 23 coastal weather station data. The estimated annual accumulation over the Greenland ice sheet is 31.2 g cm−2 yr−1, with a standard error of 0.9 g cm−2 yr−1. The main differences between the improved map developed in this study and the recently published accumulation maps are in the coastal areas, especially southeast and southwest regions. The analysis of accumulations versus elevation reveals the distribution patterns of accumulation over the Greenland ice sheet.

Probability based hydrologic catchments of the Greenland Ice Sheet

Science.gov (United States)

Hudson, B. D.

2015-12-01

Greenland Ice Sheet melt water impacts ice sheet flow dynamics, fjord and coastal circulation, and sediment and biogeochemical fluxes. Melt water exiting the ice sheet also is a key term in its mass balance. Because of this, knowledge of the area of the ice sheet that contributes melt water to a given outlet (its hydrologic catchment) is important to many ice sheet studies and is especially critical to methods using river runoff to assess ice sheet mass balance. Yet uncertainty in delineating ice sheet hydrologic catchments is a problem that is rarely acknowledged. Ice sheet catchments are delineated as a function of both basal and surface topography. While surface topography is well known, basal topography is less certain because it is dependent on radar surveys. Here, I a present a Monte Carlo based approach to delineating ice sheet catchments that quantifies the impact of uncertain basal topography. In this scheme, over many iterations I randomly vary the ice sheet bed elevation within published error bounds (using Morlighem et al., 2014 bed and bed error datasets). For each iteration of ice sheet bed elevation, I calculate the hydraulic potentiometric surface and route water over its path of 'steepest' descent to delineate the catchment. I then use all realizations of the catchment to arrive at a probability map of all major melt water outlets in Greenland. I often find that catchment size is uncertain, with small, random perturbations in basal topography leading to large variations in catchments size. While some catchments are well defined, others can double or halve in size within published basal topography error bars. While some uncertainty will likely always remain, this work points to locations where studies of ice sheet hydrology would be the most successful, allows reinterpretation of past results, and points to where future radar surveys would be most advantageous.

Vulnerability of Southeast Greenland Glaciers to Warm Atlantic Water From Operation IceBridge and Ocean Melting Greenland Data

Science.gov (United States)

Millan, R.; Rignot, E.; Mouginot, J.; Wood, M.; Bjørk, A. A.; Morlighem, M.

2018-03-01

We employ National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)'s Operation IceBridge high-resolution airborne gravity from 2016, NASA's Ocean Melting Greenland bathymetry from 2015, ice thickness from Operation IceBridge from 2010 to 2015, and BedMachine v3 to analyze 20 major southeast Greenland glaciers. The results reveal glacial fjords several hundreds of meters deeper than previously thought; the full extent of the marine-based portions of the glaciers; deep troughs enabling warm, salty Atlantic Water (AW) to reach the glacier fronts and melt them from below; and few shallow sills that limit the access of AW. The new oceanographic and topographic data help to fully resolve the complex pattern of historical ice front positions from the 1930s to 2017: glaciers exposed to AW and resting on retrograde beds have retreated rapidly, while glaciers perched on shallow sills or standing in colder waters or with major sills in the fjords have remained stable.

Retrieving a common accumulation record from Greenland ice cores for the past 1800 years

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Andersen, Katrine K.; Ditlevsen, Peter D.; Rasmussen, Sune Olander

2006-01-01

In the accumulation zone of the Greenland ice sheet the annual accumulation rate may be determined through identification of the annual cycle in the isotopic climate signal and other parameters that exhibit seasonal variations. On an annual basis the accumulation rate in different Greenland ice...... cores is highly variable, and the degree of correlation between accumulation series from different ice cores is low. However, when using multiyear averages of the different accumulation records, the correlation increases significantly. A statistical model has been developed to estimate the common...

Polarimetric C-Band SAR Observations of Sea Ice in the Greenland Sea

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Thomsen, Bjørn Bavnehøj; Nghiem, S.V.; Kwok, R.

1998-01-01

The fully polarimetric EMISAR acquired C-band radar signatures of sea ice in the Greenland Sea during a campaign in March 1995. The authors present maps of polarimetric signatures over an area containing various kinds of ice and discuss the use of polarimetric SAR for identification of ice types...

Hypsometric Amplification of Greenland Ice Sheet Meltwater Release

Science.gov (United States)

van As, D.; Hasholt, B.; Mikkelsen, A. B.; Holtegaard Nielsen, M.; Box, J.; Claesson Liljedahl, L.; Lindback, K.; Pitcher, L. H.

2017-12-01

Proglacial discharge monitoring provides valuable insights in Greenland ice sheet meltwater release. We use a 2006-2016 discharge time series from the Watson River draining 12000 km2 of the ice sheet in southwest Greenland to investigate the large variability in catchment-total meltwater production. An observationally-constrained reconstruction of past discharge shows that meltwater release has on average increased by a factor of 1.5 since 2003 compared to the 1949-2002 period, and that interannual variability has disproportionally increased by a factor of 2.1, suggesting that melt amplifiers are at play. We derive a hypsometric amplification factor of 1.6, which is the result of the exponential melt area increase with rising temperature. Peak meltwater discharge events such as during the July 2012 flooding are due to this and other melt amplifiers, but also require intense melting over a period exceeding the multi-day transit time for high-elevation meltwater to pass through the glacial drainage system.

Recent greenland accumulation estimated from regional climate model simulations and ice core analysis

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Dethloff, K.; Schwager, M.; Christensen, J. H.

2002-01-01

to precipitation. Maxima of precipitation and accumulation occur at the southwestern and southeastern coasts of Greenland and are connected with cyclonic activity and the main storm tracks around Greenland. The central region of the Greenland ice sheet acts as a blocking barrier on moving weather systems...... and prohibits cyclones moving from west to east across this region and, thus prevents moisture transports....

Elevation change and remote-sensing mass-balance methods on the Greenland ice sheet

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Ahlstrøm, Andreas P.; Reeh, Niels; Christensen, Erik Lintz

The mass balance of the Greenland Ice Sheet is virtually impossible to obtain with traditional ground-based methods alone due to its vast size. It is thus desirable to develop mass-balance methods depending on remote sensing instead and this field has experienced a dramatic development within...... of measured surface elevation change over a 50x50~km part of the western Greenland Ice-Sheet margin near Kangerlussuaq. In this region, the mean observed elevation change has been -0.5~m from 2000 to 2003. However, the change is unevenly distributed with the northern and central part generally in balance...... the last decade. Large amounts of data have been collected from satellite and airborne platforms, yielding surface elevation changes and surface velocity fields. Here we present data from the Greenland Ice-Sheet margin acquired with a new small-scale airborne system, designed for regional high...

Biogeochemical cycling in a subarctic fjord adjacent to the Greenland Ice Sheet

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Meire, L.

2016-01-01

Temperatures in the Arctic have increased rapidly in recent years resulting in the melting of sea ice and glaciers at unprecedented rates. In 2012, sea ice extent across the Arctic reached a record minimum and the melt extent of Greenland Ice Sheet reached a record maximum. The accelerated mass loss

Future climate warming increases Greenland ice sheet surface mass balance variability

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Fyke, J.G.; Vizcaino, M.; Lipscomb, W.; Price, S.

2014-01-01

The integrated surface mass balance (SMB) of the Greenland ice sheet (GrIS) has large interannual variability. Long-term future changes to this variability will affect GrIS dynamics, freshwater fluxes, regional oceanography, and detection of changes in ice volume trends. Here we analyze a simulated

Observed runoff, jokulhlaups and suspended sediment load from the Greenland ice at Kangerlussuaq, West Greenland, 2007 and 2008

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Mernild, Sebastian Haugard [Los Alamos National Laboratory; Hasholt, Bent [UNIV OF COPENHAGEN

2009-01-01

This study fills the gap in hydrologic measurements of runoff exiting a part of the Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS), the Kangerlussuaq drainage area, West Greenland. The observations are of value for obtaining knowledge about the terrestrial freshwater and sediment output from part of the GrIS and the strip of land between the GrIS and the ocean, in the context of varying ice sheet surface melt and influx entering the ocean. High-resolution stage, discharge and suspended sediment load show a decrease in runoff of {approx} 25% and in sediment load of {approx} 40% from 2007 to 2008 in response to a decrease in the summer accumulated number of positive degree days. During the 2007 and 2008 runoff season, joekulhlaups are observed at Kangerlussuaq, drained from an ice-dammed lake at the margin of the GrIS.

The Greenland ice sheet in a warming climate

NARCIS (Netherlands)

van Angelen, J.H.|info:eu-repo/dai/nl/325922470

2013-01-01

In this thesis we assess multiple aspects of the Greenland climate, including the surface energy and mass balance of the ice sheet for the contemporary and near future climate. For these purposes we used output of the extensively and well-evaluated regional atmospheric climate model RACMO2. The

Development of ice floe tracker algorithm to measure Lagrangian statistics in the eastern Greenland coast

Science.gov (United States)

Lopez, Rosalinda; Wilhelmus, Monica M.; Schodlok, Michael; Klein, Patrice

2017-11-01

Sea ice export through Fram Strait is a key component of the Arctic climate system. The East Greenland Current (EGC) carries most of the sea ice southwards until it melts. Lagrangian methods using sea ice buoys have been used to map ice features in polar regions. However, their spatial and temporal coverage is limited. Satellite data can provide a better tool to map sea ice flow and its variability. Here, an automated sea ice floe detection algorithm uses ice floes as tracers for surface ocean currents. We process Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer satellite images to track ice floes (length scale 5-10 km) in the north-eastern Greenland Sea region. Our matlab-based routines effectively filter out clouds and adaptively modify the images to segment and identify ice floes. Ice floes were tracked based on persistent surface features common in successive images throughout 2016. Their daily centroid locations were extracted and its resulting trajectories are used to describe surface circulation and its variability using differential kinematic parameters. We will discuss the application of this method to a longer time series and larger spatial coverage. This enables us to derive the inter-annual variability of mesoscale features along the eastern coast of Greenland. Supported by UCR Mechanical Engineering Departmental Fellowship.

The fate of the Greenland Ice Sheet in a geoengineered, high CO2 world

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Irvine, Peter J; Lunt, Daniel J; Stone, Emma J; Ridgwell, Andy

2009-01-01

Solar radiation management (SRM) geoengineering has been proposed as one means of helping avoid the occurrence of dangerous climate change and undesirable state transitions ('tipping points') in the Earth system. The irreversible melting of the Greenland Ice Sheet is a case in point-a state transition that could occur as a result of CO 2 -driven elevated global temperatures, and one leading to potentially catastrophic sea-level rise. SRM schemes such as the creation of a 'sunshade' or injection of sulfate aerosols into the stratosphere could reduce incoming solar radiation, and in theory balance, in a global mean, the greenhouse warming resulting from elevated concentrations of CO 2 in the atmosphere. Previous work has highlighted that a geoengineered world would have: warming towards the poles, cooling in the tropics, and a reduction in the global hydrological cycle, which may have important implications for the Greenland Ice Sheet. Using a fully coupled global climate model in conjunction with an ice sheet model, we assess the consequences for the mass balance of the Greenland Ice Sheet of the reorganization of climate patterns by the combination of high CO 2 and geoengineering. We find that Greenland surface temperature and precipitation anomalies, compared to the pre-industrial situation, decrease almost linearly with increasing levels of SRM geoengineering, but that these combine to create a highly non-linear response of the ice sheet. The substantial melting of the Greenland Ice Sheet predicted for four times pre-industrial CO 2 levels is prevented in our model with only a partial application of SRM, and hence without having to fully restore the global average temperature back to pre-industrial levels. This suggests that the degree of SRM geoengineering required to mitigate the worst impacts of greenhouse warming, such as sea-level rise, need not be as extensive as generally assumed.

Timing of the Little Ice Age in southern Greenland

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Kjær, Kurt H.; Kjeldsen, Kristian K.; Bjørk, Anders A.

2013-01-01

as a signal for ice-free terrain being overridden by LIA glacier advances, and data from threshold lakes showing the onset of glacier-fed lakes, thus revealing the advance-maximum phase initiating the LIA. Finally, we have compiled lichenometry results indicating the onset of bedrock vegetation succeeding ice......Northern hemisphere temperatures reached their Holocene minimum and most glaciers reached their maximum during The Little Ice Age (LIA), but the timing of specific cold intervals is site-specific. In southern Greenland, we have compiled data from organic matter incorporated in LIA sediments, used...

Detection of Organic Matter in Greenland Ice Cores by Deep-UV Fluorescence

Science.gov (United States)

Willis, M.; Malaska, M.; Wanger, G.; Bhartia, R.; Eshelman, E.; Abbey, W.; Priscu, J. C.

2017-12-01

The Greenland Ice Sheet is an Earthly analog for icy ocean worlds in the outer Solar System. Future missions to such worlds including Europa, Enceladus, and Titan may potentially include spectroscopic instrumentation to examine the surface/subsurface. The primary goal of our research is to test deep UV/Raman systems for in the situ detection and localization of organics in ice. As part of this effort we used a deep-UV fluorescence instrument able to detect naturally fluorescent biological materials such as aromatic molecules found in proteins and whole cells. We correlated these data with more traditional downstream analyses of organic material in natural ices. Supraglacial ice cores (2-4 m) were collected from several sites on the southwest outlet of the Greenland Ice Sheet using a 14-cm fluid-free mechanical coring system. Repeat spectral mapping data were initially collected longitudinally on uncut core sections. Cores were then cut into 2 cm thick sections along the longitudinal axis, slowly melted and analyzed for total organic carbon (TOC), total dissolved nitrogen (TDN), and bacterial density. These data reveal a spatial correlation between organic matter concentration, cell density, and the deep UV fluorescence maps. Our results provide a profile of the organics embedded within the ice from the top surface into the glacial subsurface, and the TOC:TDN data from the clean interior of the cores are indicative of a biological origin. This work provides a background dataset for future work to characterize organic carbon in the Greenland Ice Sheet and validation of novel instrumentation for in situ data collection on icy bodies.

Design and results of the ice sheet model initialisation experiments initMIP-Greenland: an ISMIP6 intercomparison

Science.gov (United States)

Goelzer, Heiko; Nowicki, Sophie; Edwards, Tamsin; Beckley, Matthew; Abe-Ouchi, Ayako; Aschwanden, Andy; Calov, Reinhard; Gagliardini, Olivier; Gillet-Chaulet, Fabien; Golledge, Nicholas R.; Gregory, Jonathan; Greve, Ralf; Humbert, Angelika; Huybrechts, Philippe; Kennedy, Joseph H.; Larour, Eric; Lipscomb, William H.; Le clec'h, Sébastien; Lee, Victoria; Morlighem, Mathieu; Pattyn, Frank; Payne, Antony J.; Rodehacke, Christian; Rückamp, Martin; Saito, Fuyuki; Schlegel, Nicole; Seroussi, Helene; Shepherd, Andrew; Sun, Sainan; van de Wal, Roderik; Ziemen, Florian A.

2018-04-01

Earlier large-scale Greenland ice sheet sea-level projections (e.g. those run during the ice2sea and SeaRISE initiatives) have shown that ice sheet initial conditions have a large effect on the projections and give rise to important uncertainties. The goal of this initMIP-Greenland intercomparison exercise is to compare, evaluate, and improve the initialisation techniques used in the ice sheet modelling community and to estimate the associated uncertainties in modelled mass changes. initMIP-Greenland is the first in a series of ice sheet model intercomparison activities within ISMIP6 (the Ice Sheet Model Intercomparison Project for CMIP6), which is the primary activity within the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 (CMIP6) focusing on the ice sheets. Two experiments for the large-scale Greenland ice sheet have been designed to allow intercomparison between participating models of (1) the initial present-day state of the ice sheet and (2) the response in two idealised forward experiments. The forward experiments serve to evaluate the initialisation in terms of model drift (forward run without additional forcing) and in response to a large perturbation (prescribed surface mass balance anomaly); they should not be interpreted as sea-level projections. We present and discuss results that highlight the diversity of data sets, boundary conditions, and initialisation techniques used in the community to generate initial states of the Greenland ice sheet. We find good agreement across the ensemble for the dynamic response to surface mass balance changes in areas where the simulated ice sheets overlap but differences arising from the initial size of the ice sheet. The model drift in the control experiment is reduced for models that participated in earlier intercomparison exercises.

Possible contribution of ice-sheet/lithosphere interactions to past glaciological changes in Greenland

Science.gov (United States)

Alley, R. B.; Parizek, B. R.; Anandakrishnan, S.; Pollard, D.; Stevens, N. T.; Pourpoint, M.

2017-12-01

Ice-lithosphere interactions may have influenced the history of ice-sheet sensitivity to climate change. The Greenland ice sheet (GIS) is sensitive to warming, and is likely to be largely removed if subjected to relatively small additional temperature increases. The recent report (Schaefer et al., 2016, Nature) of near-complete GIS removal under modest Pleistocene forcing suggests that GIS sensitivity may be even greater than generally modeled, but lack of major Holocene retreat is more consistent with existing models. As shown by Stevens et al. (2016, JGR), peak lithospheric flexural stresses associated with ice-age GIS cycling are of the same order as dike-driving stresses in plutonic systems, and migrate over ice-age cycles. The full analysis by Stevens et al. suggests the possibility that the onset of cyclic ice-sheet loading allowed deep melt associated with the passage of the Icelandic hot spot beneath Greenland to work up though the crust to or near the base of the ice sheet, helping explain the anomalous geothermal heat fluxes observed at the head of the Northeast Greenland Ice Stream and elsewhere in the northern part of GIS. If ice-age cycling aided extraction of an existing reservoir of melted rock, then geothermal heat flux would have risen with the onset of extraction and migration, but with a subsequent fall associated with reservoir depletion. Simple parameterized flow-model simulations confirm intuition that a higher geothermal flux makes deglaciation easier, with the northern part of the ice sheet especially important. Large uncertainties remain in quantification, but we suggest the hypothesis that, following the onset of ice-age cycling, deglaciation of the GIS first became easier and then more difficult in response to feedbacks involving the ice sheet and the geological system beneath. In turn, this suggests that evidence of past deglaciation under moderate forcing is consistent with existing ice-sheet models.

Mass balance of the Greenland ice sheet - a study of ICESat data, surface density and firn compaction modelling

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Sørensen, L. S.; Simonsen, Sebastian Bjerregaard; Nielsen, K.

2010-01-01

ICESat has provided surface elevation measurements of the ice sheets since the launch in January 2003, resulting in a unique data set for monitoring the changes of the cryosphere. Here we present a novel method for determining the mass balance of the Greenland ice sheet derived from ICESat...... in estimating the mass balance of the Greenland ice sheet. We find firn dynamics and surface densities to be important factors in deriving the mass loss from remote sensing altimetry. The volume change derived from ICESat data is corrected for firn compaction, vertical bedrock movement and an intercampaign...... boundary conditions. We find an annual mass loss of the Greenland ice sheet of 210 ± 21 Gt yr-1 in the period from October 2003 to March 2008. This result is in good agreement with other studies of the Greenland ice sheet mass balance, based on different remote sensing techniques....

Greenland 5 km DEM, Ice Thickness, and Bedrock Elevation Grids

Data.gov (United States)

National Aeronautics and Space Administration — A Digital Elevation Model (DEM), ice thickness grid, and bedrock elevation grid of Greenland acquired as part of the PARCA program are available in ASCII text format...

A new regional high-resolution map of basal and surface topography for the Greenland ice-sheet margin at Paakitsoq, West Greenland

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Mottram, R.; Nielsen, C.; Ahlstrøm, A. P.

2009-01-01

In 2005 an airborne survey was carried out from a Twin Otter aircraft at Pâkitsup Akuliarusersua (Paakitsoq) near Ilulissat in West Greenland. The survey aimed to measure ice thickness with a 60 MHz cohrent radar and surface elevation with a scanning laser altimeter.......In 2005 an airborne survey was carried out from a Twin Otter aircraft at Pâkitsup Akuliarusersua (Paakitsoq) near Ilulissat in West Greenland. The survey aimed to measure ice thickness with a 60 MHz cohrent radar and surface elevation with a scanning laser altimeter....

Greenland Ice Sheet Melt Characteristics Derived from Passive Microwave Data

Data.gov (United States)

National Aeronautics and Space Administration — The Greenland ice sheet melt extent data, acquired as part of the NASA Program for Arctic Regional Climate Assessment (PARCA), is a daily (or every other day, prior...

New marine geophysical and sediment record of the Northeast Greenland Ice Stream.

Science.gov (United States)

Callard, L.; Roberts, D. H.; O'Cofaigh, C.; Lloyd, J. M.; Smith, J. A.; Dorschel, B.

2017-12-01

The NE Greenland Ice Stream (NEGIS) drains 16% of the Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS) and has a sea-level equivalent of 1.1-1.4 m. Stabilised by two floating ice shelves, 79N and Zachariae Isstrom, until recently it has shown little response to increased atmospheric and oceanic warming. However, since 2010 it has experienced an accelerated rate of grounding line retreat ( 4 km) and significant ice shelf loss that indicates that this sector of the GrIS is now responding to current oceanic and/or climatic change and has the potential to be a major contributor to future global sea-level rise. The project `NEGIS', a collaboration between Durham University and AWI, aims to reconstruct the history of the NE Greenland Ice Stream from the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) to present using both onshore and offshore geological archives to better understand past ice stream response to a warming climate. This contribution presents results and interpretations from an offshore dataset collected on the RV Polarstern, cruises PS100 and PS109 in 2016 and 2017. Gravity and box cores, supplemented by swath bathymetric and sub-bottom profiler data, were acquired and initial core analysis including x-radiographs and MSCL data logging has been performed. Data collection focused principally in the Norske Trough and the area directly in front of the 79N ice shelf, a sub-ice shelf environment as recently as two years ago. On the outer shelf streamlined subglacial bedforms, grounding-zone wedges and moraines as well as overconsolidated subglacial tills, record an extensive ice sheet advance to the shelf edge. On the inner shelf and in front of the 79N ice shelf, deep, glacially-eroded bedrock basins are infilled with stratified sediment. The stratified muds represent deglacial and Holocene glacimarine sedimentation, and capture the recent transition from sub-ice shelf to shelf free conditions. Multiproxy palaeoenvironmental reconstructions, including foraminifera and diatom analysis, and radiocarbon

Acoustic Monitoring of the Arctic Ice Cap

Science.gov (United States)

Porter, D. L.; Goemmer, S. A.; Chayes, D. N.

2012-12-01

Introduction The monitoring of the Arctic Ice Cap is important economically, tactically, and strategically. In the scenario of ice cap retreat, new paths of commerce open, e.g. waterways from Northern Europe to the Far East. Where ship-going commerce is conducted, the U.S. Navy and U.S. Coast Guard have always stood guard and been prepared to assist from acts of nature and of man. It is imperative that in addition to measuring the ice from satellites, e.g. Icesat, that we have an ability to measure the ice extent, its thickness, and roughness. These parameters play an important part in the modeling of the ice and the processes that control its growth or shrinking and its thickness. The proposed system consists of three subsystems. The first subsystem is an acoustic source, the second is an array of geophones and the third is a system to supply energy and transmit the results back to the analysis laboratory. The subsystems are described below. We conclude with a plan on how to tackle this project and the payoff to the ice cap modeler and hence the users, i.e. commerce and defense. System Two historically tested methods to generate a large amplitude multi-frequency sound source include explosives and air guns. A new method developed and tested by the University of Texas, ARL is a combustive Sound Source [Wilson, et al., 1995]. The combustive sound source is a submerged combustion chamber that is filled with the byproducts of the electrolysis of sea water, i.e. Hydrogen and Oxygen, an explosive mixture which is ignited via a spark. Thus, no additional compressors, gases, or explosives need to be transported to the Arctic to generate an acoustic pulse capable of the sediment and the ice. The second subsystem would be geophones capable of listening in the O(10 Hz) range and transmitting that data back to the laboratory. Thus two single arrays of geophones arranged orthogonal to each other with a range of 1000's of kilometers and a combustive sound source where the two

Greenland ice mass balance from GPS, GRACE and ICESat

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Khan, Shfaqat Abbas; Kjær, Kurt H.; Korsgaard, Niels Jákup

Greenland, using stereoscopic coverage by aerial photographs recorded in 1985, and subsequent comparative surface elevation data from ICESat (Ice, Cloud and land Elevation Satellite) and ATM (Airborne Topographic Mapper) supplemented with measurements from GPS and the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment...... (GRACE) satellite gravity mission, launched in March, 2002. The GRACE results provide a direct measure of mass loss, while the GPS data are used to monitor crustal uplift caused by ice mass loss close to the GPS sites....

Aerial photographs reveal late-20th-century dynamic ice loss in northwestern greenland

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Kjær, Kurt H.; Khan, Shfaqat Abbas; Korsgaard, Niels J

2012-01-01

Global warming is predicted to have a profound impact on the Greenland Ice Sheet and its contribution to global sea-level rise. Recent mass loss in the northwest of Greenland has been substantial. Using aerial photographs, we produced digital elevation models and extended the time record of recent...

Understanding Recent Mass Balance Changes of the Greenland Ice Sheet

Science.gov (United States)

vanderVeen, Cornelius

2003-01-01

The ultimate goal of this project is to better understand the current transfer of mass between the Greenland Ice Sheet, the world's oceans and the atmosphere, and to identify processes controlling the rate of this transfer, to be able to predict with greater confidence future contributions to global sea level rise. During the first year of this project, we focused on establishing longer-term records of change of selected outlet glaciers, reevaluation of mass input to the ice sheet and analysis of climate records derived from ice cores, and modeling meltwater production and runoff from the margins of the ice sheet.

Hypsometric amplification and routing moderation of Greenland ice sheet meltwater release

Science.gov (United States)

van As, Dirk; Mikkelsen, Andreas Bech; Holtegaard Nielsen, Morten; Box, Jason E.; Claesson Liljedahl, Lillemor; Lindbäck, Katrin; Pitcher, Lincoln; Hasholt, Bent

2017-06-01

Concurrent ice sheet surface runoff and proglacial discharge monitoring are essential for understanding Greenland ice sheet meltwater release. We use an updated, well-constrained river discharge time series from the Watson River in southwest Greenland, with an accurate, observation-based ice sheet surface mass balance model of the ˜ 12 000 km2 ice sheet area feeding the river. For the 2006-2015 decade, we find a large range of a factor of 3 in interannual variability in discharge. The amount of discharge is amplified ˜ 56 % by the ice sheet's hypsometry, i.e., area increase with elevation. A good match between river discharge and ice sheet surface meltwater production is found after introducing elevation-dependent transit delays that moderate diurnal variability in meltwater release by a factor of 10-20. The routing lag time increases with ice sheet elevation and attains values in excess of 1 week for the upper reaches of the runoff area at ˜ 1800 m above sea level. These multi-day routing delays ensure that the highest proglacial discharge levels and thus overbank flooding events are more likely to occur after multi-day melt episodes. Finally, for the Watson River ice sheet catchment, we find no evidence of meltwater storage in or release from the en- and subglacial environments in quantities exceeding our methodological uncertainty, based on the good match between ice sheet runoff and proglacial discharge.

Direct observations of evolving subglacial drainage beneath the Greenland Ice Sheet.

Science.gov (United States)

Andrews, Lauren C; Catania, Ginny A; Hoffman, Matthew J; Gulley, Jason D; Lüthi, Martin P; Ryser, Claudia; Hawley, Robert L; Neumann, Thomas A

2014-10-02

Seasonal acceleration of the Greenland Ice Sheet is influenced by the dynamic response of the subglacial hydrologic system to variability in meltwater delivery to the bed via crevasses and moulins (vertical conduits connecting supraglacial water to the bed of the ice sheet). As the melt season progresses, the subglacial hydrologic system drains supraglacial meltwater more efficiently, decreasing basal water pressure and moderating the ice velocity response to surface melting. However, limited direct observations of subglacial water pressure mean that the spatiotemporal evolution of the subglacial hydrologic system remains poorly understood. Here we show that ice velocity is well correlated with moulin hydraulic head but is out of phase with that of nearby (0.3-2 kilometres away) boreholes, indicating that moulins connect to an efficient, channelized component of the subglacial hydrologic system, which exerts the primary control on diurnal and multi-day changes in ice velocity. Our simultaneous measurements of moulin and borehole hydraulic head and ice velocity in the Paakitsoq region of western Greenland show that decreasing trends in ice velocity during the latter part of the melt season cannot be explained by changes in the ability of moulin-connected channels to convey supraglacial melt. Instead, these observations suggest that decreasing late-season ice velocity may be caused by changes in connectivity in unchannelized regions of the subglacial hydrologic system. Understanding this spatiotemporal variability in subglacial pressures is increasingly important because melt-season dynamics affect ice velocity beyond the conclusion of the melt season.

Multi-decadal dynamic thinning on the northwest margin of the Greenland Ice Sheet

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Korsgaard, Niels Jákup; Kjær, Kurt H.; Khan, Shfaqat Abbas

records with a 25 m grid resolution and vertical uncertainty of 4.6m. Comparative DEMs were derived from laser altimetry data recorded in 2005 and 2010. Ice loss from the Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS) can be partitioned into surface mass balance (SMB) processes (runoff and precipitation) and ice dynamics...

Greenland deep boreholes inform on sliding and deformation of the basal ice

Science.gov (United States)

Dahl-Jensen, D.

2017-12-01

Repeated measurements of the deformation of the deep boreholes on the Greenland ice sheet informs on the basal sliding, near basal deformation and in general on the horizontal velocity through the ice. Results of the logging of the boreholes at Dye3, GRIP, NGRIP, NEEM and Camp Century through the last 40 years by the Danish Ice and Climate group will be presented and discussed. The results on the flow will be compared with the information on ice properties, impurity load and bedrock entrained material from the deep ice cores and the radio echo sounding images near the drill sites.The results show that the basal movement often happens in an impurity rich zone above the bedrock while pure basal sliding is limited even in the presence of basal water and significant basal melt.Most of the deep ice core sites are located close to ice divides where the surface velocity is limited so significant basal sliding is not expected. Exceptions are the surface velocities at Camp Century and Dye 3, both being 13 m/yr.Finally, the ongoing deep drilling at EGRIP will shortly be presented where we are drilling in the center of the North East Greenland Ice Stream (NEGIS).

Using Airborne Lidar Data from IcePod to Measure Annual and Seasonal Ice Changes Over Greenland

Science.gov (United States)

Frearson, N.; Bertinato, C.; Das, I.

2014-12-01

The IcePod is a multi-sensor airborne science platform that supports a wide suite of instruments, including a Riegl VQ-580 infrared scanning laser, GPS-inertial positioning system, shallow and deep-ice radars, visible-wave and infrared cameras, and upward-looking pyrometer. These instruments allow us to image the ice from top to bottom, including the surface of melt-water plumes that originate at the ice-ocean boundary. In collaboration with the New York Air National Guard 109th Airlift Wing, the IcePod is flown on LC-130 aircraft, which presents the unique opportunity to routinely image the Greenland ice sheet several times within a season. This is particularly important for mass balance studies, as we can measure elevation changes during the melt season. During the 2014 summer, laser data was collected via IcePod over the Greenland ice sheet, including Russell Glacier, Jakobshavn Glacier, Eqip Glacier, and Summit Camp. The Icepod will also be routinely operated in Antarctica. We present the initial testing, calibration, and error estimates from the first set of laser data that were collected on IcePod. At a survey altitude of 1000 m, the laser swath covers ~ 1000 m. A Northrop-Grumman LN-200 tactical grade IMU is rigidly attached to the laser scanner to provide attitude data at a rate of 200 Hz. Several methods were used to determine the lever arm between the IMU center of navigation and GPS antenna phase center, terrestrial scanning laser, total station survey, and optimal estimation. Additionally, initial bore sight calibration flights yielded misalignment angles within an accuracy of ±4 cm. We also performed routine passes over the airport ramp in Kangerlussuaq, Greenland, comparing the airborne GPS and Lidar data to a reference GPS-based ground survey across the ramp, spot GPS points on the ramp and a nearby GPS base station. Positioning errors can severely impact the accuracy of a laser altimeter when flying over remote regions such as across the ice sheets

A Meteorological Experiment in the Melting Zone of the Greenland Ice Sheet

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Oerlemans, J.; Vugts, H.F.

1993-01-01

Preliminary results are described from a glaciometeorological experiment carried out in the margin (melting zone) of the Greenland ice sheet in the summers of 1990 and 1991. This work was initiated within the framework of a Dutch research program on land ice and sea level change. Seven

Greenland Ice Sheet Mass Loss from GRACE Monthly Models

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Sørensen, Louise Sandberg; Forsberg, René

2010-01-01

The Greenland ice sheet is currently experiencing a net mass loss. There are however large discrepancies between the published qualitative mass loss estimates, based on different data sets and methods. There are even large differences between the results based on the same data sources, as is the ...

Greenland ice sheet mass balance: a review.

Science.gov (United States)

Khan, Shfaqat A; Aschwanden, Andy; Bjørk, Anders A; Wahr, John; Kjeldsen, Kristian K; Kjær, Kurt H

2015-04-01

Over the past quarter of a century the Arctic has warmed more than any other region on Earth, causing a profound impact on the Greenland ice sheet (GrIS) and its contribution to the rise in global sea level. The loss of ice can be partitioned into processes related to surface mass balance and to ice discharge, which are forced by internal or external (atmospheric/oceanic/basal) fluctuations. Regardless of the measurement method, observations over the last two decades show an increase in ice loss rate, associated with speeding up of glaciers and enhanced melting. However, both ice discharge and melt-induced mass losses exhibit rapid short-term fluctuations that, when extrapolated into the future, could yield erroneous long-term trends. In this paper we review the GrIS mass loss over more than a century by combining satellite altimetry, airborne altimetry, interferometry, aerial photographs and gravimetry data sets together with modelling studies. We revisit the mass loss of different sectors and show that they manifest quite different sensitivities to atmospheric and oceanic forcing. In addition, we discuss recent progress in constructing coupled ice-ocean-atmosphere models required to project realistic future sea-level changes.

Extending remote sensing estimates of Greenland ice sheet melting

Science.gov (United States)

Heavner, M.; Loveland, R.

2010-12-01

The Melt Area Detection Index (MADI), a remote sensing algorithm to discriminate between dry and wet snow, has been previously developed and applied to the western portion of the Greenland ice sheet for the years 2000-2006, using Moderate Resolution Imaging Radiospectrometer (MODIS) data (Chylek et al, 2007). We extend that work both spatially and temporally by taking advantage of newly available data, and developing algorithms that facilitate the sensing of cloud cover and the automated inference of wet snow regions. The automated methods allow the development of a composite melt area data product with 0.25 km^2 spatial resolution and approximately two week temporal resolution. We discuss melt area dynamics that are inferred from this high resolution composite melt area. Chylek, P., M. McCabe, M. K. Dubey, and J. Dozier (2007), Remote sensing of Greenland ice sheet using multispectral near-infrared and visible radiances, J. Geophys. Res., 112, D24S20, doi:10.1029/2007JD008742.

Oceanic Transport of Surface Meltwater from the Southern Greenland Ice Sheet

Science.gov (United States)

Luo, Hao; Castelao, Renato M.; Rennermalm, Asa K.; Tedesco, Marco; Bracco, Annalisa; Yager, Patricia L.; Mote, Thomas L.

2016-01-01

The Greenland ice sheet has undergone accelerating mass losses during recent decades. Freshwater runoff from ice melt can influence fjord circulation and dynamic1 and the delivery of bioavailable micronutrients to the ocean. It can also have climate implications, because stratification in the adjacent Labrador Sea may influence deep convection and the strength of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation. Yet, the fate of the meltwater in the ocean remains unclear. Here, we use a high-resolution ocean model to show that only 1-15% of the surface meltwater runoff originating from southwest Greenland is transported westwards. In contrast, up to 50-60% of the meltwater runoff originating from southeast Greenland is transported westwards into the northern Labrador Sea, leading to significant salinity and stratification anomalies far from the coast. Doubling meltwater runoff, as predicted in future climate scenarios, results in a more-than-double increase in anomalies offshore that persists further into the winter. Interannual variability in offshore export of meltwater is tightly related to variability in wind forcing. The new insight that meltwaters originating from the west and east coasts have different fates indicates that future changes in mass loss rates and surface runoff will probably impact the ocean differently, depending on their Greenland origins.

High-resolution ice thickness and bed topography of a land-terminating section of the Greenland Ice Sheet

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Lindbäck, K.; Pettersson, R.; Doyle, S. H.

2014-01-01

We present ice thickness and bed topography maps with high spatial resolution (250 to 500 m) of a and-terminating section of the Greenland Ice Sheet derived from combined ground-based and airborne radar surveys. The data have a total area of ~12000 km2 and cover the whole ablation area of the out...

Ice stratigraphy at the Pakitsoq ice margin, West Greenland, derived from gas records

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Schaefer, H.; Petrenko, V. V.; Brook, E. J.

2009-01-01

at Pakitsoq. Sections containing ice from every distinct climatic interval during Termination I, including Last Glacial Maximum, Bolling/Allerod, Younger Dryas and the early Holocene, are identified. In the early Holocene, we find evidence for climatic fluctuations similar to signals found in deep ice cores...... from Greenland. A second glacial-interglacial transition exposed at the extreme margin of the ice is identified as another outcrop of Termination I (rather than the onset of the Eemian interglacial as postulated in earlier work). Consequently, the main structural feature at Pakitsoq is a large......-scale anticline with accordion-type folding in both exposed sequences of the glacial-Holocene transition, leading to multiple layer duplications and age reversals....

Solitary Waves of Ice Loss Detected in Greenland Crustal Motion

Science.gov (United States)

Adhikari, S.; Ivins, E. R.; Larour, E. Y.

2017-12-01

The annual cycle and secular trend of Greenland mass loading are well recorded in measurements of solid Earth deformation. While bedrock vertical displacements are in phase with loading as inferred from space observations, horizontal motions have received almost no attention. The horizontal bedrock displacements can potentially track the spatiotemporal detail of mass changes with great fidelity. Our analysis of Greenland crustal motion data reveals that a significant excitation of horizontal amplitudes occurs during the intense Greenland melting. A suite of space geodetic observations and climate reanalysis data cannot explain these large horizontal displacements. We discover that solitary seasonal waves of substantial mass transport traveled through Rink Glacier in 2010 and 2012. We deduce that intense summer melting enhanced either basal lubrication or shear softening, or both, causing the glacier to thin dynamically. The newly routed upstream sublglacial water was likely to be both retarded and inefficient, thus providing a causal mechanism for the prolonged ice transport to continue well into the winter months. As the climate continues to produce increasingly warmer spring and summer, amplified seasonal waves of mass transport may become ever more present in years of future observations. Increased frequency of amplified seasonal mass transport may ultimately strengthen the Greenland's dynamic ice mass loss, a component of the balance that will have important ramifications for sea level rise. This animation shows a solitary wave passing through Rink Glacier, Greenland, in 2012, recorded by the motion of a GPS station (circle with arrow). Darker blue colors within the flow indicate mass loss, red colors show mass gain. The star marks the center of the wave. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

Stable oxygen isotope variability in two contrasting glacier river catchments in Greenland

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Yde, Jacob C.; Knudsen, Niels T.; Steffensen, Jørgen P.

2016-01-01

the Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS). At the Mittivakkat Gletscher river, a small river draining a local temperate glacier in southeast Greenland, diurnal oscillations in δ18O occurred with a 3 h time lag to the diurnal oscillations in run-off. The mean annual δ18O was -14.68±0.18‰ during the peak flow period...... event. Overall, a comparison of the δ18O compositions from glacial river water in Greenland shows distinct differences between water draining local glaciers and ice caps (between -23.0 and -13.7 ‰) and the GrIS (between -29.9 and -23.2 ‰). This study demonstrates that water isotope analyses can be used......Analysis of stable oxygen isotope (δ18O) characteristics is a useful tool to investigate water provenance in glacier river systems. In order to attain knowledge on the diversity of δ18O variations in Greenlandic rivers, we examined two contrasting glacierised catchments disconnected from...

Using high resolution tritium profiles to quantify the effects of melt on two Spitsbergen ice cores

NARCIS (Netherlands)

van der Wel, L.G.; Streurman, H.J.; Isaksson, E.; Helsen, M.M.; van de Wal, R.S.W.; Martma, T.; Pohjola, V.A.; Moore, J.C.; Meijer, H.A.J.

2011-01-01

Ice cores from small ice caps provide valuable climatic information, additional to that of Greenland and Antarctica. However, their integrity is usually compromised by summer meltwater percolation. To determine to what extent this can affect such ice cores, we performed high-resolution tritium

Using high-resolution tritium profiles to quantify the effects of melt on two Spitsbergen ice cores

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Wel, L.G. van der; Streurman, H.J.; Isaksson, E.; Helsen, M.M.; Wal, R.S.W. van de; Martma, T.; Pohjola, V.A.; Moore, J.C.; Meijer, H.A.J.

2011-01-01

Ice cores from small ice caps provide valuable climatic information, additional to that of Greenland and Antarctica. However, their integrity is usually compromised by summer meltwater percolation. To determine to what extent this can affect such ice cores, we performed high-resolution tritium

Hypsometric amplification and routing moderation of Greenland ice sheet meltwater release

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

D. van As

2017-06-01

Full Text Available Concurrent ice sheet surface runoff and proglacial discharge monitoring are essential for understanding Greenland ice sheet meltwater release. We use an updated, well-constrained river discharge time series from the Watson River in southwest Greenland, with an accurate, observation-based ice sheet surface mass balance model of the  ∼  12 000 km2 ice sheet area feeding the river. For the 2006–2015 decade, we find a large range of a factor of 3 in interannual variability in discharge. The amount of discharge is amplified  ∼  56 % by the ice sheet's hypsometry, i.e., area increase with elevation. A good match between river discharge and ice sheet surface meltwater production is found after introducing elevation-dependent transit delays that moderate diurnal variability in meltwater release by a factor of 10–20. The routing lag time increases with ice sheet elevation and attains values in excess of 1 week for the upper reaches of the runoff area at  ∼  1800 m above sea level. These multi-day routing delays ensure that the highest proglacial discharge levels and thus overbank flooding events are more likely to occur after multi-day melt episodes. Finally, for the Watson River ice sheet catchment, we find no evidence of meltwater storage in or release from the en- and subglacial environments in quantities exceeding our methodological uncertainty, based on the good match between ice sheet runoff and proglacial discharge.

CryoSat-2 Processing and Model Interpretation of Greenland Ice Sheet Volume Changes

Science.gov (United States)

Nilsson, J.; Gardner, A. S.; Sandberg Sorensen, L.

2015-12-01

CryoSat-2 was launched in late 2010 tasked with monitoring the changes of the Earth's land and sea ice. It carries a novel radar altimeter allowing the satellite to monitor changes in highly complex terrain, such as smaller ice caps, glaciers and the marginal areas of the ice sheets. Here we present on the development and validation of an independent elevation retrieval processing chain and respective elevation changes based on ESA's L1B data. Overall we find large improvement in both accuracy and precision over Greenland relative to ESA's L2 product when comparing against both airborne data and crossover analysis. The seasonal component and spatial sampling of the surface elevation changes where also compared against ICESat derived changes from 2003-2009. The comparison showed good agreement between the to product on a local scale. However, a global sampling bias was detected in the seasonal signal due to the clustering of CryoSat-2 data in higher elevation areas. The retrieval processing chain presented here does not correct for changes in surface scattering conditions and appears to be insensitive to the 2012 melt event (Nilsson et al., 2015). This in contrast to the elevation changes derived from ESA's L2 elevation product, which where found to be sensitive to the effects of the melt event. The positive elevation bias created by the event introduced a discrepancy between the two products with a magnitude of roughly 90 km3/year. This difference can directly be attributed to the differences in retracking procedure pointing to the importance of the retracking of the radar waveforms for altimetric volume change studies. Greenland 2012 melt event effects on CryoSat-2 radar altimetry./ Nilsson, Johan; Vallelonga, Paul Travis; Simonsen, Sebastian Bjerregaard; Sørensen, Louise Sandberg; Forsberg, René; Dahl-Jensen, Dorthe; Hirabayashi, Motohiro; Goto-Azuma, Kumiko; Hvidberg, Christine S.; Kjær, Helle A.; Satow, Kazuhide.

Climate change and forest fires synergistically drive widespread melt events of the Greenland Ice Sheet.

Science.gov (United States)

Keegan, Kaitlin M; Albert, Mary R; McConnell, Joseph R; Baker, Ian

2014-06-03

In July 2012, over 97% of the Greenland Ice Sheet experienced surface melt, the first widespread melt during the era of satellite remote sensing. Analysis of six Greenland shallow firn cores from the dry snow region confirms that the most recent prior widespread melt occurred in 1889. A firn core from the center of the ice sheet demonstrated that exceptionally warm temperatures combined with black carbon sediments from Northern Hemisphere forest fires reduced albedo below a critical threshold in the dry snow region, and caused the melting events in both 1889 and 2012. We use these data to project the frequency of widespread melt into the year 2100. Since Arctic temperatures and the frequency of forest fires are both expected to rise with climate change, our results suggest that widespread melt events on the Greenland Ice Sheet may begin to occur almost annually by the end of century. These events are likely to alter the surface mass balance of the ice sheet, leaving the surface susceptible to further melting.

Disentangling the Roles of Atmospheric and Oceanic Forcing on the Last Deglaciation of the Greenland Ice Sheet

Science.gov (United States)

Keisling, B. A.; Deconto, R. M.

2017-12-01

Today the Greenland Ice Sheet loses mass via both oceanic and atmospheric processes. However, the relative importance of these mass balance components is debated, especially their potential impact on ongoing and future mass imbalance. Discerning the impact of oceanic versus atmospheric forcing during past periods of mass loss provides potential insight into the future behavior of the ice sheet. Here we present an ensemble of Greenland Ice Sheet simulations of the last deglaciation, designed to assess separately the roles of the ocean and the atmosphere in driving mass loss over the last twenty thousand years. We use twenty-eight different ocean forcing scenarios along with a cutting-edge reconstruction of time-evolving atmospheric conditions based on climate model output and δ15N-based temperature reconstructions to generate a range of ice-sheet responses during the deglaciation. We then compare the simulated timing of ice-retreat in individual catchments with estimates based on both 10Be (exposure) and 14C (minimum-limiting) dates. These experiments allow us to identify the ocean forcing scenario that best match the data on a local-to-regional (i.e., 100-1000 km) scales, providing an assessment of the relative importance of ocean and atmospheric forcing components around the periphery of Greenland. We use these simulations to quantify the importance of the three major mass balance terms (calving, oceanic melting, and surface melting) and assess the uncertainty of the relative influence of these factors during the most recent periods of major ice loss. Our results show that mass balance components around different sectors of the ice sheet respond differently to forcing, with oceanic components driving the majority of retreat in south and east Greenland and atmospheric forcing dominating in west and north Greenland In addition, we target three areas at high spatial resolution ( 1 km) around Greenland currently undergoing substantial change (Jakobshavn, Petermann

An energy balance model for the Greenland ice sheet

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Wal, R.S.W. van de; Oerlemans, J.

1994-01-01

The sensitivity of the mass balance of the Greenland Ice Sheet is studied by means of an energy balance model. The model calculates the shortwave and longwave radiation and the turbulent fluxes on a grid with a grid point spacing of 20 km. Special attention is given to the parameterization of the

Polarimetric signatures of sea ice in the Greenland Sea

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Skriver, Henning; Pedersen, Leif Toudal

1995-01-01

Polarimetric SAR data of sea ice have been acquired by the Danish polarimetric SAR (EMISAR) during a mission at the Greenland Sea in August 1994. Video recordings from a low-altitude acquisition have been used for interpretation of the SAR data. Also, ERS-1 SAR data and NOAA AVHRR-data have been...

Towards a new common Greenland Ice Core Chronology for the last 5000 years

Science.gov (United States)

Winstrup, Mai; Olander Rasmussen, Sune; Møllesøe Vinther, Bo; Cook, Eliza; Svensson, Anders; McConnell, Joe; Steffensen, Jørgen Peder

2017-04-01

Since the development of the Greenland Ice Core Chronology 2005 (GICC05), it has been widely used as a reference chronology in paleoclimate research. However, recent research (Sigl et al, 2015) demonstrated that this timescale has small, but significant, issues over historical time. These discrepancies was found by counting annual layers in high-resolution chemistry records from the NEEM S1 shallow core, and confirmed by linking via 10Be marker horizons to the layer-counted WAIS Divide ice core, Antarctica, and accurately-dated tree-ring series. This work showed that a revision of GICC05 is required prior to 1250AD. We here refine and extend this work. Layer-counting in a single core will always involve some uncertainty, and we hence use data from multiple Greenland ice cores, for which high-resolution impurity records recently have been measured. These ice cores have been synchronized using volcanic marker horizons, and the layer-counting is performed automatically using the StratiCounter algorithm (Winstrup et al, 2012), while ensuring that the number of layers between volcanic horizons are the same in all cores. Based on this extended multiple-core data set, we are further able to extend the new Greenland timescale another few thousand years back in time. This will, among others, provide a new ice-core date for the catastrophic volcanic eruption ( 1600 BC) that destroyed the Greek Minoan culture, an important time marker in Greek history.

The future sea-level rise contribution of Greenland’s glaciers and ice caps

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Machguth, H; Rastner, P; Bolch, T; Mölg, N; Sørensen, L Sandberg; Aðalgeirsdottir, G; Van Angelen, J H; Van den Broeke, M R; Fettweis, X

2013-01-01

We calculate the future sea-level rise contribution from the surface mass balance of all of Greenland’s glaciers and ice caps (GICs, ∼90 000 km 2 ) using a simplified energy balance model which is driven by three future climate scenarios from the regional climate models HIRHAM5, RACMO2 and MAR. Glacier extent and surface elevation are modified during the mass balance model runs according to a glacier retreat parameterization. Mass balance and glacier surface change are both calculated on a 250 m resolution digital elevation model yielding a high level of detail and ensuring that important feedback mechanisms are considered. The mass loss of all GICs by 2098 is calculated to be 2016 ± 129 Gt (HIRHAM5 forcing), 2584 ± 109 Gt (RACMO2) and 3907 ± 108 Gt (MAR). This corresponds to a total contribution to sea-level rise of 5.8 ± 0.4, 7.4 ± 0.3 and 11.2 ± 0.3 mm, respectively. Sensitivity experiments suggest that mass loss could be higher by 20–30% if a strong lowering of the surface albedo were to take place in the future. It is shown that the sea-level rise contribution from the north-easterly regions of Greenland is reduced by increasing precipitation while mass loss in the southern half of Greenland is dominated by steadily decreasing summer mass balances. In addition we observe glaciers in the north-eastern part of Greenland changing their characteristics towards greater activity and mass turnover. (letter)

Airborne Geophysics and Remote Sensing Applied to Study Greenland Ice Dynamics

Science.gov (United States)

Csatho, Beata M.

2003-01-01

Overview of project: we combined and jointly analysed geophysical, remote sensing and glaciological data for investigating the temporal changes in ice flow and the role of geologic control on glacial drainage. The project included two different studies, the investigation of recent changes of the Kangerlussuaq glacier and the study of geologic control of ice flow in NW Greenland, around the Humboldt, Petermann and Ryder glaciers.

Bathymetry and retreat of Southeast Greenland glaciers from Operation IceBridge and Ocean Melting Greenland data

Science.gov (United States)

Millan, R.; Rignot, E. J.; Morlighem, M.; Bjork, A. A.; Mouginot, J.; Wood, M.

2017-12-01

Southeast Greenland has been one of the largest contributors to ice mass loss in Greenland in part because of significant changes in glacier dynamics. The leading hypothesis for the changes in glacier dynamics is that enhanced thermal forcing from the ocean has dislodged a number of glaciers from their anchoring positions and some of them retreated rapidly along a reverse bed. The glaciers response has been observed to vary significantly from one fjord to the next, but until now there was not enough data to understand or interpret these changes. In particular, there was no data on glacier bed topography and seafloor bathymetry in the fjords. Here we present the results of new fjord mapping by the NASA Ocean Melting Greenland mission combined with a recent high-resolution airborne gravity survey by NASA Operation IceBridge. We combine these data with a reconstruction of the bed using a mass conservation approach upstream extending into the glacial fjords for the first time. In the fjord and along the ice-ocean transition, we employ a 3D inversion of gravity data to infer the bed elevation along a set of 9 survey boxes spanning south of Helheim Glacier to the southern tip of Southeast Greenland. We combine the results with an analysis of the glacier front history since the 1930's and Conductivity Temperature Depth data obtained in the fjord by OMG in 2016. The data reveals bed elevations several 100-m deeper than previously thought, for almost all the glaciers, up to 500 m for some of them. For many glaciers, the bed profiles help to completely understand the history of retreat of the glaciers. For instance, glaciers stranded on sills have been stable; glaciers on a reverse slope have retreated rapidly; and glaciers with a normal slope have retreated slowly. The mapping also helps document the extent of the marine portion of the glacier basins. In many of the fjords, we document the presence of warm, salty Atlantic Water which fuels large melt rates. We employ

High Artic Glaciers and Ice Caps Ice Mass Change from GRACE, Regional Climate Model Output and Altimetry.

Science.gov (United States)

Ciraci, E.; Velicogna, I.; Fettweis, X.; van den Broeke, M. R.

2016-12-01

The Arctic hosts more than the 75% of the ice covered regions outside from Greenland and Antarctica. Available observations show that increased atmospheric temperatures during the last century have contributed to a substantial glaciers retreat in all these regions. We use satellite gravimetry by the NASA's Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE), and apply a least square fit mascon approach to calculate time series of ice mass change for the period 2002-2016. Our estimates show that arctic glaciers have constantly contributed to the sea level rise during the entire observation period with a mass change of -170+/-20 Gt/yr equivalent to the 80% of the total ice mass change from the world Glacier and Ice Caps (GIC) excluding the Ice sheet peripheral GIC, which we calculated to be -215+/-32 GT/yr, with an acceleration of 9+/-4 Gt/yr2. The Canadian Archipelago is the main contributor to the total mass depletion with an ice mass trend of -73+/-9 Gt/yr and a significant acceleration of -7+/-3 Gt/yr2. The increasing mass loss is mainly determined by melting glaciers located in the northern part of the archipelago.In order to investigate the physical processes driving the observed ice mass loss we employ satellite altimetry and surface mass balance (SMB) estimates from Regional climate model outputs available for the same time period covered by the gravimetry data. We use elevation data from the NASA ICESat (2003-2009) and ESA CryoSat-2 (2010-2016) missions to estimate ice elevation changes. We compare GRACE ice mass estimates with time series of surface mass balance from the Regional Climate Model (RACMO-2) and the Modèle Atmosphérique Régional (MAR) and determine the portion of the total mass change explained by the SMB signal. We find that in Iceland and in the and the Canadian Archipelago the SMB signal explains most of the observed mass changes, suggesting that ice discharge may play a secondary role here. In other region, e.g. in Svalbar, the SMB signal

Interannual observations and quantification of summertime H2O ice deposition on the Martian CO2 ice south polar cap

Science.gov (United States)

Brown, Adrian J.; Piqueux, Sylvain; Titus, Timothy N.

2014-01-01

The spectral signature of water ice was observed on Martian south polar cap in 2004 by the Observatoire pour l'Mineralogie, l'Eau les Glaces et l'Activite (OMEGA) ( Bibring et al., 2004). Three years later, the OMEGA instrument was used to discover water ice deposited during southern summer on the polar cap ( Langevin et al., 2007). However, temporal and spatial variations of these water ice signatures have remained unexplored, and the origins of these water deposits remains an important scientific question. To investigate this question, we have used observations from the Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer for Mars (CRISM) instrument on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) spacecraft of the southern cap during austral summer over four Martian years to search for variations in the amount of water ice. We report below that for each year we have observed the cap, the magnitude of the H2O ice signature on the southern cap has risen steadily throughout summer, particularly on the west end of the cap. The spatial extent of deposition is in disagreement with the current best simulations of deposition of water ice on the south polar cap (Montmessin et al., 2007). This increase in water ice signatures is most likely caused by deposition of atmospheric H2O ice and a set of unusual conditions makes the quantification of this transport flux using CRISM close to ideal. We calculate a ‘minimum apparent‘ amount of deposition corresponding to a thin H2O ice layer of 0.2 mm (with 70% porosity). This amount of H2O ice deposition is 0.6–6% of the total Martian atmospheric water budget. We compare our ‘minimum apparent’ quantification with previous estimates. This deposition process may also have implications for the formation and stability of the southern CO2 ice cap, and therefore play a significant role in the climate budget of modern day Mars.

Spread of ice mass loss into northwest Greenland observed by GRACE and GPS

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Khan, Shfaqat Abbas; Wahr, John; Bevis, Michael

2010-01-01

Global Positioning System (GPS) measurements from three long-term sites on bedrock adjacent to the ice sheet. The GRACE results provide a direct measure of mass loss averaged over scales of a few hundred km. The GPS data are used to monitor crustal uplift caused by ice mass loss close to the sites....... The GRACE results can be used to predict crustal uplift, which can be compared with the GPS data. In addition to showing that the northwest ice sheet margin is now losing mass, the uplift results from both the GPS measurements and the GRACE predictions show rapid acceleration in southeast Greenland in late...... 2003, followed by a moderate deceleration in 2006. Because that latter deceleration is weak, southeast Greenland still appears to be losing ice mass at a much higher rate than it was prior to fall 2003. In a more general sense, the analysis described here demonstrates that GPS uplift measurements can...

Mass Balance of the Greenland Ice Sheet at High Elevations.

Science.gov (United States)

Thomas; Akins; Csatho; Fahnestock; Gogineni; Kim; Sonntag

2000-07-21

Comparison of ice discharge from higher elevation areas of the entire Greenland Ice Sheet with total snow accumulation gives estimates of ice thickening rates over the past few decades. On average, the region has been in balance, but with thickening of 21 centimeters per year in the southwest and thinning of 30 centimeters per year in the southeast. The north of the ice sheet shows less variability, with average thickening of 2 centimeters per year in the northeast and thinning of about 5 centimeters per year in the northwest. These results agree well with those from repeated altimeter surveys, except in the extreme south, where we find substantially higher rates of both thickening and thinning.

Drainage of the ice-dammed Lake Tinninilik, West Greenland; implication on bedrock uplift

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Kjeldsen, Kristian Kjellerup; Khan, Shfaqat Abbas; Bjørk, Anders Anker

Drainage of ice-dammed lakes is regularly observed along the margin of the Greenland Ice Sheet. However, the speed of the drainage events and implications can vary depending on the size of the lakes and the local settings. Here, we assess the drainage pattern of Lake Tinninilik, dammed...

Modeling the Sulfate Deposition to the Greenland Ice Sheet From the Laki Eruption

Science.gov (United States)

Oman, L.; Robock, A.; Stenchikov, G.; Thordarson, T.; Gao, C.

2005-12-01

Using the state of the art Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) modelE general circulation model, simulations were conducted of the chemistry and transport of aerosols resulting from the 1783-84 Laki (64°N) flood lava eruption. A set of 3 ensemble simulations from different initial conditions were conducted by injecting our estimate of the SO2 gas into the atmosphere by the 10 episodes of the eruption and allowing the sulfur chemistry model to convert this gas into sulfate aerosol. The SO2 gas and sulfate aerosol is transported by the model and wet and dry deposition is calculated over each grid box during the simulation. We compare the resulting sulfate deposition to the Greenland Ice Sheet in the model to 23 ice core measurements and find very good agreement. The model simulation deposits a range of 169 to over 300 kg/km2 over interior Greenland with much higher values along the coastal areas. This compares to a range of 62 to 324 kg/km2 for the 23 ice core measurements with an average value of 158 kg/km2. This comparison is one important model validation tool. Modeling and observations show fairly large spatial variations in the deposition of sulfate across the Greenland Ice Sheet for the Laki eruption, but the patterns are similar to those we modeled for the 1912 Katmai and 1991 Pinatubo eruptions. Estimates of sulfate loading based on single ice cores can show significant differences, so ideally several ice cores should be combined in reconstructing the sulfate loading of past volcanic eruptions, taking into account the characteristic spatial variations in the deposition pattern.

Quantifying Local Ablation Rates for the Greenland Ice Sheet Using Terrestrial LIDAR

Science.gov (United States)

Kershner, C. M.; Pitcher, L. H.; LeWinter, A.; Finnegan, D. C.; Overstreet, B. T.; Miège, C.; Cooper, M. G.; Smith, L. C.; Rennermalm, A. K.

2016-12-01

Quantifying accurate ice surface ablation or melt rates for the Greenland Ice Sheet is important for calibrating and validating surface mass balance models and constraining sea level rise estimates. Common practice is to monitor surface ablation at defined points by manually measuring ice surface lowering in relation to stakes inserted into the ice / snow. However, this method does not account for the effects of local topography, solar zenith angle, and local variations in ice surface albedo/impurities on ablation rates. To directly address these uncertainties, we use a commercially available terrestrial LIDAR scanner (TLS) to monitor daily melt rates in the ablation zone of the Greenland Ice Sheet for 7 consecutive days in July 2016. Each survey is registered to previous scans using retroreflective cylinders and is georeferenced using static GPS measurements. Bulk ablation will be calculated using multi-temporal differential LIDAR techniques, and difficulties in referencing scans and collecting high quality surveys in this dynamic environment will be discussed, as well as areas for future research. We conclude that this novel application of TLS technology provides a spatially accurate, higher fidelity measurements of ablation across a larger area with less interpolation and less time spent than using traditional manual point based methods alone. Furthermore, this sets the stage for direct calibration, validation and cross-comparison with existing airborne (e.g. NASA's Airborne Topographic Mapper - ATM - onboard Operation IceBridge and NASA's Land, Vegetation & Ice Sensor - LVIS) and forthcoming spaceborne sensors (e.g. NASA's ICESat-2).

Measurement campaign for wind power potential in west Greenland

Science.gov (United States)

Rønnow Jakobsen, Kasper

2013-04-01

Experiences and results from a wind resource exploring campaign 2003- in west Greenland. Like many other countries, Greenland is trying to reduce its dependency of fossil fuel by implementing renewable energy. The main challenge is that the people live on the coast in scattered settlements, without power infrastructure. Based on this a wind power potential project was established in 2002, funded by the Greenlandic government and the Technical University of Denmark. We present results and experiences of the campaign. 1 Field campaign There were only a few climate stations in or close to settlements and due to their positioning and instrumentation, they were not usable for wind resource estimation. To establish met stations in Arctic areas with complex topography, there are some challenges to face; mast positioning in complex terrain, severe weather conditions, instrumentation, data handling, installation and maintenance budget. The terrain in the ice free and populated part, mainly consists of mountains of different heights and shapes, separated by deep fjords going from the ice cap to the sea. With a generally low wind resource the focus was on the most exposed positions close to the settlements. Data from the nearest existing climate stations was studied for background estimations of predominant wind directions and extreme wind speeds, and based on that the first 10m masts were erected in 2003. 2 Instruments The first installations used standard NRG systems with low cost NRG instruments. For most of the sites this low cost setup did a good job, but there were some problems with the first design, including instrument and boom strains. In subsequent years, the systems were updated several times to be able to operate in the extreme conditions. Different types of instruments, data logger and boom systems were tested to get better data quality and reliability. Today 11 stations with heights ranging from 10-50m are installed and equipped according to the IEC standard

Photobiology of sea ice algae during initial spring growth in Kangerlussuaq, West Greenland

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Hawes, Ian; Lund-Hansen, Lars Chresten; Sorrell, Brian Keith

2012-01-01

We undertook a series of measurements of photophysiological parameters of sea ice algae over 12 days of early spring growth in a West Greenland Fjord, by variable chlorophyll fluorescence imaging. Imaging of the ice–water interface showed the development of ice algae in 0.3–0.4 mm wide brine...

Modelling the short-term response of the Greenland ice-sheet to global warming

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Wal, R.S.W. van de; Oerlemans, J.

1997-01-01

A two-dimensional vertically integrated ice flow model has been developed to test the importance of various processes and concepts used for the prediction of the contribution of the Greenland ice-sheet to sea-level rise over the next 350 y (short-term response). The mass balance is modelled by the

Sea ice and primary production proxies in surface sediments from a High Arctic Greenland fjord

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Ribeiro, Sofia; Sejr, Mikael K; Limoges, Audrey

2017-01-01

Monitoring Programme. Clear spatial gradients in organic carbon and biogenic silica contents reflected marine influence, nutrient availability and river-induced turbidity, in good agreement with in situ measurements. The sea ice proxy IP25 was detected at all sites but at low concentrations, indicating...... that IP25 records from fjords need to be carefully considered and not directly compared to marine settings. The sea ice-associated biomarker HBI III revealed an open-water signature, with highest concentrations near the mid-July ice edge. This proxy evaluation is an important step towards reliable......In order to establish a baseline for proxy-based reconstructions for the Young Sound–Tyrolerfjord system (Northeast Greenland), we analysed the spatial distribution of primary production and sea ice proxies in surface sediments from the fjord, against monitoring data from the Greenland Ecosystem...

Greenland ice sheet surface mass balance: evaluating simulations and making projections with regional climate models

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Rae, J.G.L.; Aðalgeirsdóttir, G.; Edwards, T.L.; Fettweis, X.; Gregory, J.M.; Hewitt, H.T.; Lowe, J.A.; Lucas-Picher, P.; Mottram, R.H.; Payne, A.J.; Ridley, J.K.; Shannon, S.R.; van de Berg, W.J.; van de Wal, R.S.W.; van den Broeke, M.R.

2012-01-01

Four high-resolution regional climate models (RCMs) have been set up for the area of Greenland, with the aim of providing future projections of Greenland ice sheet surface mass balance (SMB), and its contribution to sea level rise, with greater accuracy than is possible from coarser-resolution

Greenland plateau jets

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

George William Kent Moore

2013-08-01

Full Text Available The high ice-covered topography of Greenland represents a significant barrier to atmospheric flow and, as a direct and indirect result, it plays a crucial role in the coupled climate system. The wind field over Greenland is important in diagnosing regional weather and climate, thereby providing information on the mass balance of the ice sheet as well as assisting in the interpretation of ice core data. Here, we identify a number of hitherto unrecognised features of the three-dimensional wind field over Greenland; including a 2500-km-long jet along the central ice sheet's western margin that extends from the surface into the middle-troposphere, as well as a similar but smaller scale and less intense feature along its eastern margin. We refer to these features as Greenland Plateau Jets. The jets are coupled to the downslope katabatic flow and we argue that they are maintained by the zonal temperature gradients associated with the strong temperature inversion over the central ice sheet. Their importance for Greenland's regional climate is discussed.

Improved retrieval of land ice topography from CryoSat-2 data and its impact for volume-change estimation of the Greenland Ice Sheet

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Nilsson, Johan; Gardner, Alex; Sørensen, Louise Sandberg

2016-01-01

of the snow/ice surface with lower sensitivity to changes in near-surface dielectric properties. To demonstrate the utility of the new processing methodology we produce elevations, elevation changes, and total volume changes from CryoSat-2 data for the Greenland Ice Sheet during the period January 2011...... to January 2015. We find that the Greenland Ice Sheet decreased in volume at a rate of 289 ± 20km3 a-1, with high interannual variability and spatial heterogeneity in rates of loss. This rate is 65km3 a-1 more negative than rates determined from ESA's L2 product, highlighting the importance of CryoSat-2...

Tuppiap Qeqertaa (Tobias Island): a newly discovered island off northeast Greenland

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Bennike, O.; Mikkelsen, N.; Forsberg, René

2006-01-01

The small island of Tuppiap Qeqertaa, formerly known as Tobias circle divide or Tobias Island, is situated 80 km off the northeast Greenland coast. The island was discovered in 1993 and is approximately 2 km long and 1.5 km wide. Most of the island is covered by an ice cap that rises to 35 in abo...

The projected demise of Barnes Ice Cap: Evidence of an unusually warm 21st century Arctic

Science.gov (United States)

Gilbert, A.; Flowers, G. E.; Miller, G. H.; Refsnider, K. A.; Young, N. E.; Radić, V.

2017-03-01

As a remnant of the Laurentide Ice Sheet, Barnes Ice Cap owes its existence and present form in part to the climate of the last glacial period. The ice cap has been sustained in the present interglacial climate by its own topography through the mass balance-elevation feedback. A coupled mass balance and ice-flow model, forced by Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 5 climate model output, projects that the current ice cap will likely disappear in the next 300 years. For greenhouse gas Representative Concentration Pathways of +2.6 to +8.5 Wm-2, the projected ice-cap survival times range from 150 to 530 years. Measured concentrations of cosmogenic radionuclides 10Be, 26Al, and 14C at sites exposed near the ice-cap margin suggest the pending disappearance of Barnes Ice Cap is very unusual in the last million years. The data and models together point to an exceptionally warm 21st century Arctic climate.

Higher surface mass balance of the Greenland ice sheet revealed by high - resolution climate modeling

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Ettema, Janneke; van den Broeke, Michiel R.; van Meijgaard, Erik; van de Berg, Willem Jan; Bamber, Jonathan L.; Box, Jason E.; Bales, Roger C.

2009-01-01

High‐resolution (∼11 km) regional climate modeling shows total annual precipitation on the Greenland ice sheet for 1958–2007 to be up to 24% and surface mass balance up to 63% higher than previously thought. The largest differences occur in coastal southeast Greenland, where the much higher

Continuous methane measurements from a late Holocene Greenland ice core

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Rhodes, R.H.; Mitchell, L.E.; Brook, E.J.

2013-01-01

Ancient air trapped inside bubbles in ice cores can now be analysed for methane concentration utilising a laser spectrometer coupled to a continuous melter system. We present a new ultra-high resolution record of atmospheric methane variability over the last 1800yr obtained from continuous analysis...... of a shallow ice core from the North Greenland Eemian project (NEEM-2011-S1) during a 4-week laboratory-based measurement campaign. Our record faithfully replicates the form and amplitudes of multi-decadal oscillations previously observed in other ice cores and demonstrates the detailed depth resolution (5.3cm......), rapid acquisition time (30mday) and good long-term reproducibility (2.6%, 2s) of the continuous measurement technique.In addition, we report the detection of high frequency ice core methane signals of non-atmospheric origin. Firstly, measurements of air from the firn-ice transition region...

Supraglacial bacterial community structures vary across the Greenland ice sheet

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Cameron, Karen A.; Stibal, Marek; Zarsky, Jakub D.

2016-01-01

The composition and spatial variability of microbial communities that reside within the extensive (>200 000 km(2)) biologically active area encompassing the Greenland ice sheet (GrIS) is hypothesized to be variable. We examined bacterial communities from cryoconite debris and surface ice across...... the GrIS, using sequence analysis and quantitative PCR of 16S rRNA genes from co-extracted DNA and RNA. Communities were found to differ across the ice sheet, with 82.8% of the total calculated variation attributed to spatial distribution on a scale of tens of kilometers separation. Amplicons related...... to Sphingobacteriaceae, Pseudanabaenaceae and WPS-2 accounted for the greatest portion of calculated dissimilarities. The bacterial communities of ice and cryoconite were moderately similar (global R = 0.360, P = 0.002) and the sampled surface type (ice versus cryoconite) did not contribute heavily towards community...

The response of the southern Greenland ice sheet to the Holocene thermal maximum

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Larsen, Nicolaj Krog; Kjaer, Kurt H.; Lecavalier, Benoit

2015-01-01

contribution of 0.16 m sea-level equivalent from the entire Greenland ice sheet, with a centennial ice loss rate of as much as 100 Gt/yr for several millennia during the Holocene thermal maximum. Our results provide an estimate of the long-term rates of volume loss that can be expected in the future...

Greenland Regional and Ice Sheet-wide Geometry Sensitivity to Boundary and Initial conditions

Science.gov (United States)

Logan, L. C.; Narayanan, S. H. K.; Greve, R.; Heimbach, P.

2017-12-01

Ice sheet and glacier model outputs require inputs from uncertainly known initial and boundary conditions, and other parameters. Conservation and constitutive equations formalize the relationship between model inputs and outputs, and the sensitivity of model-derived quantities of interest (e.g., ice sheet volume above floatation) to model variables can be obtained via the adjoint model of an ice sheet. We show how one particular ice sheet model, SICOPOLIS (SImulation COde for POLythermal Ice Sheets), depends on these inputs through comprehensive adjoint-based sensitivity analyses. SICOPOLIS discretizes the shallow-ice and shallow-shelf approximations for ice flow, and is well-suited for paleo-studies of Greenland and Antarctica, among other computational domains. The adjoint model of SICOPOLIS was developed via algorithmic differentiation, facilitated by the source transformation tool OpenAD (developed at Argonne National Lab). While model sensitivity to various inputs can be computed by costly methods involving input perturbation simulations, the time-dependent adjoint model of SICOPOLIS delivers model sensitivities to initial and boundary conditions throughout time at lower cost. Here, we explore both the sensitivities of the Greenland Ice Sheet's entire and regional volumes to: initial ice thickness, precipitation, basal sliding, and geothermal flux over the Holocene epoch. Sensitivity studies such as described here are now accessible to the modeling community, based on the latest version of SICOPOLIS that has been adapted for OpenAD to generate correct and efficient adjoint code.

Late Holocene spatio-temporal variability of the south Greenland Ice Sheet and adjacent mountain glaciers

Science.gov (United States)

Sinclair, G.; Carlson, A. E.; Rood, D. H.; Axford, Y.

2017-12-01

The late Holocene, with its spatially complex pattern of centennial-scale climate variation, is an ideal time period to test the response of the cryosphere to atmospheric and oceanic temperature changes. The south Greenland Ice Sheet (sGrIS), with its proximity to areas of North Atlantic Deep Water formation and a large spectrum of glaciological regimes over a relatively small area, provides an excellent location to examine the spatial heterogeneity of ice-sheet and glacier responses to climate change. Here, we will present 50 Be-10 surface exposure ages from eight moraines in six locations around the margin of the sGrIS. These moraines are located just outboard of historical moraines, and will therefore allow us to constrain the timing of the most extensive prehistoric late-Holocene advance and retreat of ice margins draining the sGrIS and independent valley glaciers. The dataset includes both marine- and land-terminating glaciers draining the sGrIS, the low-altitude Qassimiut lobe, the high-altitude alpine Julianhåb ice cap and isolated valley glaciers. This diverse dataset will allow us to determine to what extent late-Holocene centennial-scale behavior of the ice-sheet and glacier margins were synchronous, perhaps in response to an external climate forcing, or more stochastic, governed instead by local factors such as basal thermal regime, bedrock topography, or microclimates. This has implications for understanding the forcings and responses of cryospheric changes at timescales relevant to human society. In addition to providing context for paleoclimatic and glacial geologic investigations, this work will inform future sea-level projections by providing targets for validating high-resolution ice-sheet and glacier models.

Dark ice dynamics of the south-west Greenland Ice Sheet

Science.gov (United States)

Tedstone, Andrew J.; Bamber, Jonathan L.; Cook, Joseph M.; Williamson, Christopher J.; Fettweis, Xavier; Hodson, Andrew J.; Tranter, Martyn

2017-11-01

Runoff from the Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS) has increased in recent years due largely to changes in atmospheric circulation and atmospheric warming. Albedo reductions resulting from these changes have amplified surface melting. Some of the largest declines in GrIS albedo have occurred in the ablation zone of the south-west sector and are associated with the development of dark ice surfaces. Field observations at local scales reveal that a variety of light-absorbing impurities (LAIs) can be present on the surface, ranging from inorganic particulates to cryoconite materials and ice algae. Meanwhile, satellite observations show that the areal extent of dark ice has varied significantly between recent successive melt seasons. However, the processes that drive such large interannual variability in dark ice extent remain essentially unconstrained. At present we are therefore unable to project how the albedo of bare ice sectors of the GrIS will evolve in the future, causing uncertainty in the projected sea level contribution from the GrIS over the coming decades. Here we use MODIS satellite imagery to examine dark ice dynamics on the south-west GrIS each year from 2000 to 2016. We quantify dark ice in terms of its annual extent, duration, intensity and timing of first appearance. Not only does dark ice extent vary significantly between years but so too does its duration (from 0 to > 80 % of June-July-August, JJA), intensity and the timing of its first appearance. Comparison of dark ice dynamics with potential meteorological drivers from the regional climate model MAR reveals that the JJA sensible heat flux, the number of positive minimum-air-temperature days and the timing of bare ice appearance are significant interannual synoptic controls. We use these findings to identify the surface processes which are most likely to explain recent dark ice dynamics. We suggest that whilst the spatial distribution of dark ice is best explained by outcropping of particulates from

Changes in Greenland ice bed conditions inferred from seismology

Science.gov (United States)

Toyokuni, Genti; Takenaka, Hiroshi; Takagi, Ryota; Kanao, Masaki; Tsuboi, Seiji; Tono, Yoko; Childs, Dean; Zhao, Dapeng

2018-04-01

Basal conditions of the Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS) are a key research topic in climate change studies. The recent construction of a seismic network has provided a new opportunity for direct, real-time, and continuous monitoring of the GrIS. Here we use ambient noise surface wave data from seismic stations all over Greenland for a 4.5-year period to detect changes in Rayleigh-wave phase velocity between seismic station pairs. We observe clear seasonal and long-term velocity changes for many pairs, and propose a plausible mechanism for these changes. Dominant factors driving the velocity changes might be seasonal and long-term pressurization/depressurization of the GrIS and shallow bedrock by air and ice mass loading/unloading. However, heterogeneity of the GrIS basal conditions might impose strong regionalities on the results. An interesting feature is that, even at adjacent two station pairs in the inland GrIS, one pair shows velocity decrease while another shows velocity increase as a response to the high air and snow pressure. The former pair might be located on a thawed bed that decreases velocity by increased meltwater due to pressure melting, whereas the latter pair might be located on a frozen bed that increases velocity by compaction of ice and shallow bedrock. The results suggest that surface waves are very sensitive to the GrIS basal conditions, and further observations will contribute to a more direct and quantitative estimation of water balance in the Arctic region.

Validation and operational measurements with SUSIE – A sar ice motion processing chain developed within promice (Programme for monitoring of Greenland ice-sheet)

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Merryman Boncori, John Peter; Dall, Jørgen; Ahlstrøm, A. P.

2010-01-01

This paper describes the validation of an ice-motion processing chain developed for the PROMICE project – a long-term program funded by the Danish ministry of Climate and Energy to monitor the mass budget of the Greenland ice-sheet. The processor, named SUSIE, (Scripts and Utilities for SAR Ice...

EBSD in Antarctic and Greenland Ice

Science.gov (United States)

Weikusat, Ilka; Kuiper, Ernst-Jan; Pennock, Gill; Sepp, Kipfstuhl; Drury, Martyn

2017-04-01

Ice, particularly the extensive amounts found in the polar ice sheets, impacts directly on the global climate by changing the albedo and indirectly by supplying an enormous water reservoir that affects sea level change. The discharge of material into the oceans is partly controlled by the melt excess over snow accumulation, partly by the dynamic flow of ice. In addition to sliding over bedrock, an ice body deforms gravitationally under its own weight. In order to improve our description of this flow, ice microstructure studies are needed that elucidate the dominant deformation and recrystallization mechanisms involved. Deformation of hexagonal ice is highly anisotropic: ice is easily sheared in the basal plane and is about two orders of magnitude harder parallel to the c-axis. As dislocation creep is the dominant deformation mechanism in polar ice this strong anisotropy needs to be understood in terms of dislocation activity. The high anisotropy of the ice crystal is usually ascribed to a particular behaviour of dislocations in ice, namely the extension of dislocations into partials on the basal plane. Analysis of EBSD data can help our understanding of dislocation activity by characterizing subgrain boundary types thus providing a tool for comprehensive dislocation characterization in polar ice. Cryo-EBSD microstructure in combination with light microscopy measurements from ice core material from Antarctica (EPICA-DML deep ice core) and Greenland (NEEM deep ice core) are presented and interpreted regarding substructure identification and characterization. We examined one depth for each ice core (EDML: 656 m, NEEM: 719 m) to obtain the first comparison of slip system activity from the two ice sheets. The subgrain boundary to grain boundary threshold misorientation was taken to be 3-5° (Weikusat et al. 2011). EBSD analyses suggest that a large portion of edge dislocations with slip systems basal gliding on the basal plane were indeed involved in forming subgrain

Correlating Ice Cores from Quelccaya Ice Cap with Chronology from Little Ice Age Glacial Extents

Science.gov (United States)

Stroup, J. S.; Kelly, M. A.; Lowell, T. V.

2010-12-01

Proxy records indicate Southern Hemisphere climatic changes during the Little Ice Age (LIA; ~1300-1850 AD). In particular, records of change in and around the tropical latitudes require attention because these areas are sensitive to climatic change and record the dynamic interplay between hemispheres (Oerlemans, 2005). Despite this significance, relatively few records exist for the southern tropics. Here we present a reconstruction of glacial fluctuations of Quelccaya Ice Cap (QIC), Peruvian Andes, from pre-LIA up to the present day. In the Qori Kalis valley, extensive sets of moraines exist beginning with the 1963 AD ice margin (Thompson et al., 2006) and getting progressively older down valley. Several of these older moraines can be traced and are continuous with moraines in the Challpa Cocha valley. These moraines have been dated at chronology of past ice cap extents are correlated with ice core records from QIC which show an accumulation increase during ~1500-1700 AD and an accumulation decrease during ~1720-1860 AD (Thompson et al., 1985; 1986; 2006). In addition, other proxy records from Peru and the tropics are correlated with the records at QIC as a means to understand climate conditions during the LIA. This work forms the basis for future modeling of the glacial system during the LIA at QIC and for modeling of past temperature and precipitation regimes at high altitude in the tropics.

Landscape Evolution and the Reincarnation of the Southern Residual Ice Cap

Science.gov (United States)

Byrne, S.; Zuber, M. T.

2006-10-01

Given the present rate of erosion on the southern residual ice cap, it is unlikely that any part of the cap is older than a few centuries. Unless we're lucky, why is there a residual cap present today for us to observe? We propose a solution involving constant destruction and renewal of the cap.

A sea ice model for the marginal ice zone with an application to the Greenland Sea

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Pedersen, Leif Toudal; Coon, Max D.

2004-01-01

A model is presented that describes the formation, transport, and desalinization of frazil and pancake ice as it is formed in marginal seas. This model uses as input the total ice concentration evaluated from Special Sensor Microwave Imager and wind speed and direction. The model calculates...... the areal concentration, thickness, volume concentration, and salinity of frazil ice as well as the areal concentration, thickness, and salinity of pancakes. A simple parameterization for the Odden region of the Greenland Sea is presented. The model is run for the winter of 1996-1997. There are direct...... observations of the thickness and salinity of pancakes and the volume concentration of frazil ice to compare with the model. The model results compare very well with the measured data. This new ice model can be tuned to work in marginal seas elsewhere to calculate ice thickness, motion, and brine rejection...

Inverse stochastic–dynamic models for high-resolution Greenland ice core records

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

N. Boers

2017-12-01

Full Text Available Proxy records from Greenland ice cores have been studied for several decades, yet many open questions remain regarding the climate variability encoded therein. Here, we use a Bayesian framework for inferring inverse, stochastic–dynamic models from δ18O and dust records of unprecedented, subdecadal temporal resolution. The records stem from the North Greenland Ice Core Project (NGRIP, and we focus on the time interval 59–22 ka b2k. Our model reproduces the dynamical characteristics of both the δ18O and dust proxy records, including the millennial-scale Dansgaard–Oeschger variability, as well as statistical properties such as probability density functions, waiting times and power spectra, with no need for any external forcing. The crucial ingredients for capturing these properties are (i high-resolution training data, (ii cubic drift terms, (iii nonlinear coupling terms between the δ18O and dust time series, and (iv non-Markovian contributions that represent short-term memory effects.

Inverse stochastic-dynamic models for high-resolution Greenland ice core records

Science.gov (United States)

Boers, Niklas; Chekroun, Mickael D.; Liu, Honghu; Kondrashov, Dmitri; Rousseau, Denis-Didier; Svensson, Anders; Bigler, Matthias; Ghil, Michael

2017-12-01

Proxy records from Greenland ice cores have been studied for several decades, yet many open questions remain regarding the climate variability encoded therein. Here, we use a Bayesian framework for inferring inverse, stochastic-dynamic models from δ18O and dust records of unprecedented, subdecadal temporal resolution. The records stem from the North Greenland Ice Core Project (NGRIP), and we focus on the time interval 59-22 ka b2k. Our model reproduces the dynamical characteristics of both the δ18O and dust proxy records, including the millennial-scale Dansgaard-Oeschger variability, as well as statistical properties such as probability density functions, waiting times and power spectra, with no need for any external forcing. The crucial ingredients for capturing these properties are (i) high-resolution training data, (ii) cubic drift terms, (iii) nonlinear coupling terms between the δ18O and dust time series, and (iv) non-Markovian contributions that represent short-term memory effects.

Isotopes in Greenland Precipitation

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Faber, Anne-Katrine

Greenland ice cores offer a unique opportunity to investigate the climate system behaviour. The objective of this PhD project is to investigate isotope modelling of present- day conditions and conduct model-data comparison using Greenland ice cores. Thus this thesis investigates how the integration...... of model and data can be used to improve the understanding of climate changes. This is done through analysis of isotope modelling, observations and ice core measurements. This dissertation comprises three projects: (1) Modelling the isotopic response to changes in Arctic sea surface conditions, (2......) Constructing a new Greenland database of observations and present-day ice core measurements, and (3) Performance test of isotope-enabled CAM5 for Greenland. The recent decades of rapid Arctic sea ice decline are used as a basis for an observational-based model experiment using the isotope-enabled CAM model 3...

Lacustrine Records of Holocene Mountain Glacier Fluctuations from Western Greenland

Science.gov (United States)

Schweinsberg, A.; Briner, J. P.; Bennike, O.

2014-12-01

Recent studies have focused on documenting fluctuations of the Greenland Ice Sheet margin throughout the Holocene but few data exist that constrain past changes of local glaciers independent of the ice sheet. Our research combines proglacial lake sediment analysis with cosmogenic 10Be dating of Holocene moraines and radiocarbon dating of ice-cap-killed vegetation with an overall objective to use this multi-proxy approach to generate a detailed record of the coupled climate-glacier system through the Holocene. Here, we present lacustrine records of mountain glacier variability from continuous pro-glacial lake sediment sequences recovered from two glaciated catchments in northeastern Nuussuaq, western Greenland. We use radiocarbon-dated sediments from Sikuiui and Pauiaivik lakes to reconstruct the timing of advance and retreat of local glaciers. Sediments were characterized with magnetic susceptibility (MS), gamma density, Itrax XRF and visible reflectance spectroscopy at 0.2 cm intervals and sediment organic matter at 0.5 cm intervals. Basal radiocarbon ages provide minimum-age constraints on deglaciation from Sikuiui and Pauiaivik lakes of ~9.6 and 8.7 ka, respectively. Organic-rich gyttja from deglaciation until ~5.0 ka in Pauiaivik Lake suggests minimal glacial extent there while slightly elevated MS values from ~9.0 - 7.0 ka in Sikuiui Lake may reflect early Holocene glacial advances. Minerogenic sediment input gradually increases starting at ~5.0 ka in Pauiaivik Lake, which we interpret as the onset of Neoglaciation in the catchment. Furthermore, a distinct episode of enhanced glacial activity from ~4.0 - 2.2 ka in Sikuiui Lake may be correlative to a period of persistent snowline lowering evidenced by radiocarbon dates of ice-killed vegetation from nearby ice cap margins. Results from these lacustrine records and our ice-killed vegetation dataset suggest a middle Holocene onset of Neoglaciation ~5.0 - 4.0 ka in this region. We are supplementing these records

Airborne Laser Altimetry Mapping of the Greenland Ice Sheet: Application to Mass Balance Assessment

Science.gov (United States)

Abdalati, W.; Krabill, W.; Frederick, E.; Manizade, S.; Martin, C.; Sonntag, J.; Swift, R.; Thomas, R.; Wright, W.; Yungel, J.

2000-01-01

In 1998 and '99, the Arctic Ice Mapping (AIM) program completed resurveys of lines occupied 5 years earlier revealing elevation changes of the Greenland ice sheet and identifying areas of significant thinning, thickening and balance. In planning these surveys, consideration had to be given to the spatial constraints associated with aircraft operation, the spatial nature of ice sheet behavior, and limited resources, as well as temporal issues, such as seasonal and interannual variability in the context of measurement accuracy. This paper examines the extent to which the sampling and survey strategy is valid for drawing conclusions on the current state of balance of the Greenland ice sheet. The surveys covered the entire ice sheet with an average distance of 21.4 km between each location on the ice sheet and the nearest flight line. For most of the ice sheet, the elevation changes show relatively little spatial variability, and their magnitudes are significantly smaller than the observed elevation change signal. As a result, we conclude that the density of the sampling and the accuracy of the measurements are sufficient to draw meaningful conclusions on the state of balance of the entire ice sheet over the five-year survey period. Outlet glaciers, however, show far more spatial and temporal variability, and each of the major ones is likely to require individual surveys in order to determine its balance.

Ice dynamic response to two modes of surface lake drainage on the Greenland ice sheet

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Tedesco, Marco; Alexander, Patrick; Willis, Ian C; Banwell, Alison F; Arnold, Neil S; Hoffman, Matthew J

2013-01-01

Supraglacial lake drainage on the Greenland ice sheet opens surface-to-bed connections, reduces basal friction, and temporarily increases ice flow velocities by up to an order of magnitude. Existing field-based observations of lake drainages and their impact on ice dynamics are limited, and focus on one specific draining mechanism. Here, we report and analyse global positioning system measurements of ice velocity and elevation made at five locations surrounding two lakes that drained by different mechanisms and produced different dynamic responses. For the lake that drained slowly (>24 h) by overtopping its basin, delivering water via a channel to a pre-existing moulin, speedup and uplift were less than half those associated with a lake that drained rapidly (∼2 h) through hydrofracturing and the creation of new moulins in the lake bottom. Our results suggest that the mode and associated rate of lake drainage govern the impact on ice dynamics. (letter)

The Gregoriev Ice Cap length changes derived by 2-D ice flow line model for harmonic climate histories

OpenAIRE

Konovalov, Y. V.; Nagornov, O. V.

2009-01-01

Different ice thickness distributions along the flow line and the flow line length changes of the Gregoriev Ice Cap, Terskey Ala-Tau, Central Asia, were obtained for some surface mass balance histories which can be considered as possible surface mass balances in the future. The ice cap modeling was performed by solving of steady state hydrodynamic equations in the case of low Reynolds number in the form of the mechanical equilibrium equation in terms of stress deviator components coupled with...

Firn thickness variations across the Northeast Greenland Ice Stream margins indicating nonlinear densification rates

Science.gov (United States)

Riverman, K. L.; Anandakrishnan, S.; Alley, R. B.; Peters, L. E.; Christianson, K. A.; Muto, A.

2013-12-01

Northeast Greenland Ice Stream (NEGIS) is the largest ice stream in Greenland, draining approximately 8.4% of the ice sheet's area. The flow pattern and stability mechanism of this ice stream are unique to others in Greenland and Antarctica, and merit further study to ascertain the sensitivity of this ice stream to future climate change. Geophysical methods are valuable tools for this application, but their results are sensitive to the structure of the firn and any spatial variations in firn properties across a given study region. Here we present firn data from a 40-km-long seismic profile across the upper reaches of NEGIS, collected in the summer of 2012 as part of an integrated ground-based geophysical survey. We find considerable variations in firn thickness that are coincident with the ice stream shear margins, where a thinner firn layer is present within the margins, and a thicker, more uniform firn layer is present elsewhere in our study region. Higher accumulation rates in the marginal surface troughs due to drift-snow trapping can account for some of this increased densification; however, our seismic results also highlight enhanced anisotropy within the firn and upper ice column that is confined to narrow bands within the shear margins. We thus interpret these large firn thickness variations and abrupt changes in anisotropy as indicators of firn densification dependent on the effective stress state as well as the overburden pressure, suggesting that the strain rate increases nonlinearly with stress across the shear margins. A GPS strain grid maintained for three weeks across both margins observed strong side shearing, with rapid stretching and then compression along particle paths, indicating large deviatoric stresses in the margins. This work demonstrates the importance of developing a high-resolution firn densification model when conducting geophysical field work in regions possessing a complex ice flow history; it also motivates the need for a more

Greenland climate change

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Masson-Delmotte, Valérie; Swingedouw, Didier; Landais, Amaëlle

2012-01-01

Climate archives available from deep-sea and marine shelf sediments, glaciers, lakes and ice cores in and around Greenland allow us to place the current trends in regional climate, ice sheet dynamics, and land surface changes in a broader perspective. We show that during the last decade (2000s......), atmospheric and sea-surface temperatures are reaching levels last encountered millennia ago when northern high latitude summer insolation was higher due to a different orbital configuration. Concurrently, records from lake sediments in southern Greenland document major environmental and climatic conditions...... regional climate and ice sheet dynamics. The magnitude and rate of future changes in Greenland temperature, in response to increasing greenhouse gas emissions, may be faster than any past abrupt events occurring under interglacial conditions. Projections indicate that within one century Greenland may...

Sea-ice thickness from airborne laser altimetry over the Arctic Ocean north of Greenland

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Hvidegaard, Sine Munk; Forsberg, René

2002-01-01

We present a new method to measure ice thickness of polar sea-ice freeboard heights, using airborne laser altimetry combined with a precise geoid model, giving estimates of thickness of ice through isostatic equilibrium assumptions. In the paper we analyze a number of flights from the Polar Sea off...... Northern Greenland, and estimate accuracies of the estimated freeboard values to be at a 13 cm level, corresponding to about 1 m in absolute thickness....

Supraglacial Lakes in the Percolation Zone of the Western Greenland Ice Sheet: Formation and Development using Operation IceBridge Snow Radar and ATM (2009-2014)

Science.gov (United States)

Chen, C.; Howat, I. M.; de la Peña, S.

2015-12-01

Surface meltwater lakes on the Greenland Ice Sheet have appeared at higher elevations, extending well into the percolation zone, under recent warming, with the largest expansion occurring in the western Greenland Ice Sheet. The conditions that allow lakes to form atop firn are poorly constrained, but the formation of new lakes imply changes in the permeability of the firn at high elevations, promoting meltwater runoff. We explore the formation and evolution of new surface lakes in this region above 1500 meters, using a combination of satellite imagery and repeat Snow (2-6.5 GHz) radar echograms and LIDAR measurements from NASA's Operation IceBridge of 2009-2014. We identify conditions for surface lake formation at their farthest inland extent and suggest behaviors of persistence and lake drainage are due to differences in regional ice dynamics.

delta 18O variations in snow on the Devon Island ice cap, Northwest Territories, Canada

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Koerner, R.; Russel, R.D.

1979-01-01

A study of delta 18 O variations of snow samples taken on traverses across the Devon Island ice cap in June 1971, 1972, and 1973 has shown a difference between the accumulation conditions on the souteast and nortwest sides of the ice cap. On the souteast side there is an increasing depletion of 18 O in the snow with increasing elevation. This pattern is attibuted to the effect of orographic uplift of air masses moving over the ice cap from the southeast, which promotes condensation and precipitation due to adiabatic cooling. On the northwest side of the ice cap there is no evidence of any further depletion of 18 O in snow, neither with increasing distance from the possible moisture source in Baffin Bay to the southeast nor with increasing elevation if the air mass comes from the northwest. In this case condensation is due to isobaric cooling so that precipitation is generally from level cloud bases. The changes inferred for the isotopic composition of the water vapour as it rises up the southeast slope are found to be consistent with its depletion through precipitation under near-equilibrium conditions. It is calculated that approximately 30% of the moisture at sea level on the southeast side of the ice cap and 8% at the top of the ice cap are of local origin. Lower temporal and aerial variability of the delta values on the southeast side of the ice cap is attributed to dominance of the Baffin Bay low on that side Effecting consistency of storm conditions there. The delta values of ice in the ablation zone on the Sverdrup Glacier show the combined effect of ice movement from the accumulation to the ablation zone and climatic change during the period of movement from cold to warm and back to cold conditions again. (auth)

Tomographic SAR analysis of subsurface ice structure in Greenland: first results

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Banda, Francesco; Dall, Jørgen; Tebaldini, Stefano

2013-01-01

structure with P-band SAR tomography. First results from ESA IceSAR 2012 campaign carried out in south-west Greenland are presented. It is found that significant penetration in the upper layers of glacial subsurface can be achieved up to an extent of about 20–60 m, conditional on the different type...

Differences in plankton community structure and carbon cycling along a climate gradient from the Greenland Ice Sheet to offshore waters

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Arendt, K.E.; Nielsen, Torkel Gissel; Rysgaard, S.

Huge differences in plankton community structures and biomasses are observed along a climate gradient from the Greenland Ice Sheet to offshore waters at the West Greenland coast. The offshore region has a high biomass of copepods dominated by Calanus spp., which are capable of consuming 55....... Protozooplankton accounts for 20-38% of the carbon turnover in the offshore and inland areas. However, protozooplankton like copepods has low ability to turn over the primary production close to the Ice Sheet. Increased run of from the Greenland Ice Sheet due to global warming could displace the existing climate...... gradient. This would have a profound influence on the future plankton community structure as well as the energy transfer to higher trophic levels in Arctic coastal ecosystems....

Direct measurements of meltwater runoff on the Greenland ice sheet surface.

Science.gov (United States)

Smith, Laurence C; Yang, Kang; Pitcher, Lincoln H; Overstreet, Brandon T; Chu, Vena W; Rennermalm, Åsa K; Ryan, Jonathan C; Cooper, Matthew G; Gleason, Colin J; Tedesco, Marco; Jeyaratnam, Jeyavinoth; van As, Dirk; van den Broeke, Michiel R; van de Berg, Willem Jan; Noël, Brice; Langen, Peter L; Cullather, Richard I; Zhao, Bin; Willis, Michael J; Hubbard, Alun; Box, Jason E; Jenner, Brittany A; Behar, Alberto E

2017-12-12

Meltwater runoff from the Greenland ice sheet surface influences surface mass balance (SMB), ice dynamics, and global sea level rise, but is estimated with climate models and thus difficult to validate. We present a way to measure ice surface runoff directly, from hourly in situ supraglacial river discharge measurements and simultaneous high-resolution satellite/drone remote sensing of upstream fluvial catchment area. A first 72-h trial for a 63.1-km 2 moulin-terminating internally drained catchment (IDC) on Greenland's midelevation (1,207-1,381 m above sea level) ablation zone is compared with melt and runoff simulations from HIRHAM5, MAR3.6, RACMO2.3, MERRA-2, and SEB climate/SMB models. Current models cannot reproduce peak discharges or timing of runoff entering moulins but are improved using synthetic unit hydrograph (SUH) theory. Retroactive SUH applications to two older field studies reproduce their findings, signifying that remotely sensed IDC area, shape, and supraglacial river length are useful for predicting delays in peak runoff delivery to moulins. Applying SUH to HIRHAM5, MAR3.6, and RACMO2.3 gridded melt products for 799 surrounding IDCs suggests their terminal moulins receive lower peak discharges, less diurnal variability, and asynchronous runoff timing relative to climate/SMB model output alone. Conversely, large IDCs produce high moulin discharges, even at high elevations where melt rates are low. During this particular field experiment, models overestimated runoff by +21 to +58%, linked to overestimated surface ablation and possible meltwater retention in bare, porous, low-density ice. Direct measurements of ice surface runoff will improve climate/SMB models, and incorporating remotely sensed IDCs will aid coupling of SMB with ice dynamics and subglacial systems. Copyright © 2017 the Author(s). Published by PNAS.

Direct measurements of meltwater runoff on the Greenland ice sheet surface

Science.gov (United States)

Smith, Laurence C.; Yang, Kang; Pitcher, Lincoln H.; Overstreet, Brandon T.; Chu, Vena W.; Rennermalm, Åsa K.; Ryan, Jonathan C.; Cooper, Matthew G.; Gleason, Colin J.; Tedesco, Marco; Jeyaratnam, Jeyavinoth; van As, Dirk; van den Broeke, Michiel R.; van de Berg, Willem Jan; Noël, Brice; Langen, Peter L.; Cullather, Richard I.; Zhao, Bin; Willis, Michael J.; Hubbard, Alun; Box, Jason E.; Jenner, Brittany A.; Behar, Alberto E.

2017-12-01

Meltwater runoff from the Greenland ice sheet surface influences surface mass balance (SMB), ice dynamics, and global sea level rise, but is estimated with climate models and thus difficult to validate. We present a way to measure ice surface runoff directly, from hourly in situ supraglacial river discharge measurements and simultaneous high-resolution satellite/drone remote sensing of upstream fluvial catchment area. A first 72-h trial for a 63.1-km2 moulin-terminating internally drained catchment (IDC) on Greenland's midelevation (1,207–1,381 m above sea level) ablation zone is compared with melt and runoff simulations from HIRHAM5, MAR3.6, RACMO2.3, MERRA-2, and SEB climate/SMB models. Current models cannot reproduce peak discharges or timing of runoff entering moulins but are improved using synthetic unit hydrograph (SUH) theory. Retroactive SUH applications to two older field studies reproduce their findings, signifying that remotely sensed IDC area, shape, and supraglacial river length are useful for predicting delays in peak runoff delivery to moulins. Applying SUH to HIRHAM5, MAR3.6, and RACMO2.3 gridded melt products for 799 surrounding IDCs suggests their terminal moulins receive lower peak discharges, less diurnal variability, and asynchronous runoff timing relative to climate/SMB model output alone. Conversely, large IDCs produce high moulin discharges, even at high elevations where melt rates are low. During this particular field experiment, models overestimated runoff by +21 to +58%, linked to overestimated surface ablation and possible meltwater retention in bare, porous, low-density ice. Direct measurements of ice surface runoff will improve climate/SMB models, and incorporating remotely sensed IDCs will aid coupling of SMB with ice dynamics and subglacial systems.

Comparison of northern and central Greenland ice cores records of methanesulfonate covering the last glacial period

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Jonsell, U.; Hansson, M. E.; Siggaard-Andersen, M-L-

2007-01-01

Methanesulfonate (MS-) is measured in ice cores with the objective to obtain a proxy record of marine phytoplankton production of dimethylsulfide (DMS). We present a continuous MS- record covering the last glacial period from the North Greenland Ice Core Project (NGRIP) ice core and compare...... this record with the corresponding records previously presented from Greenland and, in particular, with the GISP2 ice core located 320 km south of NGRIP. Despite that the records have similar mean concentrations, their responses to climatic changes during the last glacial period are slightly different. NGRIP...... MS- concentrations were higher during the cold marine isotopic stages (MIS) 2 and 4 and lower during the warm MIS 5. This long-term trend in MS-, which is similar to the inverse of the corresponding trend in d 18O, is not detected in the GISP2 MS- record. A systematic response in MS- concentrations...

Socio-economic and cultural aspecrs of changes in the Greenland Ice Sheet

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Moshøj, Charlotte Margaret

2009-01-01

! is chapter evaluates the possibility for projecting socio-economic and cultural impacts on Greenland’s society caused directly or indirectly by changes in the Greenland Ice Sheet. ! ere are, as yet, no well-documented direct causative links between the conditions for a society dictated by nature...

Current and future darkening of the Greenland ice sheet

Science.gov (United States)

Tedesco, Marco; Stroeve, Julienne; Fettweis, Xavier; Warren, Stephen; Doherty, Sarah; Noble, Erik; Alexander, Patrick

2015-04-01

Surface melting over the Greenland ice sheet (GIS) promotes snow grains growth, reducing albedo and further enhancing melting through the increased amount of absorbed solar radiation. Using a combination of remote sensing data and outputs of a regional climate model, we show that albedo over the GIS decreased significantly from 1996 to 2012. Further, we show that most of this darkening can be accounted for by enhanced snow grain growth and the expansion of areas where bare ice is exposed, both of which are driven by increases in snow warming. An analysis of the impact of light-absorbing impurities on albedo trends detected from spaceborne measurements was inconclusive because the estimated impact for concentrations of impurities of order of magnitude found in Greenland is within the albedo uncertainty retrievable from space-based instruments. However, neither models nor observations show an increase in pollutants (black carbon and associated organics) in the atmosphere over the GIS in this time period. Additionally, we could not identify trends in the number of fires over North America and Russia, assumed to be among the sources of soot for Greenland. We did find that a 'dark band' of tilted ice plays a crucial role in decreasing albedo along the west margin, and there is some indication that dust deposition to the GIS may be decreasing albedo in this region but this is not conclusive. In addition to looking at the direct impact of impurities on albedo, we estimated the impact of impurities on albedo via their influence on grain growth and found it is relatively small (~ 1- 2 %), though more sophisticated analysis needs to be carried out. Projections obtained under different warming scenarios consistently point to a continued darkening, with anomalies in albedo driven solely by the effects of climate warming of as much as -0.12 along the west margin of the GIS by the end of this century (with respect to year 2000). Projected darkening is likely underestimated

Airborne observations of changes of ice sheet and sea ice in the Arctic using CryoVEx campaign data

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Hvidegaard, Sine Munk; Skourup, Henriette; Forsberg, René

measurements of ice sheet changes. The majority of the campaigns have been sponsored by the European Space Agency, ESA, as part of the CryoSat Validation Experiments – CryoVEx. These have been internationally coordinated efforts to collect coincident space‐borne, airborne, and in‐situ data for pre‐ and post...... cap (Svalbard), the EGIG line crossing the Greenland Ice Sheet, as well as the sea ice north of Alert and sea ice around Svalbard in the Fram Strait. Selected tracks were planned to match CryoSat‐2 passes and a few of them were flown in formation flight with the Alfred Wegener Institute (AWI) Polar‐5...

Envisat-derived elevation changes of the Greenland ice sheet, and a comparison with ICESat results in the accumulation area

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Sørensen, Louise Sandberg; Simonsen, Sebastian Bjerregaard; Meister, Rakia

2015-01-01

We show, for the first time over the Greenland ice sheet, that an along track method for deriving rates of elevationchange can successfully be applied to Envisat radar altimetry data (2002–2010). The results provide improved resolution and coverage compared to previous results obtained from cross......-over methods. Also, we find that temporal changes in the elevation change rate can be derived from Envisat data, and show clearexamples of this by generating five-year running means for selected areas of the Greenland ice sheet. For a period between 2003 and 2009, the elevation of the ice sheetswas measured...

Implications of changing scattering properties on Greenland ice sheet volume change from Cryosat-2 altimetry

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Simonsen, Sebastian Bjerregaard; Sørensen, Louise Sandberg

2017-01-01

) in the elevation change algorithm, to correct for temporal changes in the ratio between surface- and volume-scatter in Cryosat-2 observations. We present elevation and volume changes for the Greenland ice sheet in the period from 2010 until 2014. The waveform parameters considered here are the backscatter...... waveform parameters to be applicable for correcting for changes in volume scattering. The best results in the Synthetic Aperture Radar Interferometric mode area of the GrIS are found when applying only the backscatter correction, whereas the best result in the Low Resolution Mode area is obtained by only......Long-term observations of surface elevation change of the Greenland ice sheet (GrIS) is of utmost importance when assessing the state of the ice sheet. Satellite radar altimetry offers a long time series of data over the GrIS, starting with ERS-1 in 1991. ESA's Cryosat-2 mission, launched in 2010...

Landscape Evolution and the Reincarnation of the Residual CO2 Ice Cap of Mars

Science.gov (United States)

Byrne, S.; Zuber, M.

2006-12-01

Observations of the southern residual CO2 cap of Mars reveal a wide range of landforms including flat-floored quasi-circular pits with steep walls (dubbed Swiss-cheese features). Interannual comparisons show that these depressions are expanding laterally at rates of ~2m/yr to ~4m/yr, prompting suggestions of climate change. The residual CO2 ice cap is up to 10m thick and underlain by an involatile basement, it also contains layers roughly 2m thick representing different accumulation episodes in the recent past. Changes in the appearance of the residual ice between the Mariner 9 and Viking missions indicate that the top-most layer was deposited in that time-frame, soon after the global dust storm of 1971. The spatial density of the Swiss-cheese features, and the rate at which they expand, mean that it is unlikely that any part of the residual ice cap is older than a few centuries. Given this, we may ask: how can there be a residual cap present today for us to observe? To answer this and other questions we have developed a model to examine the evolution of a CO2 ice landscape. This model reproduces the morphologies and expansion rates seen in the actual residual CO2 ice cap. Our model results indicate that the fate of CO2 ice surfaces is controlled by their surface roughness. Surface roughness always increases with time, which results in an unstable situation. When the surface roughness exceeds a critical point small pits can begin to develop. The walls of these pits rapidly steepen and begin retreating which enlarges and deepens the pit. This situation always occurs even if the surface of the CO2 slab has a high enough albedo to have a net mass gain each year. Once these pits begin expanding they quickly erode the entire ice slab. When the underlying non-CO2 material is exposed, it will not frost over again if Mars were to repeat like clockwork every year. We conclude that interannual climatic variability is actually a requirement for the continued existence of a

The Greenland Ice Sheet at the peak of warming during the previous Interglacial

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

O. O. Rybak

2014-01-01

Full Text Available The Last Interglacial (LIG or the Eemian between ca. 130 and 115 kyr BP is probably the best analogue for future climate warming for which increasingly better proxy data are becoming available. The volume of the Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS during this period is of particular interest to better assess how much and how fast sea-level can rise in a future Earth undergoing gradual climatic warming. Sea-level during the LIG is inferred to have been up to 9 meter higher than today, but contribution of the GrIS into this rise remains unclear. Various ice-sheet modeling studies have come up with a very broad range of the LIG volume loss by the GrIS to between 60 cm and 6 m of equivalent sea-level rise. This wide range is explained by the sensitivity of GrIS models to the imposed climatic conditions and to poor knowledge of the LIG climate itself in terms of the magnitude and precise timing of the maximum warming, as well as in terms of spatial and annual patterns. To partially circumvent these uncertainties we made use of the newest temperature record over the Central Greenland reconstructed from the isotopic composition of the recently obtained NEEM ice core containing undisturbed LIG segment to build the climatic forcing of the model. The NEEM record unequivocally indicates times of the start and of the end of the LIG warming in Greenland as well as the duration of the warmest time period within the Eemian. Using a three-dimensional thermomechanical ice-sheet model, we produced an ensemble of possible LIG configurations by varying only four key parameters for temperature, precipitation rate, surface melting magnitude and melting pattern within realistic bounds. The outcome of a series of the numerical experiments is a variety of glaciologically consistent GrIS geometries corresponding to a wide range of possible «climates». To constrain the ensemble of GrIS geometries, we used data inferred from 5 Greenland ice cores such as the presence or absence of

Classification of new-ice in the Greenland Sea using Satellite SSM/I radiometer and SeaWinds scatterometer data and comparison with ice model

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Tonboe, Rasmus; Pedersen, Leif Toudal

2005-01-01

In the ice covered waters of the Greenland Sea the polarisation ratio of QuikSCAT SeaWinds Ku-band (13.4 GHz) scatterometer measurements and the polarisation ratio of DMSP-SSM/I 19 GHz radiometer measurements are used in combination to classify new-ice and mature ice. In particular, the formation...... to the physical transition of the ice cover from pancake ice to a consolidated young-ice sheet. The classification of each pixel into ice or water is done using two scatterometer parameters, namely the polarisation ratio and the daily standard deviation of the backscatter. (C) 2005 Elsevier Inc. All rights...

How Greenland melts

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

van den Broeke M.R.

2010-12-01

Full Text Available Satellite altimetry and gravimetry show that the Greenland ice sheet has been losing volume and mass since the beginning of this century. However, from these short time series of direct measurements we cannot infer what the causes of the mass loss are, i.e. ice dynamics or surface processes, or that maybe the ice sheet returns to normal after a period of volume increase and mass gain. By modelling and observing the individual components of the ice sheet mass balance, i.e. snowfall, meltwater runoff and iceberg production, we are able to identify the processes that led to the recent mass loss. We conclude that the Greenland ice sheet is significantly out of balance. Acceleration of outlet glaciers and increased runoff have contributed equally to recent Greenland mass loss. The potential for mass loss by surface processes, however, was three times greater than actually observed, due to refreezing and enhanced snowfall.

Holocene landscape history and ground ice distribution in Svalbard and NE-Greenland

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Cable, Stefanie

This PhD study contributes to the scarce knowledge of permafrost dynamics in mountainous terrain. In High-Arctic valleys, on Svalbard and in NE-Greenland, linkages between geomorphology and ground ice- and carbon distribution have been described, quantified and compared between landscape types...... and locations. To achieve this, detailed geomorphological mapping was combined with cryostratigraphic and laboratory analyses (grain size, solutes, radiocarbon- and optically stimulated luminescence-age) of 31 permafrost cores (up to 16 m) from seven different landforms. Ground ice in permafrost has been...

Erosion patterns produced by the paleo Haizishan ice cap, SE Tibetan Plateau

Science.gov (United States)

Fu, P.; Stroeven, A. P.; Harbor, J.; Hättestrand, C.; Heyman, J.; Caffee, M. W.

2017-12-01

Erosion is a primary driver of landscape evolution, topographic relief production, geochemical cycles, and climate change. Combining in situ 10Be and 26Al exposure age dating, geomorphological mapping, and field investigations, we examine glacial erosion patterns of the almost 4,000 km2 paleo Haizishan ice cap on the southeastern Tibetan Plateau. Our results show that ice caps on the low relief Haizishan Plateau produced a zonal pattern of landscape modification. In locations where apparent exposure ages on bedrock are consistent with the last deglaciation, complete resetting of the cosmogenic exposure age clock indicates glacial erosion of at least a few meters. However, older apparent exposure ages on bedrock in areas known to have been covered by the paleo ice cap during the Last Glacial Maximum indicate inheritance and thus limited glacial erosion. Inferred surface exposure ages from cosmogenic depth profiles through two saprolites vary from resetting and thus saprolite profile truncation to nuclide inheritance indicating limited erosion. Finally, significant nuclide inheritance in river sand samples from basins on the scoured plateau surface also indicate limited glacial erosion during the last glaciation. Hence, for the first time, our study shows clear evidence of preservation under non-erosive ice on the Tibetan Plateau. As patterns of glacial erosion intensity are largely driven by the basal thermal regime, our results confirm earlier inferences from geomorphology for a concentric basal thermal pattern for the paleo Haizishan ice cap during the LGM.

The Distribution of Basal Water Beneath the Greenland Ice Sheet from Radio-Echo Sounding

Science.gov (United States)

Jordan, T.; Williams, C.; Schroeder, D. M.; Martos, Y. M.; Cooper, M.; Siegert, M. J.; Paden, J. D.; Huybrechts, P.; Bamber, J. L.

2017-12-01

There is widespread, but often indirect, evidence that a significant fraction of the Greenland Ice Sheet is thawed at the bed. This includes major outlet glaciers and around the NorthGRIP ice-core in the interior. However, the ice-sheet-wide distribution of basal water is poorly constrained by existing observations, and the spatial relationship between basal water and other ice-sheet and subglacial properties is therefore largely unexplored. In principle, airborne radio-echo sounding (RES) surveys provide the necessary information and spatial coverage to infer the presence of basal water at the ice-sheet scale. However, due to uncertainty and spatial variation in radar signal attenuation, the commonly used water diagnostic, bed-echo reflectivity, is highly ambiguous and prone to spatial bias. Here we introduce a new RES diagnostic for the presence of basal water which incorporates both sharp step-transitions and rapid fluctuations in bed-echo reflectivity. This has the advantage of being (near) independent of attenuation model, and enables a decade of recent Operation Ice Bride RES survey data to be combined in a single map for basal water. The ice-sheet-wide water predictions are compared with: bed topography and drainage network structure, existing knowledge of the thermal state and geothermal heat flux, and ice velocity. In addition to the fast flowing ice-sheet margins, we also demonstrate widespread water routing and storage in parts of the slow-flowing northern interior. Notably, this includes a quasi-linear `corridor' of basal water, extending from NorthGRIP to Petermann glacier, which spatially correlates with a region of locally high (magnetic-derived) geothermal heat flux. The predicted water distribution places a new constraint upon the basal thermal state of the Greenland Ice Sheet, and could be used as an input for ice-sheet model simulations.

Satellite-derived submarine melt rates and mass balance (2011-2015) for Greenland's largest remaining ice tongues

Science.gov (United States)

Wilson, Nat; Straneo, Fiammetta; Heimbach, Patrick

2017-12-01

Ice-shelf-like floating extensions at the termini of Greenland glaciers are undergoing rapid changes with potential implications for the stability of upstream glaciers and the ice sheet as a whole. While submarine melting is recognized as a major contributor to mass loss, the spatial distribution of submarine melting and its contribution to the total mass balance of these floating extensions is incompletely known and understood. Here, we use high-resolution WorldView satellite imagery collected between 2011 and 2015 to infer the magnitude and spatial variability of melt rates under Greenland's largest remaining ice tongues - Nioghalvfjerdsbræ (79 North Glacier, 79N), Ryder Glacier (RG), and Petermann Glacier (PG). Submarine melt rates under the ice tongues vary considerably, exceeding 50 m a-1 near the grounding zone and decaying rapidly downstream. Channels, likely originating from upstream subglacial channels, give rise to large melt variations across the ice tongues. We compare the total melt rates to the influx of ice to the ice tongue to assess their contribution to the current mass balance. At Petermann Glacier and Ryder Glacier, we find that the combined submarine and aerial melt approximately balances the ice flux from the grounded ice sheet. At Nioghalvfjerdsbræ the total melt flux (14.2 ± 0.96 km3 a-1 w.e., water equivalent) exceeds the inflow of ice (10.2 ± 0.59 km3 a-1 w.e.), indicating present thinning of the ice tongue.

Multi-decadal record of ice dynamics on Daugaard Jensen Gletscher, East Greenland, from satellite imagery and terrestrial measurements

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Stearns, L.A.; Hamilton, G.S.; Reeh, Niels

2005-01-01

The history of ice velocity and calving front position of Daugaard Jensen Gletscher, a large outlet glacier in East Greenland, is reconstructed from field measurements, aerial photography and satellite imagery for the period 1950-2001. The calving terminus of the glacier has remained in approxima......The history of ice velocity and calving front position of Daugaard Jensen Gletscher, a large outlet glacier in East Greenland, is reconstructed from field measurements, aerial photography and satellite imagery for the period 1950-2001. The calving terminus of the glacier has remained...

Ocean Tide Influences on the Antarctic and Greenland Ice Sheets

Science.gov (United States)

Padman, Laurie; Siegfried, Matthew R.; Fricker, Helen A.

2018-03-01

Ocean tides are the main source of high-frequency variability in the vertical and horizontal motion of ice sheets near their marine margins. Floating ice shelves, which occupy about three quarters of the perimeter of Antarctica and the termini of four outlet glaciers in northern Greenland, rise and fall in synchrony with the ocean tide. Lateral motion of floating and grounded portions of ice sheets near their marine margins can also include a tidal component. These tide-induced signals provide insight into the processes by which the oceans can affect ice sheet mass balance and dynamics. In this review, we summarize in situ and satellite-based measurements of the tidal response of ice shelves and grounded ice, and spatial variability of ocean tide heights and currents around the ice sheets. We review sensitivity of tide heights and currents as ocean geometry responds to variations in sea level, ice shelf thickness, and ice sheet mass and extent. We then describe coupled ice-ocean models and analytical glacier models that quantify the effect of ocean tides on lower-frequency ice sheet mass loss and motion. We suggest new observations and model developments to improve the representation of tides in coupled models that are used to predict future ice sheet mass loss and the associated contribution to sea level change. The most critical need is for new data to improve maps of bathymetry, ice shelf draft, spatial variability of the drag coefficient at the ice-ocean interface, and higher-resolution models with improved representation of tidal energy sinks.

Spatiotemporal variability in surface energy balance across tundra, snow and ice in Greenland

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Lund, Magnus; Stiegler, Christian; Abermann, Jakob

2017-01-01

The surface energy balance (SEB) is essential for understanding the coupled cryosphere–atmosphere system in the Arctic. In this study, we investigate the spatiotemporal variability in SEB across tundra, snow and ice. During the snow-free period, the main energy sink for ice sites is surface melt....... For tundra, energy is used for sensible and latent heat flux and soil heat flux leading to permafrost thaw. Longer snow-free period increases melting of the Greenland Ice Sheet and glaciers and may promote tundra permafrost thaw. During winter, clouds have a warming effect across surface types whereas during...

Properties of horizontally oriented ice crystals observed by polarization lidar over summit, Greenland

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Neely Ryan R.

2018-01-01

Full Text Available A source of error in microphysical retrievals and model simulations is the assumption that clouds are composed of only randomly oriented ice crystals. This assumption is frequently not true, as evidenced by optical phenomena such as parhelia. Here, observations from the Cloud, Aerosol and Polarization Backscatter Lidar at Summit, Greenland are utilized along with other sensors and beam imaging to examine the properties of horizontally oriented ice crystals and the environment conditions in which they occur.

Direct observation of salts as micro-inclusions in the Greenland GRIP ice core

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Dahl-Jensen, Dorthe; Sakurai, Toshimitsu; Iizuka, Yoshinori

2009-01-01

We provide the first direct evidence that a number of water-soluble compounds, in particular calcium sulfate (CaSO4·2H2O) and calcium carbonate (CaCO3), are present as solid, micron-sized inclusions within the Greenland GRIP ice core. The compounds are detected by two independent methods: micro...... distributions of the micro-inclusions. These results suggest that water-soluble aerosols in the GRIP ice core are dependable proxies for past atmospheric conditions. Udgivelsesdato: December...

The interglacial-glacial record at the mouth of Scoresby Sund, East Greenland

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Mangerud, Jan; Funder, Svend Visby

1994-01-01

Brewster (facing the open ocean) and till on top of the interglacial beds at Kikiakajik show that both an outlet from the Greenland Ice Sheet, and more local glaciers reached the continental shelf during the Weichselian. This glacial event is poorly dated, but tentatively correlated with the Flakkerhuk...... interglaciation ( "" isotope substage Se) on the basis of mollusc assemblages and luminescence dates. Abundant Balal/lls Crel/atlls, and several bivalves, show that the advection of warm Atlantic water to the East Greenland coast was higher during that interglacial than during the Holocene. Glacial striae at Kap...... stade ( "" 19-15 ka BP) when, from marine geological data, it is suggested that the Scoresby Sund glacier terminated c. 30 km east of Kap Brewster. During the Milne Land stade (c. 10 ka BP) there was a resurgence of local ice caps in the mountains both north and south of the fjord mouth, but Scoresby...

Barnes Ice Cap South Dome Trilateration Net Survey Data 1970-1984

Data.gov (United States)

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Department of Commerce — The Barnes Ice Cap data set contains survey measurements of a network of 43 stakes along a 10 km flow line on the northeast flank of the south dome of the Barnes Ice...

Reconstructing Southern Greenland Ice Sheet History During the Plio-Pleistocene Intensification of Northern Hemisphere Glaciation: Insights from IODP Site U1307

Science.gov (United States)

Blake-Mizen, K. R.; Hatfield, R. G.; Carlson, A. E.; Walczak, M. H.; Stoner, J. S.; Xuan, C.; Lawrence, K. T.; Bailey, I.

2017-12-01

Should it melt entirely, the Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS) has the potential to raise global sea-level by 7 metres. With the Arctic continuing to warm at a remarkable rate, to better understand how the GrIS will respond to future anthropogenically-induced climate change we must constrain its natural variability in the geological past. In this regard, much uncertainty exists surrounding its pre-Quaternary history; particularly during the mid-Piacenzian warm period (mPWP; 3.3-3.0 Ma) - widely considered an analogue for near-future equilibrium climate with modern atmospheric CO2 levels and elevated temperatures relative to today - and the late Pliocene/early Pleistocene onset of widespread Northern Hemisphere glaciation (NHG, 2.7 Ma). GrIS reconstructions for these intervals have been largely hampered by a lack of well-dated, high-resolution records from suitable sites. To address this, we present new high-resolution, multi-proxy records from IODP Site U1307, a North Atlantic marine sediment core recovered from the Eirik Drift just south of Greenland. Generation of a new high-resolution relative palaeointensity (RPI)-based age-model - representing the first of its kind for high-latitude sediments deposited during NHG - has enabled strong orbital age control. Our ice-rafted debris (IRD) record confirms a 2.72 Ma initiation of major southern GrIS marine-terminating glaciations, which appear to persist even through interglacial periods up to at least 2.24 Ma. XRF-scanning and IRD evidence suggests, however, that an ephemeral ice-cap of likely considerable size persisted on southern Greenland prior to the mPWP. These data, together with the analysed provenance of individual IRD, indicate marine-based GrIS margins extended southward over the NHG interval and only occurred on Greenland's southern tip from 2.7 Ma. Despite a large increase in the deposition of GrIS-derived IRD from this time, bulk sedimentation rates and magnetic grain-size dropped significantly, implying that

Mass loss of the Greenland Ice Sheet since the Little Ice Age, implications on sea level

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Kjeldsen, K. K.; Bjork, A. A.; Khan, Shfaqat Abbas

The impact of mass loss from the Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS) on 20th Century sea level rise (SLR) has long been subject to intense discussions. While globally distributed tide gauges suggest a global mean SLR of 15-20 cm, quantifying the separate components is of great concern - in particular...... for modeling sea level projections into the 21st Century. Estimates of the past GrIS contribution to SLR have been derived using a number of different approaches, e.g. surface mass balance (SMB) calculations combined with estimates of ice discharge found by in correlating SMB anomalies and calving rates. Here......-2010, NASA's Ice, Cloud, and land Elevation Satellite (ICESat) from 2003-2009, and NASA's Land, Vegetation, and Ice Sensor (LVIS) from 2010, to estimate mass loss throughout the 20th and early 21st Century. We present mass balance estimates of the GrIS since retreat commence from the maximum extent...

The pattern of anthropogenic signal emergence in Greenland Ice Sheet surface mass balance

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Fyke, J.G.; Vizcaino, M.; Lipscomb, W.H.

2014-01-01

Surface mass balance (SMB) trends influence observed Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS) mass loss, but the component of these trends related to anthropogenic forcing is unclear. Here we study the simulated spatial pattern of emergence of an anthropogenically derived GrIS SMB signal between 1850 and 2100

Basin-scale partitioning of Greenland ice sheet mass balance components (2007-2011)

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Andersen, M.L.; Stenseng, Lars; Skourup, Henriette

2015-01-01

The current deficit in Greenland ice sheet mass balance is due to both a decrease in surface mass balance (SMB) input and an increase in ice discharge (D) output. While SMB processes are beginning to be well captured by observationally-constrained climate modeling, insight into D is relatively...... of the gate. Using a 1961-1990 reference climatology SMB field from the MAR regional climate model, we quantify ice sheet mass balance within eighteen basins. We find a 2007-2011 mean D of 515±57 Gtyr-1. We find a 2007-2011 mean total mass balance of -262±21 Gtyr-1, which is equal to a 0.73 mm yr-1 global sea...... limited. We use InSAR-derived velocities, in combination with ice thickness observations, to quantify the mass flux (F) across a flux perimeter around the ice sheet at ~1700 m elevation. To quantify D, we correct F for SMB, as well as changes in volume due to ice dynamics, in the area downstream...

Elevation change of the Greenland Ice Sheet due to surface mass balance and firn processes, 1960-2014

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Kuipers Munneke, P.; Ligtenberg, S. R M; Noël, B. P Y; Howat, I. M.; Box, J. E.; Mosley-Thompson, E.; McConnell, J. R.; Steffen, K.; Harper, J. T.; Das, S. B.; Van Den Broeke, M. R.

2015-01-01

Observed changes in the surface elevation of the Greenland Ice Sheet are caused by ice dynamics, basal elevation change, basal melt, surface mass balance (SMB) variability, and by compaction of the overlying firn. The last two contributions are quantified here using a firn model that includes

Recent Greenland Thinning from Operation IceBridge ATM and LVIS Data

Science.gov (United States)

Sutterley, T. C.; Velicogna, I.

2015-12-01

We investigate regional thinning rates in Greenland using two Operation IceBridge lidar instruments, the Airborne Topographic Mapper (ATM) and the Land, Vegetation and Ice Sensor (LVIS). IceBridge and Pre-IceBridge ATM data are available from 1993 to present and IceBridge and Pre-Icebridge LVIS data are available from 2007 to present. We compare different techniques for combining the two datasets: overlapping footprints, triangulated irregular network meshing and radial basis functions. We validate the combination for periods with near term overlap of the two instruments. By combining the two lidar datasets, we are able to investigate intra-annual, annual, interannual surface elevation change. We investigate both the high melt season of 2012 and the low melt season of 2013. In addition, the major 2015 IceBridge Arctic campaign provides new crucial data for determining seasonal ice sheet thinning rates. We compare our LVIS/ATM results with surface mass balance outputs from two regional climate models: the Regional Atmospheric Climate Model (RACMO) and the Modèle Atmosphérique Régional (MAR). We also investigate the thinning rates of major outlet glaciers.

Southwest Greenland's Alpine Glacier History: Recent Glacier Change in the Context of the Holocene Geologic Record

Science.gov (United States)

Larocca, L. J.; Axford, Y.; Lasher, G. E.; Lee, C. W.

2017-12-01

Due to anthropogenic climate change, the Arctic region is currently undergoing major transformation, and is expected to continue warming much faster than the global average. To put recent and future changes into context, a longer-term understanding of this region's past response to natural climate variability is needed. Given their sensitivity to modest climate change, small alpine glaciers and ice caps on Greenland's coastal margin (beyond the Greenland Ice Sheet) represent ideal features to record climate variability through the Holocene. Here we investigate the Holocene history of a small ( 160 square km) ice cap and adjacent alpine glaciers, located in southwest Greenland approximately 50 km south of Nuuk. We employ measurements on sediment cores from a glacier-fed lake in combination with geospatial analysis of satellite images spanning the past several decades. Sedimentary indicators of sediment source and thus glacial activity, including organic matter abundance, inferred chlorophyll-a content, sediment major element abundances, grain size, and magnetic susceptibility are presented from cores collected from a distal glacier-fed lake (informally referred to here as Per's Lake) in the summer of 2015. These parameters reflect changes in the amount and character of inorganic detrital input into the lake, which may be linked to the size of the upstream glaciers and ice cap and allow us to reconstruct their status through the Holocene. Additionally, we present a complementary record of recent changes in Equilibrium Line Altitude (ELA) for the upstream alpine glaciers. Modern ELAs are inferred using the accumulation area ratio (AAR) method in ArcGIS via Landsat and Worldview-2 satellite imagery, along with elevation data obtained from digital elevation models (DEMs). Paleo-ELAs are inferred from the positions of moraines and trim lines marking the glaciers' most recent expanded state, which we attribute to the Little Ice Age (LIA). This approach will allow us to

The significance of volcanic ash in Greenland ice cores during the Common Era

Science.gov (United States)

Plunkett, G.; Pilcher, J. R.; McConnell, J. R.; Sigl, M.; Chellman, N.

2017-12-01

Volcanic forcing is now widely regarded as a leading natural factor in short-term climate variability. Polar ice cores provide an unrivalled and continuous record of past volcanism through their chemical and particulate content. With an almost annual precision for the Common Era, the ice core volcanic record can be combined with historical data to investigate the climate and social impacts of the eruptions. The sulfate signature in ice cores is critical for determining the possible climate effectiveness of an eruption, but the presence and characterization of volcanic ash (tephra) in the ice is requisite for establishing the source eruption so that location and eruptive style can be better factored in to climate models. Here, we review the Greenland tephra record for the Common Era, and present the results of targeted sampling for tephra of volcanic events that are of interest either because of their suspected climate and societal impacts or because of their potential as isochrons in paleoenvironmental (including ice core) archives. The majority of identifiable tephras derive from Northern Hemisphere mid- to high latitude eruptions, demonstrating the significance of northern extra-tropical volcanic regions as a source of sulfates in Greenland. A number of targets are represented by sparse or no tephra, or shards that cannot be firmly correlated with a source. We consider the challenges faced in isolating and characterizing tephra from low latitude eruptions, and the implications for accurately modelling climate response to large, tropical events. Finally, we compare the ice core tephra record with terrestrial tephrostratigraphies in the circum-North Atlantic area to evaluate the potential for intercontinental tephra linkages and the refinement of volcanic histories.

Seasonal migration, vertical activity and winter temperature experience of Greenland halibut Reinhardtius hippoglossoides (Walbaum) in West Greenland waters

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Boje, Jesper; Neuenfeldt, Stefan; Sparrevohn, Claus Reedtz

2014-01-01

resident in Disko Bay (mean range 2.6°C) than when resident in the ice fjord (mean range 1.4°C). Using the tagged halibut as a 'live tool,' we show that parts of the ice fjord are hundreds of meters deeper than previously thought. We also document the first seawater temperature measurements made beneath......The deep-water flatfish Greenland halibut Reinhardtius hippoglossoides (Walbaum) is common along the West Greenland coast. In the northwestern fjords, Greenland halibut is an important socio-economic resource for the Greenland community, but due to the deep and partly ice-covered environment, very...

Dynamics of the Greenland Ice Sheet over multiple timescales

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Kjeldsen, Kristian Kjellerup

to further constrain the individual components of the current budget, and in conjunction with longer records, it is important to provide a trustworthy basis for future projections. In this thesis, using airborne- and satellite derived data combined with terrestrial and marine observations, the dynamic...... become grounded and also assuming a similar warming pattern. This thesis implies that in order to investigate the response of the Greenland Ice Sheet to future climate change much is to be gained by merging and incorporating data from both marine and terrestrial geology, combined with air- and satellite...

Ocean tidal loading affecting precise geodetic observations on Greenland: Error account of surface deformations by tidal gravity measurements

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Jentzsch, G.; Knudsen, Per; Ramatschi, M.

2000-01-01

Air-borne and satellite based altimetry are used to monitor the Greenland ice-cap. Since these measurements are related to fiducial sites at the coast, the robustness of the height differences depends on the stability of these reference points. To benefit from the accuracy of these methods...... observations. Near the coast ocean tidal loading causes additional vertical deformations in the order of 1 to 10 cm Therefore, tidal gravity measurements were carried out at four fiducial sites around Greenland in order to provide corrections for the kinematic part of the coordinates of these sites. Starting...

Tracing Internal Radar Layers in the Greenland Ice Sheet

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Panton, Christian

Internal layers in radio-echograms from the sounding of ice sheets have long been a valuable resource in glaciology, but their usefulness have been limited by availability of traced (digitized) layers. To speed up this process, we have developed an algorithm for semi-automatic tracing the internal...... layers and a fully automated algorithm for mapping the layer slope. The layer slope is inferred by the intensity response to a slanted Gaussian filter, whereafter layers can be traced using an active contour model. With these techniques we show that it possible to trace internal layers over distances...... of hundreds kilometers with minimal operator intervention, and the methods have been successfully validated between two Greenland deep ice cores with internal match points. In order to remove any operator assistance, we show how the layer slope can be used to detect disturbances in the deep radiostratigraphy...

Reconstructing surface elevation changes for the Greenland Ice Sheet (1993-2013) and analysis of Zachariae Isstrom, northeast Greenland

Science.gov (United States)

Duncan, Kyle

Previous studies investigating the velocity and elevation change records of the Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS) revealed rapid and complex changes. It is therefore imperative to determine changes with both high spatial and temporal resolutions. By fusing multiple laser altimetry data sets, the Surface Elevation Reconstruction and Change (SERAC) program is capable of reconstructing surface elevation changes with high spatial and temporal resolution over the entire GrIS. The input data include observations from NASA's Ice, Cloud and land Elevation Satellite (ICESat) mission (2003-2009) as well as data collected by NASA's Airborne Topographic Mapper (ATM) (1993-2013) and Land, Vegetation and Ice Sensor (LVIS) (2007-2012) airborne laser altimetry systems. This study extends the record of surface elevation changes over the GrIS by adding 2012 and 2013 laser altimetry data to the previous 1993-2011 record. Extending the record leads to a new, more accurate and detailed altimetry record for 1993-2013. Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER) Digital Elevation Models (DEMs) are fused with laser altimetry data over Zachariae Isstrom, northeast Greenland to analyze surface elevation changes and associated thinning rates during 1978-2014. Little to no elevation change occurred over Zachariae Isstrom from 1978-1999, however, from 1999-2014 elevation changes near the calving front became increasingly negative and accelerated. Calving front position showed steady retreat and grounding line position has been retreating towards the interior of the ice sheet at an increasing rate from 2010-2014 when compared to the 1996-2010 period. The measured elevation changes near the calving front have brought a large portion of the glacier close to the height of flotation. If the current thinning trend continues this portion of the glacier will reach flotation within the next 2-5 years allowing for further retreat and increased vulnerability to retreat for sections of

Molecular characterization of dissolved organic matter associated with the Greenland ice sheet

Science.gov (United States)

Bhatia, Maya P.; Das, Sarah B.; Longnecker, Krista; Charette, Matthew A.; Kujawinski, Elizabeth B.

2010-07-01

Subsurface microbial oxidation of overridden soils and vegetation beneath glaciers and ice sheets may affect global carbon budgets on glacial-interglacial timescales. The likelihood and magnitude of this process depends on the chemical nature and reactivity of the subglacial organic carbon stores. We examined the composition of carbon pools associated with different regions of the Greenland ice sheet (subglacial, supraglacial, proglacial) in order to elucidate the type of dissolved organic matter (DOM) present in the subglacial discharge over a melt season. Electrospray ionization (ESI) Fourier transform ion cyclotron resonance (FT-ICR) mass spectrometry coupled to multivariate statistics permitted unprecedented molecular level characterization of this material and revealed that carbon pools associated with discrete glacial regions are comprised of different compound classes. Specifically, a larger proportion of protein-like compounds were observed in the supraglacial samples and in the early melt season (spring) subglacial discharge. In contrast, the late melt season (summer) subglacial discharge contained a greater fraction of lignin-like and other material presumably derived from underlying vegetation and soil. These results suggest (1) that the majority of supraglacial DOM originates from autochthonous microbial processes on the ice sheet surface, (2) that the subglacial DOM contains allochthonous carbon derived from overridden soils and vegetation as well as autochthonous carbon derived from in situ microbial metabolism, and (3) that the relative contribution of allochthonous and autochthonous material in subglacial discharge varies during the melt season. These conclusions are consistent with the hypothesis that, given sufficient time (e.g., overwinter storage), resident subglacial microbial communities may oxidize terrestrial material beneath the Greenland ice sheet.

Amplified melt and flow of the Greenland ice sheet driven by late-summer cyclonic rainfall

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Doyle, Samuel H.; Hubbard, Alun; van de Wal, Roderik S.W.

2015-01-01

and meteorological variables from the western margin of the Greenland ice sheet during a week of warm, wet cyclonic weather in late August and early September 2011. We find that extreme surface runoff from melt and rainfall led to a widespread acceleration in ice flow that extended 140 km into the ice-sheet interior....... We suggest that the late-season timing was critical in promoting rapid runoff across an extensive bare ice surface that overwhelmed a subglacial hydrological system in transition to a less-efficient winter mode. Reanalysis data reveal that similar cyclonic weather conditions prevailed across southern...

Use and Limitations of a Climate-Quality Data Record to Study Temperature Trends on the Greenland Ice Sheet

Science.gov (United States)

Hall, Dorothy K.; Comiso, Josefino C.; Shuman, Christopher A.; Koenig, Lora S.; DiGirolamo, Nicolo E.

2011-01-01

Enhanced melting of the Greenland Ice Sheet has been documented in recent literature along with surface-temperature increases measured using infrared satellite data since 1981. Using a recently-developed climate-quality data record, 11- and 12-year trends in the clear-sky ice-surface temperature (IST) of the Greenland Ice Sheet have been studied using the Moderate-Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) IST product. Daily and monthly MODIS ISTs of the Greenland Ice Sheet beginning on 1 March 2000 and continuing through 31 December 2010 are now available at 6.25-km spatial resolution on a polar stereographic grid as described in Hall et al. (submitted). This record will be elevated in status to a climate-data record (CDR) when more years of data become available either from the MODIS on the Terra or Aqua satellites, or from the Visible Infrared Imager Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) to be launched in October 2011. Maps showing the maximum extent of melt for the entire ice sheet and for the six major drainage basins have been developed from the MODIS IST dataset. Twelve-year trends of the duration of the melt season on the ice sheet vary in different drainage basins with some basins melting progressively earlier over the course of the study period. Some (but not all) of the basins also show a progressively-longer duration of melt. IST 12-year trends are compared with in-situ data, and climate data from the Modern Era Retrospective-Analysis for Research and Applications (MERRA) Reanalysis.

Surface elevation changes of the greenland ice sheet - results from ESA'S ice sheet CCI

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Fredenslund Levinsen, Joanna; Khvorostovky, Kirill; Meister, Rakia

2013-01-01

In order to ensure long-term climate data records for the Greenland Ice Sheet (GIS), ESA have launched the Climate Change Initiative (CCI). This work presents the preliminary steps towards the Ice Sheet CCI's surface elevation change (SEC) derivation using radar altimeter data. In order to find...... the most optimal method, a Round Robin exercise was conducted in which the scientific community was asked to provide their best SEC estimate over the Jakobshavn Isbr drainage basin. The participants used both repeat-track (RT), overlapping footprints, and the cross-over (XO) methods, and both ICESat laser...... and Envisat radar altimeter data were used. Based on this and feedback sheets describing their methods we found that a combination of the RT and XO techniques yielded the best results. In the following, the obtained results will be presented and discussed....

An in situ measurement of the radio-frequency attenuation in ice at Summit Station, Greenland

OpenAIRE

Avva, J.; Kovac, J. M.; Miki, C.; Saltzberg, D.; Vieregg, A. G.

2014-01-01

We report an in situ measurement of the electric field attenuation length Lα at radio frequencies for the bulk ice at Summit Station, Greenland, made by broadcasting radio-frequency signals vertically through the ice and measuring the relative power in the return ground bounce signal. We find the depth-averaged field attenuation length to be hLαi = 947+92 −85 m at 75 MHz. While this measurement has clear radioglaciological applications, the radio clarity of the ice also has implications for t...

A SAR Ice-Motion Processing Chain in Support of PROMICE (Programme for the Monitoring of the Greenland Ice Sheet)

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Merryman Boncori, John Peter; Dall, Jørgen; Ahlstrøm, A. P.

2010-01-01

This paper reports on the development of a SAR icemotion processing chain developed for the PROMICE project – a long-term program funded by the Danish ministry of Climate and Energy to monitor the mass budget of the Greenland ice sheet. The end goal of the SAR data processing is to output map-pro...

Marginal thinning in Northwest Greenland during 2002-2011

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Khan, Shfaqat Abbas; Kjær, K. H.; Wahr, J. M.

2012-01-01

Many glaciers along the southeast and northwest coast of Greenland have accelerated, increasing the Greenland ice sheet's (GrIS) contribution to global sea-level rise. Here, we map elevation changes in northwest Greenland during 2003-2009 using high-resolution Ice, Cloud and land Elevation Satell...

Resolving climate change in the period 15-23 ka in Greenland ice cores: A new application of spectral trend analysis

NARCIS (Netherlands)

de Jong, M.G.G.; Nio, D.S.; Böhm, A.R.; Seijmonsbergen, H.C.; de Graaff, L.W.S.

2009-01-01

Northern Hemisphere climate history through and following the Last Glacial Maximum is recorded in detail in ice cores from Greenland. However, the period between Greenland Interstadials 1 and 2 (15-23 ka), i.e. the period of deglaciation following the last major glaciation, has been difficult to

An efficient regional energy-moisture balance model for simulation of the Greenland Ice Sheet response to climate change

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

A. Robinson

2010-04-01

Full Text Available In order to explore the response of the Greenland ice sheet (GIS to climate change on long (centennial to multi-millennial time scales, a regional energy-moisture balance model has been developed. This model simulates seasonal variations of temperature and precipitation over Greenland and explicitly accounts for elevation and albedo feedbacks. From these fields, the annual mean surface temperature and surface mass balance can be determined and used to force an ice sheet model. The melt component of the surface mass balance is computed here using both a positive degree day approach and a more physically-based alternative that includes insolation and albedo explicitly. As a validation of the climate model, we first simulated temperature and precipitation over Greenland for the prescribed, present-day topography. Our simulated climatology compares well to observations and does not differ significantly from that of a simple parameterization used in many previous simulations. Furthermore, the calculated surface mass balance using both melt schemes falls within the range of recent regional climate model results. For a prescribed, ice-free state, the differences in simulated climatology between the regional energy-moisture balance model and the simple parameterization become significant, with our model showing much stronger summer warming. When coupled to a three-dimensional ice sheet model and initialized with present-day conditions, the two melt schemes both allow realistic simulations of the present-day GIS.

Ice-dammed lake drainage evolution at Russell Glacier, west Greenland

Science.gov (United States)

Carrivick, Jonathan L.; Tweed, Fiona S.; Ng, Felix; Quincey, Duncan J.; Mallalieu, Joseph; Ingeman-Nielsen, Thomas; Mikkelsen, Andreas B.; Palmer, Steven J.; Yde, Jacob C.; Homer, Rachel; Russell, Andrew J.; Hubbard, Alun

2017-11-01

Glaciological and hydraulic factors that control the timing and mechanisms of glacier lake outburst floods (GLOFs) remain poorly understood. This study used measurements of lake level at fifteen minute intervals and known lake bathymetry to calculate lake outflow during two GLOF events from the northern margin of Russell Glacier, west Greenland. We used measured ice surface elevation, interpolated subglacial topography and likely conduit geometry to inform a melt enlargement model of the outburst evolution. The model was tuned to best-fit the hydrograph’s rising limb and timing of peak discharge in both events; it achieved Mean Absolute Errors of Lake water temperature, which strongly governed the enlargement rate, preconditioned the high peak discharge and short duration of these floods. We hypothesize that both GLOFs were triggered by ice dam flotation, and localised hydraulic jacking sustained most of their early-stage outflow, explaining the particularly rapid water egress in comparison to that recorded at other ice-marginal lakes. As ice overburden pressure relative to lake water hydraulic head diminished, flow became confined to a subglacial conduit. This study has emphasised the inter-play between ice dam thickness and lake level, drainage timing, lake water temperature and consequently rising stage lake outflow and flood evolution.

Validation of a Climate-Data Record of the "Clear-Kky" Surface Temperature of the Greenland Ice Sheet

Science.gov (United States)

Hall, Dorothy K.; Box, Jason E.; Koenig, Lora S.; DiGirolamo, Nicolo E.; Comiso, Josefino C.; Shuman, Christopher A.

2011-01-01

Surface temperatures on the Greenland Ice Sheet have been studied on the ground, using automatic weather station (AWS) data from the Greenland-Climate Network (GC-Net), and from analysis of satellite sensor data. Using Advanced Very High Frequency Radiometer (AVHRR) weekly surface temperature maps, warming of the surface of the Greenland Ice Sheet has been documented since 1981. We extended and refined this record using higher-resolution Moderate-Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) data from March 2000 to the present. We developed a daily and monthly climate-data record (CDR) of the "clear-sky" surface temperature of the Greenland Ice Sheet using an ice-surface temperature (1ST) algorithm developed for use with MODIS data. Validation of this CDR is ongoing. MODIS Terra swath data are projected onto a polar stereographic grid at 6.25-km resolution to develop binary, gridded daily and mean-monthly 1ST maps. Each monthly map also has a color-coded image map that is available to download. Also included with the monthly maps is an accompanying map showing number of days in the month that were used to calculate the mean-monthly 1ST. This is important because no 1ST decision is made by the algorithm for cells that are considered cloudy by the internal cloud mask, so a sufficient number of days must be available to produce a mean 1ST for each grid cell. Validation of the CDR consists of several facets: 1) comparisons between ISTs and in-situ measurements; 2) comparisons between ISTs and AWS data; and 3) comparisons of ISTs with surface temperatures derived from other satellite instruments such as the Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER) and Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus (ETM+). Previous work shows that Terra MODIS ISTs are about 3 C lower than in-situ temperatures measured at Summit Camp, during the winter of 2008-09 under clear skies. In this work we begin to compare surface temperatures derived from AWS data with ISTs from the MODIS CDR. The

Greenland ice sheet surface mass balance: evaluating simulations and making projections with regional climate models

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

J. G. L. Rae

2012-11-01

Full Text Available Four high-resolution regional climate models (RCMs have been set up for the area of Greenland, with the aim of providing future projections of Greenland ice sheet surface mass balance (SMB, and its contribution to sea level rise, with greater accuracy than is possible from coarser-resolution general circulation models (GCMs. This is the first time an intercomparison has been carried out of RCM results for Greenland climate and SMB. Output from RCM simulations for the recent past with the four RCMs is evaluated against available observations. The evaluation highlights the importance of using a detailed snow physics scheme, especially regarding the representations of albedo and meltwater refreezing. Simulations with three of the RCMs for the 21st century using SRES scenario A1B from two GCMs produce trends of between −5.5 and −1.1 Gt yr⁻² in SMB (equivalent to +0.015 and +0.003 mm sea level equivalent yr⁻², with trends of smaller magnitude for scenario E1, in which emissions are mitigated. Results from one of the RCMs whose present-day simulation is most realistic indicate that an annual mean near-surface air temperature increase over Greenland of ~ 2°C would be required for the mass loss to increase such that it exceeds accumulation, thereby causing the SMB to become negative, which has been suggested as a threshold beyond which the ice sheet would eventually be eliminated.

A Climate-Data Record (CDR) of the "Clear-Sky" Surface Temperature of the Greenland Ice Sheet

Science.gov (United States)

Hall, Dorothy K.; Comiso, Josefino C.; DiGirolamo, Nocolo E.; Shuman, Christopher A.

2011-01-01

We have developed a climate-data record (CDR) of "clear-sky" ice-surface temperature (IST) of the Greenland Ice Sheet using Moderate-Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) data. The CDR provides daily and monthly-mean IST from March 2000 through December 2010 on a polar stereographic projection at a resolution of 6.25 km. The CDR is amenable to extension into the future using Visible/Infrared Imager Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) data. Regional "clear-sky" surface temperature increases since the early 1980s in the Arctic, measured using Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR) infrared data, range from 0.57 +/- 0.02 to 0.72 +/- 0.1 c per decade. Arctic warming has important implications for ice-sheet mass balance because much of the periphery of the Greenland Ice Sheet is already near O C during the melt season, and is thus vulnerable to rapid melting if temperatures continue to increase. An increase in melting of the ice sheet would accelerate sea-level rise, an issue affecting potentially billions of people worldwide. The IST CDR will provide a convenient data set for modelers and for climatologists to track changes of the surface temperature of the ice sheet as a whole and of the individual drainage basins on the ice sheet. The daily and monthly maps will provide information on surface melt as well as "clear-sky" temperature. The CDR will be further validated by comparing results with automatic-weather station data and with satellite-derived surface-temperature products.

Geodetic measurements reveal similarities between post–Last Glacial Maximum and present-day mass loss from the Greenland ice sheet

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Khan, Shfaqat Abbas; Sasgen, Ingo; Bevis, Michael

2016-01-01

and ocean load changes occurring since the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM; ~21 thousand years ago) and may be used to constrain the GrIS deglaciation history. We use data from the Greenland Global Positioning System network to directly measure GIA and estimate basinwide mass changes since the LGM. Unpredicted......Accurate quantification of the millennial-scale mass balance of the Greenland ice sheet (GrIS) and its contribution to global sea-level rise remain challenging because of sparse in situ observations in key regions. Glacial isostatic adjustment (GIA) is the ongoing response of the solid Earth to ice...

Modelling seasonal meltwater forcing of the velocity of land-terminating margins of the Greenland Ice Sheet

Science.gov (United States)

Koziol, Conrad P.; Arnold, Neil

2018-03-01

Surface runoff at the margin of the Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS) drains to the ice-sheet bed, leading to enhanced summer ice flow. Ice velocities show a pattern of early summer acceleration followed by mid-summer deceleration due to evolution of the subglacial hydrology system in response to meltwater forcing. Modelling the integrated hydrological-ice dynamics system to reproduce measured velocities at the ice margin remains a key challenge for validating the present understanding of the system and constraining the impact of increasing surface runoff rates on dynamic ice mass loss from the GrIS. Here we show that a multi-component model incorporating supraglacial, subglacial, and ice dynamic components applied to a land-terminating catchment in western Greenland produces modelled velocities which are in reasonable agreement with those observed in GPS records for three melt seasons of varying melt intensities. This provides numerical support for the hypothesis that the subglacial system develops analogously to alpine glaciers and supports recent model formulations capturing the transition between distributed and channelized states. The model shows the growth of efficient conduit-based drainage up-glacier from the ice sheet margin, which develops more extensively, and further inland, as melt intensity increases. This suggests current trends of decadal-timescale slowdown of ice velocities in the ablation zone may continue in the near future. The model results also show a strong scaling between average summer velocities and melt season intensity, particularly in the upper ablation area. Assuming winter velocities are not impacted by channelization, our model suggests an upper bound of a 25 % increase in annual surface velocities as surface melt increases to 4 × present levels.

Holocene glacial history of the west Greenland Ice Sheet inferred from cosmogenic exposure ages and threshold lakes

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Larsen, Nicolaj Krog; Kjaer, K. H.; Colding, Sune Oluf

2011-01-01

In this study, we use a combination of 10Be exposure ages and threshold lakes to constrain the ice sheet history in Godthåbs- and Buksefjorden, west Greenland (63-64°N) during the Holocene. The 10Be cosmogenic exposure ages have been used to quantify both the ice retreat and thinning of the west...

Efficient meltwater drainage through supraglacial streams and rivers on the southwest Greenland ice sheet.

Science.gov (United States)

Smith, Laurence C; Chu, Vena W; Yang, Kang; Gleason, Colin J; Pitcher, Lincoln H; Rennermalm, Asa K; Legleiter, Carl J; Behar, Alberto E; Overstreet, Brandon T; Moustafa, Samiah E; Tedesco, Marco; Forster, Richard R; LeWinter, Adam L; Finnegan, David C; Sheng, Yongwei; Balog, James

2015-01-27

Thermally incised meltwater channels that flow each summer across melt-prone surfaces of the Greenland ice sheet have received little direct study. We use high-resolution WorldView-1/2 satellite mapping and in situ measurements to characterize supraglacial water storage, drainage pattern, and discharge across 6,812 km(2) of southwest Greenland in July 2012, after a record melt event. Efficient surface drainage was routed through 523 high-order stream/river channel networks, all of which terminated in moulins before reaching the ice edge. Low surface water storage (3.6 ± 0.9 cm), negligible impoundment by supraglacial lakes or topographic depressions, and high discharge to moulins (2.54-2.81 cm⋅d(-1)) indicate that the surface drainage system conveyed its own storage volume every drainage to true outflow from the ice edge. However, Isortoq discharges tended lower than runoff simulations from the Modèle Atmosphérique Régional (MAR) regional climate model (0.056-0.112 km(3)⋅d(-1) vs. ∼0.103 km(3)⋅d(-1)), and when integrated over the melt season, totaled just 37-75% of MAR, suggesting nontrivial subglacial water storage even in this melt-prone region of the ice sheet. We conclude that (i) the interior surface of the ice sheet can be efficiently drained under optimal conditions, (ii) that digital elevation models alone cannot fully describe supraglacial drainage and its connection to subglacial systems, and (iii) that predicting outflow from climate models alone, without recognition of subglacial processes, may overestimate true meltwater export from the ice sheet to the ocean.

Greenland surface mass-balance observations from the ice-sheet ablation area and local glaciers

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Machguth, Horst; Thomsen, Henrik H.; Weidick, Anker; Ahlstrøm, Andreas P.; Abermann, Jakob; Andersen, Morten L.; Andersen, Signe B.; Bjørk, Anders A.; Box, Jason E.; Braithwaite, Roger J.; Bøggild, Carl E.; Citterio, Michele; Clement, Poul; Colgan, William; Fausto, Robert S.; Gleie, Karin; Gubler, Stefanie; Hasholt, Bent; Hynek, Bernhard; Knudsen, Niels T.; Larsen, Signe H.; Mernild, Sebastian H.; Oerlemans, Johannes; Oerter, Hans; Olesen, Ole B.; Smeets, C. J P Paul; Steffen, Konrad; Stober, Manfred; Sugiyama, Shin; Van As, Dirk; Van Den Broeke, Michiel R.; Van De Wal, Roderik S W

2016-01-01

Glacier surface mass-balance measurements on Greenland started more than a century ago, but no compilation exists of the observations from the ablation area of the ice sheet and local glaciers. Such data could be used in the evaluation of modelled surface mass balance, or to document changes in

Pathways of warm water to the Northeast Greenland outlet glaciers

Science.gov (United States)

Schaffer, Janin; Timmermann, Ralph; Kanzow, Torsten; Arndt, Jan Erik; Mayer, Christoph; Schauer, Ursula

2015-04-01

The ocean plays an important role in modulating the mass balance of the Greenland Ice Sheet by delivering heat to the marine-terminating outlet glaciers surrounding the Greenland coast. The warming and accumulation of Atlantic Water in the subpolar North Atlantic has been suggested to be a potential driver of the glaciers' retreat over the last decades. The shelf regions thus play a critical role for the transport of Atlantic Water towards the glaciers, but also for the transfer of freshwater towards the deep ocean. A key region for the mass balance of the Greenland Ice Sheet is the Northeast Greenland Ice Stream. This large ice stream drains the second-largest basin of the Greenland Ice Sheet and feeds three outlet glaciers. The largest one is Nioghalvfjerdsfjorden (79°N-Glacier) featuring an 80 km long floating ice tongue. Both the ocean circulation on the continental shelf off Northeast Greenland and the circulation in the cavity below the ice tongue are weakly constrained so far. In order to study the relevant processes of glacier-ocean interaction we combine observations and model work. Here we focus on historic and recent hydrographic observations and on the complex bathymetry in the Northeast Greenland shelf region, which is thought to steer the flux of warm Atlantic water onto the continental shelf and into the sub-ice cavity beneath the 79°N-Glacier. We present a new global topography data set, RTopo-2, which includes the most recent surveys on the Northeast Greenland continental shelf and provides a detailed bathymetry for all around Greenland. In addition, RTopo-2 contains ice and bedrock surface topographies for Greenland and Antarctica. Based on the updated ocean bathymetry and a variety of hydrographic observations we show the water mass distribution on the continental shelf off Northeast Greenland. These maps enable us to discuss possible supply pathways of warm modified Atlantic waters on the continental shelf and thus potential ways of heat

Insight into biogeochemical inputs and composition of Greenland Ice Sheet surface snow and glacial forefield river catchment environments.

Science.gov (United States)

Cameron, Karen; Hagedorn, Birgit; Dieser, Markus; Christner, Brent; Choquette, Kyla; Sletten, Ronald; Lui, Lu; Junge, Karen

2014-05-01

The volume of freshwater transported from Greenland to surrounding marine waters has tended to increase annually over the past four decades as a result of warmer surface air temperatures (Bamber et al 2012, Hanna et al 2008). Ice sheet run off is estimated to make up approximately of third of this volume (Bamber et al 2012). However, the biogeochemical composition and seeding sources of the Greenland Ice Sheet supraglacial landscape is largely unknown. In this study, the structure and diversity of surface snow microbial assemblages from two regions of the western Greenland Ice Sheet ice-margin was investigated through the sequencing of small subunit rRNA genes. Furthermore, the origins of microbiota were investigated by examining correlations to molecular data obtained from marine, soil, freshwater and atmospheric environments and to geochemical analytes measured in the snow. Snow was found to contain a diverse assemblage of bacteria (Alphaproteobacteria, Betaproteobacteria and Gammaproteobacteria) and eukarya (Alveolata, Fungi, Stramenopiles and Viridiplantae). Phylotypes related to archaeal Thaumarchaeota and Euryarchaeota phyla were also identified. The structure of microbial assemblages was found to have strong similarities to communities sampled from marine and air environments, and sequences obtained from the South-West region, near Kangerlussuaq, which is bordered by an extensive periglacial expanse, had additional resemblances to soil originating communities. Strong correlations were found between bacterial beta diversity and Na+ and Cl- concentrations. These data suggest that surface snow from western regions of Greenland contain microbiota that are most likely derived from exogenous, wind transported sources. Downstream of the supraglacial environment, Greenland's rivers likely influence the ecology of localized estuary and marine systems. Here we characterize the geochemical and biotic composition of a glacial and glacial forefield fed river catchment in

Greenland surface mass-balance observations from the ice-sheet ablation area and local glaciers

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Machguth, Horst; Thomsen, Henrik H.; Weidick, Anker

2016-01-01

Glacier surface mass-balance measurements on Greenland started more than a century ago, but no compilation exists of the observations from the ablation area of the ice sheet and local glaciers. Such data could be used in the evaluation of modelled surface mass balance, or to document changes in g...

Mapping of a Hydrological Ice Sheet Drainage Basin on the West Greenland Ice Sheet Margin from ERS-1/2 SAR Interferometry, Ice-Radar Measurement, and Modelling

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Ahlstrøm, Andreas P.; Bøggild, C.E.; Stenseng, L.

2002-01-01

importance of the potential of the ice overburden pressure compared to the bedrock topography. The meltwater run-off for the basin delineations was modelled with an energy-balance model calibrated with observed ice-sheet ablation and compared to a 25 year time series of measured basin run-off. The standard......The hydrological ice-sheet basin draining into the Tasersiaq lake, West Greenland (66°13'N, 50°30'W), was delineated, First using standard digital elevation models (DEMs) for ice-sheet surface and bedrock, and subsequently using a new high-resolution dataset, with a surface DEM derived from repeat......-track interferometric synthetic aperture radar (SAR) and a bedrock topography derived from an airborne 60 MHz ice-penetrating radar. The extent of the delineation was calculated from a water-pressure potential as a function of the ice-sheet surface and bedrock elevations and a hydraulic factor κ describing the relative...

Long term ice sheet mass change rates and inter-annual variability from GRACE gravimetry.

Science.gov (United States)

Harig, C.

2017-12-01

The GRACE time series of gravimetry now stretches 15 years since its launch in 2002. Here we use Slepian functions to estimate the long term ice mass trends of Greenland, Antarctica, and several glaciated regions. The spatial representation shows multi-year to decadal regional shifts in accelerations, in agreement with increases in radar derived ice velocity. Interannual variations in ice mass are of particular interest since they can directly link changes in ice sheets to the drivers of change in the polar ocean and atmosphere. The spatial information retained in Slepian functions provides a tool to determine how this link varies in different regions within an ice sheet. We present GRACE observations of the 2013-2014 slowdown in mass loss of the Greenland ice sheet, which was concentrated in specific parts of the ice sheet and in certain months of the year. We also discuss estimating the relative importance of climate factors that control ice mass balance, as a function of location of the glacier/ice cap as well as the spatial variation within an ice sheet by comparing gravimetry with observations of surface air temperature, ocean temperature, etc. as well as model data from climate reanalysis products.

Barnes Ice Cap South Dome Trilateration Net Survey Data 1970-1984, Version 1

Data.gov (United States)

National Aeronautics and Space Administration — The Barnes Ice Cap data set contains survey measurements of a network of 43 stakes along a 10 km flow line on the northeast flank of the south dome of the Barnes Ice...

Tracking millennial-scale Holocene glacial advance and retreat using osmium isotopes: Insights from the Greenland ice sheet

Science.gov (United States)

Rooney, Alan D.; Selby, David; Llyod, Jeremy M.; Roberts, David H.; Luckge, Andreas; Sageman, Bradley B.; Prouty, Nancy G.

2016-01-01

High-resolution Os isotope stratigraphy can aid in reconstructing Pleistocene ice sheet fluctuation and elucidating the role of local and regional weathering fluxes on the marine Os residence time. This paper presents new Os isotope data from ocean cores adjacent to the West Greenland ice sheet that have excellent chronological controls. Cores MSM-520 and DA00-06 represent distal to proximal sites adjacent to two West Greenland ice streams. Core MSM-520 has a steadily decreasing Os signal over the last 10 kyr (187Os/188Os = 1.35–0.81). In contrast, Os isotopes from core DA00-06 (proximal to the calving front of Jakobshavn Isbræ) highlight four stages of ice stream retreat and advance over the past 10 kyr (187Os/188Os = 2.31; 1.68; 2.09; 1.47). Our high-resolution chemostratigraphic records provide vital benchmarks for ice-sheet modelers as we attempt to better constrain the future response of major ice sheets to climate change. Variations in Os isotope composition from sediment and macro-algae (seaweed) sourced from regional and global settings serve to emphasize the overwhelming effect weathering sources have on seawater Os isotope composition. Further, these findings demonstrate that the residence time of Os is shorter than previous estimates of ∼104 yr.

Geodetic measurements reveal similarities between post–Last Glacial Maximum and present-day mass loss from the Greenland ice sheet

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Khan, Shfaqat A.; Sasgen, Ingo; Bevis, Michael

2016-01-01

Accurate quantification of the millennial-scale mass balance of the Greenland ice sheet (GrIS) and its contribution to global sea-level rise remain challenging because of sparse in situ observations in key regions. Glacial isostatic adjustment (GIA) is the ongoing response of the solid Earth to ice...

Application of GRACE to the Evaluation of an Ice Flow Model of the Greenland Ice Sheet

Science.gov (United States)

Schlegel, N.; Wiese, D. N.; Watkins, M. M.; Larour, E. Y.; Box, J. E.; Fettweis, X.; van den Broeke, M. R.; Morlighem, M.; Boening, C.; Seroussi, H. L.

2014-12-01

Quantifying Greenland's future contribution to sea level rise is a challenging task and requires accurate estimates of ice flow sensitivity to climate change. Transient ice flow models are promising tools for estimating future ice sheet behavior. However, confidence in these types of future projections is low, especially because evaluation of model historical runs is so challenging due to the scarcity of continental-wide data for validation. For more than a decade, NASA's GRACE has continuously acquired time-variable measurements of the Earth's gravity field and has provided unprecedented surveillance of mass balance of the ice sheets, offering an opportunity for ice sheet model evaluation. Here, we take advantage of a new high-resolution (~300 km) monthly mascon solution for the purpose of mass balance comparison with an independent, historical ice flow model simulation using the Ice Sheet System Model (ISSM). The comparison highlights which regions of the ice sheet differ most from GRACE. Investigation of regional differences in trends and seasonal amplitudes between simulations forced with three different Regional Climate Model (RCM)-based estimates of surface mass balance (SMB) allows us to make conclusions about the relative contributions of various error sources in the model hindcast. This study constitutes the first regional comparison of GRACE data and an ice sheet model. Conclusions will aid in the improvement of RCM SMB estimates as well as ice sheet simulation estimates of present and future rates of sea level rise. This work was performed at the California Institute of Technology's Jet Propulsion Laboratory under a contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's Cryosphere Program and President's and Director's Fund Program.

The sensitivity of the Greenland Ice Sheet to glacial-interglacial oceanic forcing

Science.gov (United States)

Tabone, Ilaria; Blasco, Javier; Robinson, Alexander; Alvarez-Solas, Jorge; Montoya, Marisa

2018-04-01

Observations suggest that during the last decades the Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS) has experienced a gradually accelerating mass loss, in part due to the observed speed-up of several of Greenland's marine-terminating glaciers. Recent studies directly attribute this to warming North Atlantic temperatures, which have triggered melting of the outlet glaciers of the GrIS, grounding-line retreat and enhanced ice discharge into the ocean, contributing to an acceleration of sea-level rise. Reconstructions suggest that the influence of the ocean has been of primary importance in the past as well. This was the case not only in interglacial periods, when warmer climates led to a rapid retreat of the GrIS to land above sea level, but also in glacial periods, when the GrIS expanded as far as the continental shelf break and was thus more directly exposed to oceanic changes. However, the GrIS response to palaeo-oceanic variations has yet to be investigated in detail from a mechanistic modelling perspective. In this work, the evolution of the GrIS over the past two glacial cycles is studied using a three-dimensional hybrid ice-sheet-shelf model. We assess the effect of the variation of oceanic temperatures on the GrIS evolution on glacial-interglacial timescales through changes in submarine melting. The results show a very high sensitivity of the GrIS to changing oceanic conditions. Oceanic forcing is found to be a primary driver of GrIS expansion in glacial times and of retreat in interglacial periods. If switched off, palaeo-atmospheric variations alone are not able to yield a reliable glacial configuration of the GrIS. This work therefore suggests that considering the ocean as an active forcing should become standard practice in palaeo-ice-sheet modelling.

Validation of a Climate-Data Record of the "Clear-Sky" Surface Temperature of the Greenland Ice Sheet

Science.gov (United States)

Hall, Dorothy K.; Box, Jason E.; Koenig, Lora S.; DiGirolamo, Nicolo E.; Comiso, Josefino C.; Shuman, Christopher A.

2011-01-01

Surface temperatures on the Greenland Ice Sheet have been studied on the ground, using automatic weather station (AWS) data from the Greenland-Climate Network (GC-Net), and from analysis of satellite sensor data. Using Advanced Very High Frequency Radiometer (AVHRR) weekly surface temperature maps, warming of the surface of the Greenland Ice Sheet has been documented since 1981. We extended and refined this record using higher-resolution Moderate-Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) data from March 2000 to the present. We developed a daily and monthly climate-data record (CDR) of the "clear-sky" surface temperature of the Greenland Ice Sheet using an ice-surface temperature (1ST) algorithm developed for use with MODIS data. Validation of this CDR is ongoing. MODIS Terra swath data are projected onto a polar stereographic grid at 6.25-km resolution to develop binary, gridded daily and mean-monthly 1ST maps. Each monthly map also has a color-coded image map that is available to download. Also included with the monthly maps is an accompanying map showing number of days in the month that were used to calculate the mean-monthly 1ST. This is important because no 1ST decision is made by the algorithm for cells that are considered cloudy by the internal cloud mask, so a sufficient number of days must be available to produce a mean 1ST for each grid cell. Validation of the CDR consists of several facets: 1) comparisons between ISTs and in-situ measurements; 2) comparisons between ISTs and AWS data; and 3) comparisons of ISTs with surface temperatures derived from other satellite instruments such as the Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER) and Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus (ETM+). Previous work shows that Terra MODIS ISTs are about 3 C lower than in-situ temperatures measured at Summit Camp, during the winter of 2008-09 under clear skies. In this work we begin to compare surface temperatures derived from AWS data with ISTs from the MODIS CDR.

Circulation and fjord-shelf exchange during the ice-covered period in Young Sound-Tyrolerfjord, Northeast Greenland (74°N)

Science.gov (United States)

Boone, W.; Rysgaard, S.; Kirillov, S.; Dmitrenko, I.; Bendtsen, J.; Mortensen, J.; Meire, L.; Petrusevich, V.; Barber, D. G.

2017-07-01

Fjords around Greenland connect the Greenland Ice Sheet to the ocean and their hydrography and circulation are determined by the interplay between atmospheric forcing, runoff, topography, fjord-shelf exchange, tides, waves, and seasonal growth and melt of sea ice. Limited knowledge exists on circulation in high-Arctic fjords, particularly those not impacted by tidewater glaciers, and especially during winter, when they are covered with sea-ice and freshwater input is low. Here, we present and analyze seasonal observations of circulation, hydrography and cross-sill exchange of the Young Sound-Tyrolerfjord system (74°N) in Northeast Greenland. Distinct seasonal circulation phases are identified and related to polynya activity, meltwater and inflow of coastal water masses. Renewal of basin water in the fjord is a relatively slow process that modifies the fjord water masses on a seasonal timescale. By the end of winter, there is two-layer circulation, with outflow in the upper 45 m and inflow extending down to approximately 150 m. Tidal analysis showed that tidal currents above the sill were almost barotropic and dominated by the M2 tidal constituent (0.26 m s-1), and that residual currents (∼0.02 m s-1) were relatively small during the ice-covered period. Tidal pumping, a tidally driven fjord-shelf exchange mechanism, drives a salt flux that is estimated to range between 145 kg s-1 and 603 kg s-1. Extrapolation of these values over the ice-covered period indicates that tidal pumping is likely a major source of dense water and driver of fjord circulation during the ice-covered period.

Polarimetric SAR interferometry applied to land ice: modeling

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Dall, Jørgen; Papathanassiou, Konstantinos; Skriver, Henning

2004-01-01

This paper introduces a few simple scattering models intended for the application of polarimetric SAR interfer-ometry to land ice. The principal aim is to eliminate the penetration bias hampering ice sheet elevation maps generated with single-channel SAR interferometry. The polarimetric coherent...... scattering models are similar to the oriented-volume model and the random-volume-over-ground model used in vegetation studies, but the ice models are adapted to the different geometry of land ice. Also, due to compaction, land ice is not uniform; a fact that must be taken into account for large penetration...... depths. The validity of the scattering models is examined using L-band polarimetric interferometric SAR data acquired with the EMISAR system over an ice cap located in the percolation zone of the Greenland ice sheet. Radar reflectors were deployed on the ice surface prior to the data acquisition in order...

King George Island ice cap geometry updated with airborne GPR measurements

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

M. Rückamp

2012-07-01

Full Text Available Ice geometry is a mandatory requirement for numerical modelling purposes. In this paper we present a consistent data set for the ice thickness, the bedrock topography and the ice surface topography of the King George Island ice cap (Arctowski icefield and the adjacent central part. The new data set is composed of ground based and airborne ground penetrating radar (GPR and differential GPS (DGPS measurements, obtained during several field campaigns. Blindow et al. (2010 already provided a comprehensive overview of the ground based measurements carried out in the safely accessible area of the ice cap. The updated data set incorporates airborne measurements in the heavily crevassed coastal areas. Therefore, in this paper special attention is paid to the airborne measurements by addressing the instrument used, survey procedure, and data processing in more detail. In particular, the inclusion of airborne GPR measurements with the 30 MHz BGR-P30-System developed at the Institute of Geophysics (University of Münster completes the picture of the ice geometry substantially. The compiled digital elevation model of the bedrock shows a rough, highly variable topography with pronounced valleys, ridges, and troughs. Mean ice thickness is 240 ± 6 m, with a maximum value of 422 ± 10 m in the surveyed area. Noticeable are bounded areas in the bedrock topography below sea level where marine based ice exists. The provided data set is required as a basis for future monitoring attempts or as input for numerical modelling experiments. The data set is available from the PANGAEA database at http://dx.doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.770567.

Greenland ice sheet melt from MODIS and associated atmospheric variability.

Science.gov (United States)

Häkkinen, Sirpa; Hall, Dorothy K; Shuman, Christopher A; Worthen, Denise L; DiGirolamo, Nicolo E

2014-03-16

Daily June-July melt fraction variations over the Greenland ice sheet (GIS) derived from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) (2000-2013) are associated with atmospheric blocking forming an omega-shape ridge over the GIS at 500 hPa height. Blocking activity with a range of time scales, from synoptic waves breaking poleward (days) to full-fledged blocks (≥5 days), brings warm subtropical air masses over the GIS controlling daily surface temperatures and melt. The temperature anomaly of these subtropical air mass intrusions is also important for melting. Based on the years with the greatest melt (2002 and 2012) during the MODIS era, the area-average temperature anomaly of 2 standard deviations above the 14 year June-July mean results in a melt fraction of 40% or more. Though the summer of 2007 had the most blocking days, atmospheric temperature anomalies were too small to instigate extreme melting. Short-term atmospheric blocking over Greenland contributes to melt episodesAssociated temperature anomalies are equally important for the meltDuration and strength of blocking events contribute to surface melt intensity.

Falsifying the Sikussak-Oasis Hypothesis for the Tillite Group, East Greenland: Implications for Trezona-like Carbon Isotope Excursions Beneath Neoproterozoic Glacials

Science.gov (United States)

Hoffman, P. F.; Domack, E. W.; Maloof, A. C.; Halverson, G. P.

2006-05-01

In Neoproterozoic time, East Greenland and East Svalbard (EGES) occupied landward and seaward positions, respectively, on the southern subtropical margin of Laurentia. In both areas, thick clastic-to-carbonate successions are overlain by two discrete glacial and/or periglacial formations, separated by fine basinal clastics. In Svalbard, the younger glacial has a characteristic Marinoan (basal Ediacaran) cap dolostone, but the older glacial is underlain by a 10-permil negative carbon isotope excursion that is indistinguishable from excursions observed exclusively beneath Marinoan glacials in Australia, Namibia and western Laurentia. This led us to propose (Basin Research 16, 297-324, 2004) that the paired glacials in EGES represent the onset and climax of a single, long-lived, Marinoan glaciation. The intervening fine clastics, which contain ikaite pseudomorphs, presumptively accumulated beneath permanent shorefast sea ice (sikussak), analogous to East Greenland fjords during the Younger Dryas and Little Ice Age. In this model, the top of the older glacial signals the start of Snowball Earth. We conducted a preliminary field test of the sikussak hypothesis in Strindberg Land (SL), Andrée Land (AL) and Ella O (EO), East Greenland. We confirmed the correlation of the paired glacials and the Marinoan cap dolostone (missing on EO). In SL, the older glacial (Ulveso Fm) is a thin diamictite overlain by conglomerate lag and a set of megavarves composed of alternating siltstone and ice-rafted debris. In AL and EO, the Ulveso is a sub-glacial diamictite overlain by aeolian and/or marine sandstone. In Bastion Bugt on EO, it is a transgressive shoreface sandstone. This proves that glacial recession occurred under open-water conditions and did not result from permanent sea-ice formation, as stipulated in the sikussak model. There is no evidence that the fine clastic sequence between the glacials formed under an ice cover, or for a single glacial period. This brings us back to

Nitrate addition has minimal short-term impacts on greenland ice sheet supraglacial prokaryotes

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Cameron, Karen A.; Stibal, Marek; Chrismas, Nathan

2017-01-01

Tropospheric nitrate levels are predicted to increase throughout the 21st century, with potential effects on terrestrial ecosystems, including the Greenland ice sheet (GrIS). This study considers the impacts of elevated nitrate concentrations on the abundance and composition of dominant bulk...... and active prokaryotic communities sampled from in situ nitrate fertilization plots on the GrIS surface. Nitrate concentrations were successfully elevated within sediment-filled meltwater pools, known as cryoconite holes; however, nitrate additions applied to surface ice did not persist. Estimated bulk...... cryoconite communities were not nitrate limited at the time of sampling. Instead, temporal changes in biomass and community composition were more pronounced. As these in situ incubations were short (6 weeks), and the community composition across GrIS surface ice is highly variable, we suggest that further...

PIXE analysis as a tool for dating of ice cores from the Greenland ice sheet

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Hansson, H.C.; Swietlicki, E.; Larsson, N.P.O.; Johnsen, S.J.

1993-01-01

Sections from the 2037 m long Dye 3 ice core drilled in 1979-1981 in the ice sheet of Southern Greenland were analysed with PIXE. The seven selected sections were from depths between 1778 and 1813 m, which corresponds to a time interval between about 8 500 and 10 000 years B.C. at the end of the last Ice Age. During this time period, fast climatic changes of several degrees centrigrade per century are known to have taken place. The exact time scales of these changes need yet to be verified by renewed measurements using nonconventional stratigraphic dating techniques such as PIXE. The problem is highly relevant for the prediction of climatic changes in our present age. A new sample preparation technique was developed which enables the determination of annual thicknesses of the parts of the ice core representing 10 000-40 000 years before present, where the thickness of the annual ice layers are believed to be less than 2.5 cm. More commonly used techniques of dating, such as measurements of oxygen and hydrogen isotopes δ 18 O and δD, nitrate, acidity or conductivity all have difficulties in resolving annual cycles in thicknesses of less than about 2 cm. The new technique involves sublimation of 18 cm long ice sections, after which the material contained in the ice is deposited on the thin backing. In this way, the material to be analysed is preconcentrated through the removal of the H 2 O, while still retaining the spatial distribution pattern of the various water soluble and insoluble components along the ice core. The resulting spatial resolution of the sublimation technique is estimated to be ±1 mm. A PIXE analysis was performed in contiguous millimeter steps across the sublimated ice sections. Estimations of annual ice layer thicknesses were based on the patterns of seasonal variation along the ice sections for several major and minor elements quantified with PIXE. (orig./TW)

How robust are in situ observations for validating satellite-derived albedo over the dark zone of the Greenland Ice Sheet?

Science.gov (United States)

Ryan, J.; Hubbard, A., II; Irvine-Fynn, T. D.; Doyle, S. H.; Cook, J.; Stibal, M.; Smith, L. C.; Box, J. E.

2017-12-01

Calibration and validation of satellite-derived ice sheet albedo data require high-quality, in situ measurements commonly acquired by up and down facing pyranometers mounted on automated weather stations (AWS). However, direct comparison between ground and satellite-derived albedo can only be justified when the measured surface is homogeneous at the length-scale of both satellite pixel and in situ footprint. We used digital imagery acquired by an unmanned aerial vehicle to evaluate point-to-pixel albedo comparisons across the western, ablating margin of the Greenland Ice Sheet. Our results reveal that in situ measurements overestimate albedo by up to 0.10 at the end of the melt season because the ground footprints of AWS-mounted pyranometers are insufficient to capture the spatial heterogeneity of the ice surface as it progressively ablates and darkens. Statistical analysis of 21 AWS across the entire Greenland Ice Sheet reveals that almost half suffer from this bias, including some AWS located within the wet snow zone.

Measurement of spectral sea ice albedo at Qaanaaq fjord in northwest Greenland

Science.gov (United States)

Tanikawa, T.

2017-12-01

The spectral albedos of sea ice were measured at Qaanaaq fjord in northwest Greenland. Spectral measurements were conducted for sea ice covered with snow and sea ice without snow where snow was artificially removed around measurement point. Thickness of the sea ice was approximately 1.3 m with 5 cm of snow over the sea ice. The measurements show that the spectral albedos of the sea ice with snow were lower than those of natural pure snow especially in the visible regions though the spectral shapes were similar to each other. This is because the spectral albedos in the visible region have information of not only the snow but also the sea ice under the snow. The spectral albedos of the sea ice without the snow were approximately 0.4 - 0.5 in the visible region, 0.05-0.25 in the near-infrared region and almost constant of approximately 0.05 in the region of 1500 - 2500 nm. In the visible region, it would be due to multiple scattering by an air bubble within the sea ice. In contrast, in the near-infrared and shortwave infrared wavelengths, surface reflection at the sea ice surface would be dominant. Since a light absorption by the ice in these regions is relatively strong comparing to the visible region, the light could not be penetrated deeply within the sea ice, resulting that surface reflection based on Fresnel reflection would be dominant. In this presentation we also show the results of comparison between the radiative transfer calculation and spectral measurement data.

A 600-year annual ¹⁰Be record from the NGRIP ice core, Greenland

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Berggren, A.M.; Johnsen, Sigfus Johann; Vinther, Bo Møllesøe

2009-01-01

in an ice core from the NGRIP site in Greenland. NGRIP and Dye-3 10Be exhibits similar long-term variability, although occasional short term differences between the two sites indicate that at least two high resolution 10Be records are needed to assess local variations and to confidently reconstruct past...

Ice-Dammed Lake Drainage Evolution at Russell Glacier, West Greenland

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Jonathan L. Carrivick

2017-11-01

Full Text Available KEY POINTS/HIGHLIGHTSTwo rapid ice-dammed lake drainage events gauged and ice dam geometry measured.A melt enlargement model is developed to examine the evolution of drainage mechanism(s.Lake temperature dominated conduit melt enlargement and we hypothesize a flotation trigger.Glaciological and hydraulic factors that control the timing and mechanisms of glacier lake outburst floods (GLOFs remain poorly understood. This study used measurements of lake level at 15 min intervals and known lake bathymetry to calculate lake outflow during two GLOF events from the northern margin of Russell Glacier, west Greenland. We used measured ice surface elevation, interpolated subglacial topography and likely conduit geometry to inform a melt enlargement model of the outburst evolution. The model was tuned to best-fit the hydrograph rising limb and timing of peak discharge in both events; it achieved Mean Absolute Errors of <5%. About one third of the way through the rising limb, conduit melt enlargement became the dominant drainage mechanism. Lake water temperature, which strongly governed the enlargement rate, preconditioned the high peak discharge and short duration of these floods. We hypothesize that both GLOFs were triggered by ice dam flotation, and localized hydraulic jacking sustained most of their early-stage outflow, explaining the particularly rapid water egress in comparison to that recorded at other ice-marginal lakes. As ice overburden pressure relative to lake water hydraulic head diminished, flow became confined to a subglacial conduit. This study has emphasized the inter-play between ice dam thickness and lake level, drainage timing, lake water temperature and consequently rising stage lake outflow and flood evolution.

Spatial gradients of temperature, accumulation and δ18O-ice in Greenland over a series of Dansgaard–Oeschger events

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

M. Guillevic

2013-05-01

Full Text Available Air and water stable isotope measurements from four Greenland deep ice cores (GRIP, GISP2, NGRIP and NEEM are investigated over a series of Dansgaard–Oeschger events (DO 8, 9 and 10, which are representative of glacial millennial scale variability. Combined with firn modeling, air isotope data allow us to quantify abrupt temperature increases for each drill site (1σ = 0.6 °C for NEEM, GRIP and GISP2, 1.5 °C for NGRIP. Our data show that the magnitude of stadial–interstadial temperature increase is up to 2 °C larger in central and North Greenland than in northwest Greenland: i.e., for DO 8, a magnitude of +8.8 °C is inferred, which is significantly smaller than the +11.1 °C inferred at GISP2. The same spatial pattern is seen for accumulation increases. This pattern is coherent with climate simulations in response to reduced sea-ice extent in the Nordic seas. The temporal water isotope (δ18O–temperature relationship varies between 0.3 and 0.6 (±0.08 ‰ °C−1 and is systematically larger at NEEM, possibly due to limited changes in precipitation seasonality compared to GISP2, GRIP or NGRIP. The gas age−ice age difference of warming events represented in water and air isotopes can only be modeled when assuming a 26% (NGRIP to 40% (GRIP lower accumulation than that derived from a Dansgaard–Johnsen ice flow model.

Net accumulation of the Greenland ice sheet

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Kiilsholm, Sissi; Christensen, Jens Hesselbjerg; Dethloff, Klaus

2003-01-01

High-resolution (50 km) climate change simulations for an area covering the entire Arctic have been conducted with the regional climate model (RCM) HIRHAM. The experiments were forced at the lateral boundary by large-scale atmospheric conditions from transient climate change scenario simulations...... with HIRHAM for periods representing present-day (1961-1990) and the future (2071-2100) in the two scenarios. We find that due to a much better representation of the surface topography in the RCM, the geographical distribution of present-day accumulation rates simulated by the RCM represents a substantial...... improvement compared to the driving OAGCM. Estimates of the regional net balance are also better represented by the RCM. In the future climate the net balance for the Greenland Ice Sheet is reduced in all the simulation, but discrepancies between the amounts when based on ECHAM4/OPYC3 and HIRHAM are found...

Towards Greenland Glaciation: cumulative or abrupt transition?

Science.gov (United States)

Ramstein, Gilles; Tan, Ning; Ladant, Jean-baptiste; Dumas, Christophe; Contoux, Camille

2017-04-01

During the mid-Pliocene warming period (3-3.3 Ma BP), the global annual mean temperatures inferred by data and model studies were 2-3° warmer than pre-industrial values. Accordingly, Greenland ice sheet volume is supposed to reach at the most, only half of that of present-day [Haywood et al. 2010]. Around 2.7-2.6 Ma BP, just ˜ 500 kyr after the warming peak of mid-Pliocene, the Greenland ice sheet has reached its full size [Lunt et al. 2008]. A crucial question concerns the evolution of the Greenland ice sheet from half to full size during the 3 - 2.5 Ma period. Data show a decreasing trend of atmospheric CO2 concentration from 3 Ma to 2.5 Ma [Seki et al.2010; Bartoli et al. 2011; Martinez et al. 2015]. However, a recent study [Contoux et al. 2015] suggests that a lowering of CO2 is not sufficient to initiate a perennial glaciation on Greenland and must be combined with low summer insolation to preserve the ice sheet during insolation maxima. This suggests rather a cumulative process than an abrupt event. In order to diagnose the evolution of the ice sheet build-up, we carry on, for the first time, a transient simulation of climate and ice sheet evolutions from 3 Ma to 2.5 Ma. This strategy enables us to investigate the waxing and waning of the ice sheet during several orbital cycles. We use a tri-dimensional interpolation method designed by Ladant et al. (2014), which allows the evolution of CO2 concentration and of orbital parameters, and the evolution of the Greenland ice sheet size to be taken into account. By interpolating climatic snapshot simulations ran with various possible combinations of CO2, orbits and ice sheet sizes, we can build a continuous climatic forcing that is then used to provide 500 kyrs-long ice sheet simulations. With such a tool, we may offer a physically based answer to different CO2 reconstructions scenarios and analyse which one is the most consistent with Greenland ice sheet buildup.

Crustal movements due to Iceland's shrinking ice caps mimic magma inflow signal at Katla volcano.

Science.gov (United States)

Spaans, Karsten; Hreinsdóttir, Sigrún; Hooper, Andrew; Ófeigsson, Benedikt Gunnar

2015-05-20

Many volcanic systems around the world are located beneath, or in close proximity to, ice caps. Mass change of these ice caps causes surface movements, which are typically neglected when interpreting surface deformation measurements around these volcanoes. These movements can however be significant, and may closely resemble movements due to magma accumulation. Here we show such an example, from Katla volcano, Iceland. Horizontal movements observed by GPS on the flank of Katla have led to the inference of significant inflow of magma into a chamber beneath the caldera, starting in 2000, and continuing over several years. We use satellite radar interferometry and GPS data to show that between 2001 and 2010, the horizontal movements seen on the flank can be explained by the response to the long term shrinking of ice caps, and that erratic movements seen at stations within the caldera are also not likely to signify magma inflow. It is important that interpretations of geodetic measurements at volcanoes in glaciated areas consider the effect of ice mass change, and previous studies should be carefully reevaluated.

Estimating the rates of mass change, ice volume change and snow volume change in Greenland from ICESat and GRACE data

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Slobbe, D.C.; Ditmar, P.G.; Lindenbergh, R.C.

2008-01-01

The focus of this paper is on the quantification of ongoing mass and volume changes over the Greenland ice sheet. For that purpose, we used elevation changes derived from the Ice, Cloud, and land Elevation Satellite (ICESat) laser altimetry mission and monthly variations of the Earth’s gravity field

A Snow Density Dataset for Improving Surface Boundary Conditions in Greenland Ice Sheet Firn Modeling

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Robert S. Fausto

2018-05-01

Full Text Available The surface snow density of glaciers and ice sheets is of fundamental importance in converting volume to mass in both altimetry and surface mass balance studies, yet it is often poorly constrained. Site-specific surface snow densities are typically derived from empirical relations based on temperature and wind speed. These parameterizations commonly calculate the average density of the top meter of snow, thereby systematically overestimating snow density at the actual surface. Therefore, constraining surface snow density to the top 0.1 m can improve boundary conditions in high-resolution firn-evolution modeling. We have compiled an extensive dataset of 200 point measurements of surface snow density from firn cores and snow pits on the Greenland ice sheet. We find that surface snow density within 0.1 m of the surface has an average value of 315 kg m−3 with a standard deviation of 44 kg m−3, and has an insignificant annual air temperature dependency. We demonstrate that two widely-used surface snow density parameterizations dependent on temperature systematically overestimate surface snow density over the Greenland ice sheet by 17–19%, and that using a constant density of 315 kg m−3 may give superior results when applied in surface mass budget modeling.

Ice-Ocean Interactions to the North-West of Greenland: Glaciers, Straits, Ice Bridges, and the Rossby Radius (Invited)

Science.gov (United States)

Muenchow, A.; Falkner, K. K.; Melling, H.; Johnson, H. L.; Huntley, H. S.; Ryan, P.; Friends Of Petermann

2010-12-01

Petermann Glacier at 81 N latitude is a major outlet glacier adjacent to Nares Strait. It terminates in a long (70 km), narrow (16 km) and thin (50 m) floating tongue and has a grounding line more than 500 m below sea level. A calving event in 2010 reduced the floating area by 25% and produced a single 240 km2 ice island currently moving south in Nares Strait where it will likely interact with island to potentially create a temporary polynya in Nares Strait. The 2010 calving from Petermann Glacier contributes bridge formed regularly at the southern end of Nares Strait creating the North-Water polynya near 79 N latitude. Since 2006 this ice bridge has largely failed to form, leading, perhaps, to the occasional formation of a secondary ice bridge 300 km to the north where Nares Strait connects to the Arctic Ocean. However, this ice bridge appears to form for shorter periods only. Consequently Arctic sea ice can now exit the Arctic in winter via pathways to the west of Greenland all year. We speculate that this changed ocean and sea ice regime in Nares Strait and the Arctic Ocean may contribute to the recently observed calving events in Petermann Fjord.

Modelling the climate and surface mass balance of polar ice sheets using RACMO2 - Part 1: Greenland (1958-2016)

Science.gov (United States)

Noël, Brice; van de Berg, Willem Jan; Melchior van Wessem, J.; van Meijgaard, Erik; van As, Dirk; Lenaerts, Jan T. M.; Lhermitte, Stef; Kuipers Munneke, Peter; Smeets, C. J. P. Paul; van Ulft, Lambertus H.; van de Wal, Roderik S. W.; van den Broeke, Michiel R.

2018-03-01

We evaluate modelled Greenland ice sheet (GrIS) near-surface climate, surface energy balance (SEB) and surface mass balance (SMB) from the updated regional climate model RACMO2 (1958-2016). The new model version, referred to as RACMO2.3p2, incorporates updated glacier outlines, topography and ice albedo fields. Parameters in the cloud scheme governing the conversion of cloud condensate into precipitation have been tuned to correct inland snowfall underestimation: snow properties are modified to reduce drifting snow and melt production in the ice sheet percolation zone. The ice albedo prescribed in the updated model is lower at the ice sheet margins, increasing ice melt locally. RACMO2.3p2 shows good agreement compared to in situ meteorological data and point SEB/SMB measurements, and better resolves the spatial patterns and temporal variability of SMB compared with the previous model version, notably in the north-east, south-east and along the K-transect in south-western Greenland. This new model version provides updated, high-resolution gridded fields of the GrIS present-day climate and SMB, and will be used for projections of the GrIS climate and SMB in response to a future climate scenario in a forthcoming study.

The Abandoned Ice Sheet Base at Camp Century, Greenland, in a Warming Climate

Science.gov (United States)

Colgan, William; Machguth, Horst; Macferrin, Mike; Colgan, Jeff D.; Van As, Dirk; Macgregor, Joseph A.

2016-01-01

In 1959 the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers built Camp Century beneath the surface of the northwestern Greenland Ice Sheet. There they studied the feasibility of deploying ballistic missiles within the ice sheet. The base and its wastes were abandoned with minimal decommissioning in 1967, under the assumption they would be preserved for eternity by perpetually accumulating snowfall. Here we show that a transition in ice sheet surface mass balance at Camp Century from net accumulation to net ablation is plausible within the next 75years, under a business-as-usual anthropogenic emissions scenario (Representative Concentration Pathway 8.5). Net ablation would guarantee the eventual remobilization of physical, chemical, biological, and radiological wastes abandoned at the site. While Camp Century and four other contemporaneous ice sheet bases were legally established under a Danish-U.S. treaty, the potential remobilization of their abandoned wastes, previously regarded as sequestered, represents an entirely new pathway of political dispute resulting from climate change.

A tentative record of the last 1,000 years of Greenland temperature from occluded air in the GISP2 ice core

Science.gov (United States)

Kobashi, T.; Severinghaus, J. P.; Barnola, J.; Kawamura, K.; Beaudette, R.

2005-12-01

Ice borehole temperature inversion has been used to reconstruct Greenland surface temperature during the last millennium (Dahl-Jensen et al, Science, 1998). However, this technique does not preserve high frequencies because of diffusion of heat in the ice. Here, we present a tentative reconstruction of the past 1,000 years of central Greenland temperature using nitrogen and argon isotopes from occluded air in the GISP2 ice core. This technique preserves decadal-to-centennial-scale temperature variations and complements the borehole technique. Nitrogen and argon isotopes in the porous snow layer (~80m) experience two isotopic fractionations by gravitation and temperature gradients (ΔT) between the top and bottom of the snow layer. The simultaneous analysis of argon and nitrogen isotopes allows us to separate these two effects, and obtain a history of ΔT in the layer. To a first approximation, ΔT change on decadal to centennial time scales is a surface temperature history because the heat conductivity of snow is much smaller than that of ice, and the heat capacity of the ice sheet is quite large. The preliminary ΔT history (20-year interval) shows a Medieval Warm Period in the 11th to 12th centuries and the Little Ice Age in the 15th to 19th centuries. Furthermore, the record shows a clear similarity with the Be-10 record (a proxy for solar activity) with Wolf, Sporer, Maunder, and Dalton minima clearly seen in the cold periods. This finding is consistent with the hypothesis that solar activity influenced Greenland temperature during the past 1000 years.

Detection of Supra-Glacial Lakes on the Greenland Ice Sheet Using MODIS Images

Science.gov (United States)

Verin, Gauthier; Picard, Ghislain; Libois, Quentin; Gillet-Chaulet, Fabien; Roux, Antoine

2015-04-01

During melt season, supra-glacial lakes form on the margins of the Greenland ice sheet. Because of their size exceeding several kilometers, and their concentration, they affect surface albedo leading to an amplification of the regional melt. Furthermore, they foster hydro-fracturing that propagate liquid water to the bedrock and therefore enhance the basal lubrication which may affect the ice motion. It is known that Greenland ice sheet has strongly responded to recent global warming. As air temperature increases, melt duration and melt intensity increase and surface melt area extends further inland. These recent changes may play an important role in the mass balance of the Greenland ice sheet. In this context, it is essential to better monitor and understand supra-glacial spatio-temporal dynamics in order to better assess future sea level rise. In this study MODIS (Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer) images have been used to detect supra-glacial lakes. The observation site is located on the West margin of the ice sheet, between 65°N and 70°N where the concentration of lake is maximum. The detection is performed by a fully automatic algorithm using images processing techniques introduced by Liang et al. (2012) which can be summarized in three steps: the selection of usable MODIS images, mainly we exclude images with too many clouds. The detection of lake and the automatic correction of false detections. This algorithm is capable to tag each individual lake allowing a survey of all lake geometrical properties over the entire melt season. We observed a large population of supra-glacial lakes over 14 melt seasons, from 2000 to 2013 on an extended area of 70.000 km2. In average, lakes are observed from June 9 ± 8.7 days to September 13 ± 13.9 days, and reach a maximum total area of 699 km2 ± 146 km2. As the melt season progresses, lakes form higher in altitude up to 1800 m above sea level. Results show a very strong inter-annual variability in term of

The observed katabatic flow at the edge of the Greenland ice sheet during GIMEX-91

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Broeke, M.R. van den; Duynkerke, P.G.; Oerlemans, J.

1994-01-01

Observations performed in the melting zone of the Greenland ice sheet and over the adjacent tundra in the summer of 1991 are described. The experimental area is the region near St ndre Stromfjord (67°N, 54°W), which is relatively dry and sunny, resulting in the highest mean temperature in

New geoid of Greenland: A case study of terrain and ice effects, GOCE and use of local sea level data

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Forsberg, René; Jensen, Tim Enzlberger

2015-01-01

Making an accurate geoid model of Greenland has always been a challenge due to the ice sheet and glaciers, and the rough topography and deep fjords in the ice free parts. Terrestrial gravity coverage has for the same reasons been relatively sparse, with an older airborne survey of the interior be...

Inverse stochastic-dynamic models for high-resolution Greenland ice core records

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Boers, Niklas; Chekroun, Mickael D.; Liu, Honghu

2017-01-01

as statistical properties such as probability density functions, waiting times and power spectra, with no need for any external forcing. The crucial ingredients for capturing these properties are (i) high-resolution training data, (ii) cubic drift terms, (iii) nonlinear coupling terms between the 18O and dust......Proxy records from Greenland ice cores have been studied for several decades, yet many open questions remain regarding the climate variability encoded therein. Here, we use a Bayesian framework for inferring inverse, stochastic-dynamic models from 18O and dust records of unprecedented, subdecadal...

An explanation for the dark region in the western melt zone of the Greenland ice sheet

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

I. G. M. Wientjes

2010-07-01

Full Text Available The western part of the Greenland ice sheet contains a region that is darker than the surrounding ice. This feature has been analysed with the help of MODIS images. The dark region appears every year during the summer season and can always be found at the same location, which makes meltwater unlikely as the only source for the low albedos. Spectral information indicates that the ice in this region contains more debris than the ice closer to the margin. ASTER images reveal a wavy pattern in the darker ice. Based on these findings we conclude that ice, containing dust from older periods, is presently outcropping near the margin, leading to albedos lower than observed for the remaining ablation area. Therefore it can be concluded that the accumulation of meltwater is a result rather than a cause of the darkening.

Ice sheet in peril

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Hvidberg, Christine Schøtt

2016-01-01

Earth's large ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica are major contributors to sea level change. At present, the Greenland Ice Sheet (see the photo) is losing mass in response to climate warming in Greenland (1), but the present changes also include a long-term response to past climate transitions...

Impact of Greenland and Antarctic ice sheet interactions on climate sensitivity

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Goelzer, H.; Huybrechts, P. [Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Earth System Sciences and Departement Geografie, Brussels (Belgium); Loutre, M.F.; Goosse, H.; Fichefet, T. [Universite Catholique de Louvain, Georges Lemaitre Centre for Earth and Climate Research (TECLIM), Earth and Life Institute, Louvain-la-Neuve (Belgium); Mouchet, A. [Universite de Liege, Laboratoire de Physique Atmospherique et Planetaire, Liege (Belgium)

2011-09-15

We use the Earth system model of intermediate complexity LOVECLIM to show the effect of coupling interactive ice sheets on the climate sensitivity of the model on a millennial time scale. We compare the response to a 2 x CO{sub 2} warming scenario between fully coupled model versions including interactive Greenland and Antarctic ice sheet models and model versions with fixed ice sheets. For this purpose an ensemble of different parameter sets have been defined for LOVECLIM, covering a wide range of the model's sensitivity to greenhouse warming, while still simulating the present-day climate and the climate evolution over the last millennium within observational uncertainties. Additional freshwater fluxes from the melting ice sheets have a mitigating effect on the model's temperature response, leading to generally lower climate sensitivities of the fully coupled model versions. The mitigation is effectuated by changes in heat exchange within the ocean and at the sea-air interface, driven by freshening of the surface ocean and amplified by sea-ice-related feedbacks. The strength of the effect depends on the response of the ice sheets to the warming and on the model's climate sensitivity itself. The effect is relatively strong in model versions with higher climate sensitivity due to the relatively large polar amplification of LOVECLIM. With the ensemble approach in this study we cover a wide range of possible model responses. (orig.)

Ice-dynamic projections of the Greenland ice sheet in response to atmospheric and oceanic warming

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

J. J. Fürst

2015-05-01

Full Text Available Continuing global warming will have a strong impact on the Greenland ice sheet in the coming centuries. During the last decade (2000–2010, both increased melt-water runoff and enhanced ice discharge from calving glaciers have contributed 0.6 ± 0.1 mm yr−1 to global sea-level rise, with a relative contribution of 60 and 40% respectively. Here we use a higher-order ice flow model, spun up to present day, to simulate future ice volume changes driven by both atmospheric and oceanic temperature changes. For these projections, the flow model accounts for runoff-induced basal lubrication and ocean warming-induced discharge increase at the marine margins. For a suite of 10 atmosphere and ocean general circulation models and four representative concentration pathway scenarios, the projected sea-level rise between 2000 and 2100 lies in the range of +1.4 to +16.6 cm. For two low emission scenarios, the projections are conducted up to 2300. Ice loss rates are found to abate for the most favourable scenario where the warming peaks in this century, allowing the ice sheet to maintain a geometry close to the present-day state. For the other moderate scenario, loss rates remain at a constant level over 300 years. In any scenario, volume loss is predominantly caused by increased surface melting as the contribution from enhanced ice discharge decreases over time and is self-limited by thinning and retreat of the marine margin, reducing the ice–ocean contact area. As confirmed by other studies, we find that the effect of enhanced basal lubrication on the volume evolution is negligible on centennial timescales. Our projections show that the observed rates of volume change over the last decades cannot simply be extrapolated over the 21st century on account of a different balance of processes causing ice loss over time. Our results also indicate that the largest source of uncertainty arises from the surface mass balance and the underlying climate change

QUANTIFYING REGIONAL SEA LEVEL RISE CONTRIBUTIONS FROM THE GREENLAND ICE SHEET

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Diandong Ren

2013-01-01

Full Text Available This study projects the sea level contribution from the Greenland ice sheet (GrIS through to 2100, using a recently developed ice dynamics model forced by atmospheric parameters derived from three different climate models (CGCMs. The geographical pattern of the near-surface ice warming imposes a divergent flow field favoring mass loss through enhanced ice flow. The calculated average mass loss rate during the latter half of the 21st century is ~0.64±0.06 mm/year eustatic sea level rise, which is significantly larger than the IPCC AR4 estimate from surface mass balance. The difference is due largely to the positive feedbacks from reduced ice viscosity and the basal sliding mechanism present in the ice dynamics model. This inter-model, inter-scenario spread adds approximately a 20% uncertainty to the IPCC ice model estimates. The sea level rise is geographically non-uniform and reaches 1.69±0.24 mm/year by 2100 for the northeast coastal region of the United States, amplified by the expected weakening of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (AMOC. In contrast to previous estimates, which neglected the GrIS fresh water input, both sides of the North Atlantic Gyre are projected to experience sea level rises. The impacts on a selection of major cities on both sides of the Atlantic and in the Pacific and southern oceans also are assessed. The other ocean basins are found to be less affected than the Atlantic Ocean.

MEaSUREs Greenland Ice Mapping Project (GIMP) Digital Elevation Model from GeoEye and WorldView Imagery, Version 1

Data.gov (United States)

National Aeronautics and Space Administration — This data set consists of an enhanced resolution digital elevation model (DEM) for the Greenland Ice Sheet. The DEM is derived from sub-meter resolution,...

Spatial and temporal melt variability at Helheim Glacier, East Greenland, and its effect on ice dynamics

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Andersen, M. L.; Larsen, T. B.; Nettles, M.

2010-01-01

Understanding the behavior of large outlet glaciers draining the Greenland Ice Sheet is critical for assessing the impact of climate change on sea level rise. The flow of marine-terminating outlet glaciers is partly governed by calving-related processes taking place at the terminus but is also in...

Land motion due to 20th century mass balance of the Greenland Ice Sheet

Science.gov (United States)

Kjeldsen, K. K.; Khan, S. A.

2017-12-01

Quantifying the contribution from ice sheets and glaciers to past sea level change is of great value for understanding sea level projections into the 21st century. However, quantifying and understanding past changes are equally important, in particular understanding the impact in the near-field where the signal is highest. We assess the impact of 20th century mass balance of the Greenland Ice Sheet on land motion using results from Kjeldsen et al, 2015. These results suggest that the ice sheet on average lost a minimum of 75 Gt/yr, but also show that the mass balance was highly spatial- and temporal variable, and moreover that on a centennial time scale changes were driven by a decreasing surface mass balance. Based on preliminary results we discuss land motion during the 20th century due to mass balance changes and the driving components surface mass balance and ice dynamics.

Mass loss from the southern half of the Greenland Ice Sheet since the Little Ice Age

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Kjeldsen, Kristian K.; Kjær, Kurt H.; Bjørn, Anders A.

2013-01-01

Northern hemisphere temperatures reached their Holocene minimum and most glaciers reached their maximum during The Little Ice Age (LIA), but the timing of specific cold intervals is site-specific. In southern Greenland, we have compiled data from organic matter incorporated in LIA sediments, used...... retreat. Our results show that the advance of glaciers during the LIA occurs early after the Medieval Warm Period terminating soon after 1200 AD and culminates c. 1500-1600 AD. Historical maps also show that many glaciers on the western coast occupy a still-stand near the LIA maximum until 1900 AD before...

One million years of glaciation and denudation history in west Greenland

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Strunk, Astrid; Knudsen, Mads Faurschou; Egholm, David Lundbek

2017-01-01

The influence of major Quaternary climatic changes on growth and decay of the Greenland Ice Sheet, and associated erosional impact on the landscapes, is virtually unknown beyond the last deglaciation. Here we quantify exposure and denudation histories in west Greenland by applying a novel Markov......-Chain Monte Carlo modelling approach to all available paired cosmogenic 10Be-26Al bedrock data from Greenland. We find that long-term denudation rates in west Greenland range from >50 m Myr−1 in low-lying areas to ∼2 m Myr−1 at high elevations, hereby quantifying systematic variations in denudation rate among...... different glacial landforms caused by variations in ice thickness across the landscape. We furthermore show that the present day ice-free areas only were ice covered ca. 45% of the past 1 million years, and even less at high-elevation sites, implying that the Greenland Ice Sheet for much of the time...

The 1988-2003 Greenland ice sheet melt extent using passive microwave satellite data and a regional climate model

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Fettweis, Xavier; Ypersele, Jean-Pascal van [Universite Catholique de Louvain, Institut d' Astronomie et de Geophysique de G. Lemaitre, Louvain-La-Neuve (Belgium); Gallee, Hubert [CNRS, Laboratoire de Glaciologie et Geophysique de l' Environnement, Grenoble (France); Lefebre, Filip [Vito-IMS (Flemish Institute for Technological Research-Integral Environmental Studies), Mol (Belgium)

2006-10-15

Measurements from ETH-Camp and JAR1 AWS (West Greenland) as well as coupled atmosphere-snow regional climate simulations have highlighted flaws in the cross-polarized gradient ratio (XPGR) technique used to identify melt from passive microwave satellite data. It was found that dense clouds (causing notably rainfall) on the ice sheet severely perturb the XPGR melt signal. Therefore, the original XPGR melt detection algorithm has been adapted to better incorporate atmospheric variability over the ice sheet and an updated melt trend for the 1988-2003 period has been calculated. Compared to the original algorithm, the melt zone area increase is eight times higher (from 0.2 to 1.7% year{sup -1}). The increase is higher with the improved XPGR technique because rainfall also increased during this period. It is correlated to higher atmospheric temperatures. Finally, the model shows that the total ice sheet runoff is directly proportional to the melt extent surface detected by satellites. These results are important for the understanding of the effect of Greenland melting on the stability of the thermohaline circulation. (orig.)

Levels of ammonium, sulfate, chloride, calcium, and sodium in snow and ice from southern Greenland

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Busenberg, E.; Langway, C.C. Jr.

1979-01-01

Chemical analysis of surface snows and dated ice core samples from Dye 3, Greenland, suggests that the ammonium cation is a major constituent in all samples and that the annual ammonium levels present in the south Greenland samples have varied from 3.3 to 26.3 μg/kg between the seventeenth century and the present time. The annual range of 1974--1975 surface samples was between 3.8 and 8.8 μg/kg, while the mean was 5.7 +- 1.8 μ/kg. The recent large-scale uses of fixed nitrogen fertilizers and industrial pollution have apparently not affected the levels of ammonia reaching southern Greenland. The sodium and chloride present are predominantly derived from ocean spray, while more than 90% of the calcium is of continental origin. The levels of these three elements have not apparently been affected by human activity since the industrial revolution. Sulfate levels have increased dramatically since the industrial revolution, suggesting that sulfate of anthropogenic origin is the most important source of sulfate in modern snows from southern Greenland. The amount of the sulfuric acid neutralized by the ammonium cations was approximately 100% in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, dropping to approximately 20% in the 1974--1975 samples. These figures imply that there has been in increase in the acidity of precipitation in southern Greenland since the end of the eighteenth ce

Inter-annual Variations in Snow/Firn Density over the Greenland Ice Sheet by Combining GRACE gravimetry and Envisat Altimetry

Science.gov (United States)

Su, X.; Shum, C. K.; Guo, J.; Howat, I.; Jezek, K. C.; Luo, Z.; Zhou, Z.

2017-12-01

Satellite altimetry has been used to monitor elevation and volume change of polar ice sheets since the 1990s. In order to derive mass change from the measured volume change, different density assumptions are commonly used in the research community, which may cause discrepancies on accurately estimating ice sheets mass balance. In this study, we investigate the inter-annual anomalies of mass change from GRACE gravimetry and elevation change from Envisat altimetry during years 2003-2009, with the objective of determining inter-annual variations of snow/firn density over the Greenland ice sheet (GrIS). High positive correlations (0.6 or higher) between these two inter-annual anomalies at are found over 93% of the GrIS, which suggests that both techniques detect the same geophysical process at the inter-annual timescale. Interpreting the two anomalies in terms of near surface density variations, over 80% of the GrIS, the inter-annual variation in average density is between the densities of snow and pure ice. In particular, at the Summit of Central Greenland, we validate the satellite data estimated density with the in situ data available from 75 snow pits and 9 ice cores. This study provides constraints on the currently applied density assumptions for the GrIS.

Coupling of climate models and ice sheet models by surface mass balance gradients: application to the Greenland Ice Sheet

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

M. M. Helsen

2012-03-01

Full Text Available It is notoriously difficult to couple surface mass balance (SMB results from climate models to the changing geometry of an ice sheet model. This problem is traditionally avoided by using only accumulation from a climate model, and parameterizing the meltwater run-off as a function of temperature, which is often related to surface elevation (H_s. In this study, we propose a new strategy to calculate SMB, to allow a direct adjustment of SMB to a change in ice sheet topography and/or a change in climate forcing. This method is based on elevational gradients in the SMB field as computed by a regional climate model. Separate linear relations are derived for ablation and accumulation, using pairs of H_s and SMB within a minimum search radius. The continuously adjusting SMB forcing is consistent with climate model forcing fields, also for initially non-glaciated areas in the peripheral areas of an ice sheet. When applied to an asynchronous coupled ice sheet – climate model setup, this method circumvents traditional temperature lapse rate assumptions. Here we apply it to the Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS. Experiments using both steady-state forcing and glacial-interglacial forcing result in realistic ice sheet reconstructions.

Translating hydrologically-relevant variables from the ice sheet model SICOPOLIS to the Greenland Analog Project hydrologic modeling domain

Science.gov (United States)

Vallot, Dorothée; Applegate, Patrick; Pettersson, Rickard

2013-04-01

Projecting future climate and ice sheet development requires sophisticated models and extensive field observations. Given the present state of our knowledge, it is very difficult to say what will happen with certainty. Despite the ongoing increase in atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations, the possibility that a new ice sheet might form over Scandinavia in the far distant future cannot be excluded. The growth of a new Scandinavian Ice Sheet would have important consequences for buried nuclear waste repositories. The Greenland Analogue Project, initiated by the Swedish Nuclear Fuel and Waste Management Company (SKB), is working to assess the effects of a possible future ice sheet on groundwater flow by studying a constrained domain in Western Greenland by field measurements (including deep bedrock drilling in front of the ice sheet) combined with numerical modeling. To address the needs of the GAP project, we interpolated results from an ensemble of ice sheet model runs to the smaller and more finely resolved modeling domain used in the GAP project's hydrologic modeling. Three runs have been chosen with three fairly different positive degree-day factors among those that reproduced the modern ice margin at the borehole position. The interpolated results describe changes in hydrologically-relevant variables over two time periods, 115 ka to 80 ka, and 20 ka to 1 ka. In the first of these time periods, the ice margin advances over the model domain; in the second time period, the ice margin retreats over the model domain. The spatially-and temporally dependent variables that we treated include the ice thickness, basal melting rate, surface mass balance, basal temperature, basal thermal regime (frozen or thawed), surface temperature, and basal water pressure. The melt flux is also calculated.

A photogrammetric DEM of Greenland based on 1978-1987 aerial photos: validation and integration with laser altimetry and satellite-derived DEMs

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Korsgaard, Niels Jákup; Kjær, Kurt H.; Nuth, Christopher

Here we present a DEM of Greenland covering all ice-free terrain and the margins of the GrIS and local glaciers and ice caps. The DEM is based on the 3534 photos used in the aero-triangulation which were recorded by the Danish Geodata Agency (then the Geodetic Institute) in survey campaigns...... spanning the period 1978-1987. The GrIS is covered tens of kilometers into the interior due to the large footprints of the photos (30 x 30 km) and control provided by the aero-triangulation. Thus, the data are ideal for providing information for analysis of ice marginal elevation change and also control...

Holocene glacier and climate variations in Vestfirðir, Iceland, from the modeling of Drangajökull ice cap

Science.gov (United States)

Anderson, Leif S.; Flowers, Gwenn E.; Jarosch, Alexander H.; Aðalgeirsdóttir, Guðfinna Th; Geirsdóttir, Áslaug; Miller, Gifford H.; Harning, David J.; Thorsteinsson, Thorsteinn; Magnússon, Eyjólfur; Pálsson, Finnur

2018-06-01

Drangajökull is a maritime ice cap located in northwest (Vestfirðir) Iceland. Drangajökull's evolution is therefore closely linked to atmospheric and ocean variability. In order to better constrain the Holocene climate and glacier history of Vestfirðir we model the past evolution of Drangajökull ice cap. Simulations from 10 ka to present are forced by general circulation model output, ice-core-based temperature reconstructions, and sea-surface temperature reconstructions. Based on these 10-thousand year simulations, Drangajökull did not persist through the Holocene. We estimate that air temperatures were 2.5-3.0 °C higher during the Holocene Thermal Maximum than the local 1960-1990 average. Simulations support Drangajökull's late Holocene inception between 2 and 1 ka, though intermittent ice likely occupied cirques as early as 2.6 ka. Drangajökull is primarily a Little Ice Age ice cap: it expanded between 1300 and 1750 CE, with the most rapid growth occurring between 1600 and 1750 CE. The maximum Holocene extent of Drangajökull occurred between 1700 and 1925 CE, despite the lowest late Holocene temperatures, occurring between 1650 and 1720 CE. Between 1700 and 1925 CE temperatures were likely 0.6-0.8 °C lower than the 1950-2015 reference temperature. The modern equilibrium line altitude (ELA) is bracketed by topographic thresholds: a 1 °C temperature increase from the modern ELA would eliminate the ice cap's accumulation area, while a reduction of 0.5 °C would lead to the rapid expansion of the ice cap across Vestfirðir. The proximity of Drangajökull to topographic thresholds may explain its late inception and rapid expansion during the Little Ice Age.

The Effect of Topographic Shadowing by Ice on Irradiance in the Greenland Ice Sheet Ablation Zone

Science.gov (United States)

Leidman, S. Z.; Rennermalm, A. K.; Ryan, J.; Cooper, M. G.; Smith, L. C.

2017-12-01

Accurately predicting runoff contributions to global sea level rise requires more refined surface mass balance (SMB) models of the Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS). Topographic shadowing has shown to be important in the SMB of snow-covered regions, yet SMB models for the GrIS generally ignore how surface topography affects spatial variability of incoming solar radiation on a surface. In the ablation zone of Southwest Greenland, deeply incised supraglacial drainage features, fracturing, and large-scale bed deformation result in extensive areas of rough surface topography. This topography blocks direct radiation such that shadowed areas receive less energy for melting while other topographic features such as peaks recieve more energy. In this study, we quantify how shadowing from local topography features changes incoming solar radiation. We apply the ArcGIS Pro Solar Radiation Toolset to calculate the direct and diffuse irradiance in sunlit and shadowed areas by determining the sun's movement for every half hour increment of 2016. Multiple digital elevation models (DEMs) with spatial resolutions ranging from 0.06 to 5m were derived from fixed wing and quadcopter UAV imagery collected in summer 2016 and the ArcticDEM dataset. Our findings show that shadowing significantly decreases irradiance compared to smoothed surfaces where local topography is removed. This decrease is exponentially proportional to the DEM pixel sized with 5m DEMs only able to capture a small percentage of the effect. Applying these calculations to the ArcticDEM to cover a larger study area indicates that decreases in irradiance are nonlinearly proportional to elevation with highly crevassed areas showing a larger effect from shadowing. Even so, shading at higher elevations reduces irradiance enough to result in several centimeters snow water equivalence (SWE) per year of over-prediction of runoff in SMB models. Furthermore, analysis of solar radiation products shows that shadowing predicts albedo

Response of the Atlantic Ocean circulation to Greenland Ice Sheet melting in a strongly-eddying ocean model

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Weijer, W.; Maltrud, M.E.; Hecht, M.W.; Dijkstra, H.A.; Kliphuis, M.

2012-01-01

The sensitivity of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) to high-latitude freshwater input is one of the key uncertainties in the climate system. Considering the importance of the AMOC for global heat transports, and the vulnerability of the Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS) to global

The evolution of the englacial temperature distribution in the superimposed ice zone of a polar ice cap during a summer season

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Greuell, W.; Oerlemans, J.

1989-01-01

The aim of the present investigation was to provide more insight into the processes affecting the evolution of the englacial temperature distribution at a non-temperate location on a glacier. Measurements were made in the top 10 m of the ice at the summit of Laika Ice Cap (Canadian Arctic)

Sensitivity of Greenland Ice Sheet surface mass balance to surface albedo parameterization: a study with a regional climate model

OpenAIRE

Angelen, J. H.; Lenaerts, J. T. M.; Lhermitte, S.; Fettweis, X.; Kuipers Munneke, P.; Broeke, M. R.; Meijgaard, E.; Smeets, C. J. P. P.

2012-01-01

We present a sensitivity study of the surface mass balance (SMB) of the Greenland Ice Sheet, as modeled using a regional atmospheric climate model, to various parameter settings in the albedo scheme. The snow albedo scheme uses grain size as a prognostic variable and further depends on cloud cover, solar zenith angle and black carbon concentration. For the control experiment the overestimation of absorbed shortwave radiation (+6%) at the K-transect (west Greenland) for the period 2004–2009 is...

A Chronology of Late-Glacial and Holocene Advances of Quelccaya Ice Cap, Peru, Based on 10Be and Radiocarbon Dating

Science.gov (United States)

Kelly, M. A.; Lowell, T. V.; Schaefer, J. M.

2007-12-01

The Quelccaya Ice Cap region in the southeastern Peruvian Andes (~13-14°S latitude) is a key location for the development of late-glacial and Holocene terrestrial paleoclimate records in the tropics. We present a chronology of past extents of Quelccaya Ice Cap based on ~thirty internally consistent 10Be dates of boulders on moraines and bedrock as well as twenty radiocarbon dates of organic material associated with moraines. Based on results from both dating methods, we suggest that significant advances of Quelccaya Ice Cap occurred during late-glacial time, at ~12,700-11,400 yr BP, and during Late Holocene time ~400-300 yr BP. Radiocarbon dating of organic material associated with moraines provides maximum and minimum ages for ice advances and recessions, respectively, thus providing an independent check on 10Be dates of boulders on moraines. The opportunity to use both 10Be and radiocarbon dating makes the Quelccaya Ice Cap region a potentially important low-latitude calibration site for production rates of cosmogenic nuclides. Our radiocarbon chronology provides a tighter constraint on maximum ages of late-glacial and Late Holocene ice advances. Upcoming field research will obtain organic material for radiocarbon dating to improve minimum age constrains for late-glacial and Late Holocene ice recessions.

A century of variation in the dependence of Greenland iceberg calving on ice sheet surface mass balance and regional climate change.

Science.gov (United States)

Bigg, G R; Wei, H L; Wilton, D J; Zhao, Y; Billings, S A; Hanna, E; Kadirkamanathan, V

2014-06-08

Iceberg calving is a major component of the total mass balance of the Greenland ice sheet (GrIS). A century-long record of Greenland icebergs comes from the International Ice Patrol's record of icebergs (I48N) passing latitude 48° N, off Newfoundland. I48N exhibits strong interannual variability, with a significant increase in amplitude over recent decades. In this study, we show, through a combination of nonlinear system identification and coupled ocean-iceberg modelling, that I48N's variability is predominantly caused by fluctuation in GrIS calving discharge rather than open ocean iceberg melting. We also demonstrate that the episodic variation in iceberg discharge is strongly linked to a nonlinear combination of recent changes in the surface mass balance (SMB) of the GrIS and regional atmospheric and oceanic climate variability, on the scale of the previous 1-3 years, with the dominant causal mechanism shifting between glaciological (SMB) and climatic (ocean temperature) over time. We suggest that this is a change in whether glacial run-off or under-ice melting is dominant, respectively. We also suggest that GrIS calving discharge is episodic on at least a regional scale and has recently been increasing significantly, largely as a result of west Greenland sources.

Mass loss from the southern half of the Greenland Ice Sheet since the Little Ice Age Maximum

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Kjeldsen, Kristian Kjellerup; Kjær, Kurt H.; Bjørk, Anders Anker

Northern hemisphere temperatures reached their Holocene minimum and most glaciers reached their maximum during The Little Ice Age (LIA), but the timing of specific cold intervals is site-specific. In southern Greenland, we have compiled data from organic matter incorporated in LIA sediments, used...... retreat. Our results show that the advance of glaciers during the LIA occurs early after the Medieval Warm Period terminating soon after 1200 AD and culminates c. 1500-1600 AD. Historical maps also show that many glaciers on the western coast occupy a still-stand near the LIA maximum until 1900 AD before...

Snapshots of the Greenland ice sheet configuration in the Pliocene to early Pleistocene

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Solgaard, Anne M.; Reeh, Niels; Japsen, Peter

2011-01-01

The geometry of the ice sheets during the Pliocene to early Pleistocene is not well constrained. Here we apply an ice-flow model in the study of the Greenland ice sheet (GIS) during three extreme intervals of this period constrained by geological observations and climate reconstructions. We study...... the extent of the GIS during the Mid-Pliocene Warmth (3.3-3.0 Ma), its advance across the continental shelf during the late Pliocene to early Pleistocene glaciations (3.0-2.4 Ma) as implied by offshore geological studies, and the transition from glacial to interglacial conditions around 2.4 Ma as deduced...... the variability of the GIS during the Pliocene to early Pleistocene and underline the importance of including independent estimates of the GIS in studies of climate during this period. We conclude that the GIS did not exist throughout the Pliocene to early Pleistocene, and that it melted during interglacials even...

Experimental investigation of insolation-driven dust ejection from Mars' CO2 ice caps

Science.gov (United States)

Kaufmann, E.; Hagermann, A.

2017-01-01

Mars' polar caps are - depending on hemisphere and season - partially or totally covered with CO2 ice. Icy surfaces such as the polar caps of Mars behave differently from surfaces covered with rock and soil when they are irradiated by solar light. The latter absorb and reflect incoming solar radiation within a thin layer beneath the surface. In contrast, ices are partially transparent in the visible spectral range and opaque in the infrared. Due to this fact, the solar radiation can penetrate to a certain depth and raise the temperature of the ice or dust below the surface. This may play an important role in the energy balance of icy surfaces in the solar system, as already noted in previous investigations. We investigated the temperature profiles inside CO2 ice samples including a dust layer under Martian conditions. We have been able to trigger dust eruptions, but also demonstrated that these require a very narrow range of temperature and ambient pressure. We discuss possible implications for the understanding of phenomena such as arachneiform patterns or fan shaped deposits as observed in Mars' southern polar region.

Application of GRACE to the assessment of model-based estimates of monthly Greenland Ice Sheet mass balance (2003-2012)

Science.gov (United States)

Schlegel, Nicole-Jeanne; Wiese, David N.; Larour, Eric Y.; Watkins, Michael M.; Box, Jason E.; Fettweis, Xavier; van den Broeke, Michiel R.

2016-09-01

Quantifying the Greenland Ice Sheet's future contribution to sea level rise is a challenging task that requires accurate estimates of ice sheet sensitivity to climate change. Forward ice sheet models are promising tools for estimating future ice sheet behavior, yet confidence is low because evaluation of historical simulations is challenging due to the scarcity of continental-wide data for model evaluation. Recent advancements in processing of Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) data using Bayesian-constrained mass concentration ("mascon") functions have led to improvements in spatial resolution and noise reduction of monthly global gravity fields. Specifically, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory's JPL RL05M GRACE mascon solution (GRACE_JPL) offers an opportunity for the assessment of model-based estimates of ice sheet mass balance (MB) at ˜ 300 km spatial scales. Here, we quantify the differences between Greenland monthly observed MB (GRACE_JPL) and that estimated by state-of-the-art, high-resolution models, with respect to GRACE_JPL and model uncertainties. To simulate the years 2003-2012, we force the Ice Sheet System Model (ISSM) with anomalies from three different surface mass balance (SMB) products derived from regional climate models. Resulting MB is compared against GRACE_JPL within individual mascons. Overall, we find agreement in the northeast and southwest where MB is assumed to be primarily controlled by SMB. In the interior, we find a discrepancy in trend, which we presume to be related to millennial-scale dynamic thickening not considered by our model. In the northwest, seasonal amplitudes agree, but modeled mass trends are muted relative to GRACE_JPL. Here, discrepancies are likely controlled by temporal variability in ice discharge and other related processes not represented by our model simulations, i.e., hydrological processes and ice-ocean interaction. In the southeast, GRACE_JPL exhibits larger seasonal amplitude than predicted by the

Surface-atmosphere decoupling limits accumulation at Summit, Greenland.

Science.gov (United States)

Berkelhammer, Max; Noone, David C; Steen-Larsen, Hans Christian; Bailey, Adriana; Cox, Christopher J; O'Neill, Michael S; Schneider, David; Steffen, Konrad; White, James W C

2016-04-01

Despite rapid melting in the coastal regions of the Greenland Ice Sheet, a significant area (~40%) of the ice sheet rarely experiences surface melting. In these regions, the controls on annual accumulation are poorly constrained owing to surface conditions (for example, surface clouds, blowing snow, and surface inversions), which render moisture flux estimates from myriad approaches (that is, eddy covariance, remote sensing, and direct observations) highly uncertain. Accumulation is partially determined by the temperature dependence of saturation vapor pressure, which influences the maximum humidity of air parcels reaching the ice sheet interior. However, independent proxies for surface temperature and accumulation from ice cores show that the response of accumulation to temperature is variable and not generally consistent with a purely thermodynamic control. Using three years of stable water vapor isotope profiles from a high altitude site on the Greenland Ice Sheet, we show that as the boundary layer becomes increasingly stable, a decoupling between the ice sheet and atmosphere occurs. The limited interaction between the ice sheet surface and free tropospheric air reduces the capacity for surface condensation to achieve the rate set by the humidity of the air parcels reaching interior Greenland. The isolation of the surface also acts to recycle sublimated moisture by recondensing it onto fog particles, which returns the moisture back to the surface through gravitational settling. The observations highlight a unique mechanism by which ice sheet mass is conserved, which has implications for understanding both past and future changes in accumulation rate and the isotopic signal in ice cores from Greenland.

Climatology of increased temperatures and melt at Swiss Camp, western slope of Greenland ice sheet, 1991-2012

Science.gov (United States)

Steffen, K.; McGrath, D.

2013-12-01

Climate observations (1991-2012) will be discussed from the Swiss Camp (69deg 33‧53″N, 49deg 19‧51″W, 1176 m), located at the western slope of the Greenland ice sheet, 60 km inland from Ilulissat. The mean annual temperature of -12 C increased 3.6 C between 1991 and 2012 (1.7 C per decade) with large interannual variability in all seasons. The mean spring temperature increased from -16.0 C to -13.8 C, and the fall temperature increased from -12.4 C to -11.3 C in the same time. The winter temperature showed the largest increase of 6.5 C, whereas summer temperatures increased 3.0 C during the 21 years (1991 - 2012). Radiation has been monitored continuously at Swiss Camp since 1993. Net radiation of 50 W/ m2 was recorded in 2012, the warmest summer month on record. The entire annual snow cover melted at Swiss Camp, reducing the monthly albedo value to 0.4 with bare ice exposed. Interannual variability of snow accumulation ranged between 0.07 and 0.70 m water equivalent, whereas annual snow and ice ablation varied between +0.35 (net gain) and -1.8 m (net loss) for the time period 1991-2012. The equilibrium line altitude (ELA) is no longer located at Swiss Camp (1176 m elevation) with a net surface lowering of 9.5 m since 1991. Increasing summer air temperatures have resulted in an upward migration of both the percolation facies and ablation area of the Greenland ice sheet. The 0°C isothermal migrated upward at a rate of 35 m/a over the 1995-2012 period in West Greenland. There is a 50% probability of the mean annual dry snow line migrating above Summit by 2025, at which time Summit will experience routine melt on an annual basis. The surface mass balance observations similarly indicate that the ELA has migrated upwards at a rate of 44 m/a over the 1997-2011 period in West Greenland, resulting in a more than doubling of the ablation zone width during this period. Inter-annual variability of monthly mean albedo at the Swiss Camp (1993 - 2012). Albedo at 0.5 is

Greenland ice sheet model parameters constrained using simulations of the Eemian Interglacial

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

A. Robinson

2011-04-01

Full Text Available Using a new approach to force an ice sheet model, we performed an ensemble of simulations of the Greenland Ice Sheet evolution during the last two glacial cycles, with emphasis on the Eemian Interglacial. This ensemble was generated by perturbing four key parameters in the coupled regional climate-ice sheet model and by introducing additional uncertainty in the prescribed "background" climate change. The sensitivity of the surface melt model to climate change was determined to be the dominant driver of ice sheet instability, as reflected by simulated ice sheet loss during the Eemian Interglacial period. To eliminate unrealistic parameter combinations, constraints from present-day and paleo information were applied. The constraints include (i the diagnosed present-day surface mass balance partition between surface melting and ice discharge at the margin, (ii the modeled present-day elevation at GRIP; and (iii the modeled elevation reduction at GRIP during the Eemian. Using these three constraints, a total of 360 simulations with 90 different model realizations were filtered down to 46 simulations and 20 model realizations considered valid. The paleo constraint eliminated more sensitive melt parameter values, in agreement with the surface mass balance partition assumption. The constrained simulations resulted in a range of Eemian ice loss of 0.4–4.4 m sea level equivalent, with a more likely range of about 3.7–4.4 m sea level if the GRIP δ¹⁸O isotope record can be considered an accurate proxy for the precipitation-weighted annual mean temperatures.

Present conditions in Greenland and the Kangerlussuaq area

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Nielsen, A. B.

2010-01-01

Greenland is the world's largest island, with an area of 2.2 million square kilometres, 80 % of which is covered by the ice sheet. The climate is Arctic, but as Greenland stretches 2600 km from north to south, there is a huge variability in climate, with temperature decreasing from south to north. Due to the influence of oceanic currents, the west coast is slightly warmer than the east coast. Precipitation also decreases strongly from the south to the north, and also with distance from the coast. Kangerlussuaq is located in the dry, continental area of central west Greenland. The bedrock of Greenland is dominated by Precambrian gneisses, with sedimentary rocks occurring in some areas of East and North Greenland, and smaller areas of basalts. All of Greenland has been glaciated several times and has thus been eroded and shaped by the ice, as it still is at the ice margin. Soils are generally thin, and especially in the gneiss regions rather poor in plant nutrients. Permafrost occurs throughout the ice free areas of Greenland. It is continuous in the north, discontinuous along parts of the central east and west coast and occurs as isolated patches in the south. Kangerlussuaq is in the southernmost part of the continuous permafrost zone. The spatial variability in climate is also reflected in the vegetation zones, which range from Arctic dessert in the far north, through dwarf shrub zones with increasing plant height and density towards the south, to the arctic shrub zone in the continental parts of West Greenland and subarctic Birch forest in South Greenland. The terrestrial food chains in Greenland are generally short and with few species. Cyclic variation in population sizes has been observed in some mammal species, including lemming and caribou. Many species of mammals and birds are associated with the coastal environment, which is therefore also and important resource area for the human population. Fishery is the most economically important industry in Greenland

Improved GRACE regional mass balance estimates of the Greenland ice sheet cross-validated with the input-output method

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Xu, Zheng; Schrama, Ernst J. O.; van der Wal, Wouter; van den Broeke, Michiel; Enderlin, Ellyn M.

2016-01-01

In this study, we use satellite gravimetry data from the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) to estimate regional mass change of the Greenland ice sheet (GrIS) and neighboring glaciated regions using a least squares inversion approach. We also consider results from the input–output

Improved GRACE regional mass balance estimates of the Greenland ice sheet cross-validated with the input–output method

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Xu, Z.; Schrama, E.J.O.; van der Wal, W.; van den Broeke, MR; Enderlin, EM

2016-01-01

In this study, we use satellite gravimetry data from the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) to estimate regional mass change of the Greenland ice sheet (GrIS) and neighboring glaciated regions using a least squares inversion approach. We also consider results from the input–output

Bergy Bit and Melt Water Trajectories in Godthåbsfjord (SW Greenland) Observed by the Expendable Ice Tracker

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Carlson, D.F.; Boone, W.; Meire, L.; Abermann, J.; Rysgaard, S.

2017-01-01

Icebergs and bergy bits makes up a significant component of the total freshwater flux from the Greenland Ice Sheet to the ocean. Observations of iceberg trajectories are biased toward larger icebergs and, as a result, the drift characteristics of smaller icebergs and bergy bits are poorly

Greenland from Archaean to Quaternary, Descriptive text to the 1995 Geological Map of Greenland 1:2 500 000, 2nd edition

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Kalsbeek, Feiko

2009-11-01

Full Text Available The geological development of Greenland spans a period of nearly 4 Ga, from Eoarchaean to the Quaternary. Greenland is the largest island on Earth with a total area of 2 166 000 km2, but only c. 410 000 km2 are exposed bedrock, the remaining part being covered by a major ice sheet (the Inland Ice reaching over 3 km in thickness. The adjacent offshore areas underlain by continental crust have an area of c. 825 000 km2. Greenland is dominated by crystalline rocks of the Precambrian shield, which formed during a succession of Archaean and Palaeoproterozoic orogenic events and stabilised as a part of the Laurentian shield about 1600 Ma ago. The shield area can be divided into three distinct types of basement provinces: (1 Archaean rocks (3200–2600 Ma old, with local older units up to >3800Ma that were almost unaffected by Proterozoic or later orogenic activity; (2 Archaean terrains reworked during the Palaeoproterozoic around 1900–1750 Ma ago; and (3 terrains mainly composed of juvenile Palaeoproterozoic rocks (2000–1750 Ma in age.Subsequent geological developments mainly took place along the margins of the shield. During the Proterozoic and throughout the Phanerozoic major sedimentary basins formed, notably in North and North-East Greenland, in which sedimentary successions locally reaching 18 km in thickness were deposited. Palaeozoic orogenic activity affected parts of these successions in the Ellesmerian fold belt of North Greenland and the East Greenland Caledonides; the latter also incorporates reworked Precambrian crystalline basement complexes. Late Palaeozoic and Mesozoic sedimentary basins developed along the continent–ocean margins in North, East and West Greenland and are now preserved both onshore and offshore. Their development was closely related to continental break-up with formation of rift basins. Initial rifting in East Greenland in latest Devonian to earliest Carboniferous time and succeeding phases culminated with the

Climate variability in West Greenland during the past 1500 years

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

dos Santos Ribeiro, Sofia Isabel; Moros, Matthias; Ellegaard, Marianne

2012-01-01

-surface temperatures in Disko Bay are out-of-phase with Greenland ice-core reconstructed temperatures and marine proxy data from South and East Greenland. This is probably governed by an NAO-type pattern, which results in warmer sea-surface conditions with less extensive sea ice in the area for the later part....... Sea ice cover and primary productivity were identified as the two main factors driving dinoflagellate cyst community changes through time. Our data provide evidence for an opposite climate trend in West Greenland relative to the NE Atlantic region from c. AD 500 to 1050. For the same period, sea...

Bergy Bit and Melt Water Trajectories in Godthåbsfjord (SW Greenland Observed by the Expendable Ice Tracker

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Daniel F. Carlson

2017-08-01

Full Text Available Icebergs and bergy bits makes up a significant component of the total freshwater flux from the Greenland Ice Sheet to the ocean. Observations of iceberg trajectories are biased toward larger icebergs and, as a result, the drift characteristics of smaller icebergs and bergy bits are poorly understood. In an attempt to fill this critical knowledge gap, we developed the open-source EXpendable Ice TrackEr (EXITE. EXITE is a low-cost, satellite-tracked GPS beacon capable of high-resolution temporal measurements over extended deployment periods (30 days or more. Furthermore, EXITE can transform to a surface drifter when its host iceberg capsizes or fragments. Here we describe basic construction of an EXITE beacon and present results from a deployment in Godthåbsfjord (SW Greenland in August 2016. Overall, EXITE trajectories show out-fjord surface transport, in agreement with a simple estuarine circulation paradigm. However, eddies and abrupt wind-driven reversals reveal complex surface transport pathways at time scales of hours to days.

Calculation of mass discharge of the Greenland ice sheet in the Earth System Model

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

O. O. Rybak

2016-01-01

Full Text Available Mass discharge calculation is a challenging task for the ice sheet modeling aimed at evaluation of their contribution to the global sea level rise during past interglacials, as well as one of the consequences of future climate change. In Greenland, ablation is the major source of fresh water runoff. It is approximately equal to the dynamical discharge (iceberg calving. Its share might have still larger during the past interglacials when the margins of the GrIS retreated inland. Refreezing of the melted water and its retention are two poorly known processes playing as a counterpart of melting and, thus, exerting influence on the run off. Interaction of ice sheets and climate is driven by energy and mass exchange processes and is complicated by numerous feed-backs. To study the complex of these processes, coupling of an ice sheet model and a climate model (i.e. models of the atmosphere and the ocean in one model is required, which is often called the Earth System Model (ESM. Formalization of processes of interaction between the ice sheets and climate within the ESM requires elaboration of special techniques to deal with dramatic differences in spatial and temporal variability scales within each of three ESM’s blocks. In this paper, we focus on the method of coupling of a Greenland ice sheet model (GrISM with the climate model INMCM having been developed in the Institute of Numerical Mathematics of Russian Academy of Sciences. Our coupling approach consists in applying of a special buffer model, which serves as an interface between GrISM and INMCM. A simple energy and water exchange model (EWBM-G allows realistic description of surface air temperature and precipitation fields adjusted to a relief of elevation of the GrIS surface. In a series of diagnostic numerical experiments with the present-day GrIS geometry and the modeled climate we studied sensitivity of the modeled surface mass balance and run off to the key EWBM-G parameters and compared

Geochemical cycling and depositional patterns across the northeast region of the Greenland Ice Sheet as determined from trace element chemistry

Science.gov (United States)

Wong, G. J.; Osterberg, E. C.; Courville, Z.; Hawley, R. L.; Lutz, E.; Overly, T. B.

2012-12-01

The Greenland Ice Sheet is both a repository of climate history and a major driver in Arctic and global climate. Between 1952 and 1955, Carl Benson led a series of traverses of the Greenland Ice Sheet (GIS), and characterized the GIS via mapping of the spatial distribution of annual net accumulation and classifying the diagenetic glacier facies (Benson, 1962). While polar ice sheets represent a unique archive of past atmospheric and climatic conditions, little information exists on large-scale geographical trends in trace element snow chemistry across GIS because of the remote, challenging location. In the spring of 2011, we undertook a 1120 km traverse of the GIS from Thule Air Base to Summit Station. Samples from 11 snow pits and 3 firn cores, dated by stable water isotopes, were analyzed and evaluated in seasonal resolution for their trace element content (23Na, 24Mg, 27Al, 32S, 39K, 44Ca, 47Ti, 51V, 52Cr, 55Mn, 56Fe, 59Co, 63Cu, 66Zn, 75As, 88Sr, 111Cd, 133Cs, 138Ba, 139La, 140Ce, 141Pr, 208Pb, 209Bi, 238U). Here, we present an initial analysis of the spatial gradients of these trace elements and an interpretation of how their depositional patterns characterize the GIS. The seasonal trends coupled with spatial variability of certain trace elements establish the behavior of specific aerosols (e.g. dust, sea salt, pollution), which will be useful in quantifying geochemical cycling across the GIS and comparing characterizations with results from Benson's traverses. Benson, CS. 1962. Stratigraphic studies in the snow and firn of the Greenland Ice Sheet. SIPRE Research Report, 70, 89 pp.

Spatial Variability of accumulation across the Western Greenland Ice Sheet Percolation Zone from ground-penetrating-radar and shallow firn cores

Science.gov (United States)

Lewis, G.; Osterberg, E. C.; Hawley, R. L.; Marshall, H. P.; Birkel, S. D.; Meehan, T. G.; Graeter, K.; Overly, T. B.; McCarthy, F.

2017-12-01

The mass balance of the Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS) in a warming climate is of critical interest to scientists and the general public in the context of future sea-level rise. Increased melting in the GrIS percolation zone over the past several decades has led to increased mass loss at lower elevations due to recent warming. Uncertainties in mass balance are especially large in regions with sparse and/or outdated in situ measurements. This study is the first to calculate in situ accumulation over a large region of western Greenland since the Program for Arctic Regional Climate Assessment campaign during the 1990s. Here we analyze 5000 km of 400 MHz ground penetrating radar data and sixteen 25-33 m-long firn cores in the western GrIS percolation zone to determine snow accumulation over the past 50 years. The cores and radar data were collected as part of the 2016-2017 Greenland Traverse for Accumulation and Climate Studies (GreenTrACS). With the cores and radar profiles we capture spatial accumulation gradients between 1850-2500 m a.s.l and up to Summit Station. We calculate accumulation rates and use them to validate five widely used regional climate models and to compare with IceBridge snow and accumulation radars. Our results indicate that while the models capture most regional spatial climate patterns, they lack the small-scale spatial variability captured by in situ measurements. Additionally, we evaluate temporal trends in accumulation at ice core locations and throughout the traverse. Finally, we use empirical orthogonal function and correlation analyses to investigate the principal drivers of radar-derived accumulation rates across the western GrIS percolation zone, including major North Atlantic climate modes such as the North Atlantic Oscillation, Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation, and Greenland Blocking Index.

Reconstruction of the Greenland ice sheet dynamics in a fully coupled Earth System Model

Science.gov (United States)

Rybak, Oleg; Volodin, Evgeny; Huybrechts, Philippe

2016-04-01

Earth system models (ESMs) are undoubtedly effective tools for studying climate dynamics. Incorporation of evolving ice sheets to ESMs is a challenging task because response times of the climate system and of ice sheets differ by several orders of magnitude. Besides, AO GCMs operate on spatial and temporal resolutions substantially differing from those of ice sheet models (ICMs). Therefore elaboration of an effective coupling methodology of an AO GCM and an ICM is the key problem of an ESM construction and utilization. Several downscaling strategies of varying complexity exist now of data exchange between modeled climate system and ice sheets. Application of a particular strategy depends on the research objectives. In our view, the optimum approach for model studying of significant environmental changes (e.g. glacial/interglacial transitions) when ice sheets undergo substantial evolution of geometry and volume would be an asynchronous coupling. The latter allows simulation in the interactive way of growth and decay of ice sheets in the changing climatic conditions. In the focus of the presentation, is the overview of coupling aspects of an AO GCM INMCM32 elaborated in the Institute of Numerical Mathematics (Moscow, Russia) to the Greenland ice sheet model (GrISM, Vrije Uninersiteit Brussel, Belgium). To provide interactive coupling of INMCM32 (spatial resolution 5°×4°, 21 vertical layers and temporal resolution 6 min. in the atmospheric block) and GrISM (spatial resolution 20×20 km, 51 vertical layers and 1 yr temporal resolution), we employ a special energy- and water balance model (EWBM-G), which serves as a buffer providing effective data exchange between INMCM32 and GrISM. EWBM-G operates in a rectangle domain including Greenland. Transfer of daily meanings of simulated climatic variables (air surface temperature and specific humidity) is provided on the lateral boundarias of the domain and inside the domain (sea level air pressure, wind speed and total

Historical and Future Black Carbon Deposition on the Three Ice Caps: Ice Core Measurements and Model Simulations from 1850 to 2100

Science.gov (United States)

Bauer, Susanne E.; Bausch, Alexandra; Nazarenko, Larissa; Tsigaridis, Kostas; Xu, Baiqing; Edwards. Ross; Bisiaux, Marion; McConnell, Joe

2013-01-01

Ice core measurements in conjunction with climate model simulations are of tremendous value when examining anthropogenic and natural aerosol loads and their role in past and future climates. Refractory black carbon (BC) records from the Arctic, the Antarctic, and the Himalayas are analyzed using three transient climate simulations performed with the Goddard Institute for Space Studies ModelE. Simulations differ in aerosol schemes (bulk aerosols vs. aerosol microphysics) and ocean couplings (fully coupled vs. prescribed ocean). Regional analyses for past (1850-2005) and future (2005-2100) carbonaceous aerosol simulations focus on the Antarctic, Greenland, and the Himalayas. Measurements from locations in the Antarctic show clean conditions with no detectable trend over the past 150 years. Historical atmospheric deposition of BC and sulfur in Greenland shows strong trends and is primarily influenced by emissions from early twentieth century agricultural and domestic practices. Models fail to reproduce observations of a sharp eightfold BC increase in Greenland at the beginning of the twentieth century that could be due to the only threefold increase in the North American emission inventory. BC deposition in Greenland is about 10 times greater than in Antarctica and 10 times less than in Tibet. The Himalayas show the most complicated transport patterns, due to the complex terrain and dynamical regimes of this region. Projections of future climate based on the four CMIP5 Representative Concentration Pathways indicate further dramatic advances of pollution to the Tibetan Plateau along with decreasing BC deposition fluxes in Greenland and the Antarctic.

Calibrating a surface mass-balance model for Austfonna ice cap, Svalbard

Science.gov (United States)

Schuler, Thomas Vikhamar; Loe, Even; Taurisano, Andrea; Eiken, Trond; Hagen, Jon Ove; Kohler, Jack

2007-10-01

Austfonna (8120 km2) is by far the largest ice mass in the Svalbard archipelago. There is considerable uncertainty about its current state of balance and its possible response to climate change. Over the 2004/05 period, we collected continuous meteorological data series from the ice cap, performed mass-balance measurements using a network of stakes distributed across the ice cap and mapped the distribution of snow accumulation using ground-penetrating radar along several profile lines. These data are used to drive and test a model of the surface mass balance. The spatial accumulation pattern was derived from the snow depth profiles using regression techniques, and ablation was calculated using a temperature-index approach. Model parameters were calibrated using the available field data. Parameter calibration was complicated by the fact that different parameter combinations yield equally acceptable matches to the stake data while the resulting calculated net mass balance differs considerably. Testing model results against multiple criteria is an efficient method to cope with non-uniqueness. In doing so, a range of different data and observations was compared to several different aspects of the model results. We find a systematic underestimation of net balance for parameter combinations that predict observed ice ablation, which suggests that refreezing processes play an important role. To represent these effects in the model, a simple PMAX approach was included in its formulation. Used as a diagnostic tool, the model suggests that the surface mass balance for the period 29 April 2004 to 23 April 2005 was negative (-318 mm w.e.).

Holocene fluctuations of Quelccaya Ice Cap, Peru based on lacustrine and surficial geologic archives

Science.gov (United States)

Stroup, J. S.; Kelly, M. A.; Lowell, T. V.; Beal, S. A.; Smith, C. A.

2013-12-01

Peru's Quelccaya Ice Cap (QIC; 13.9°S, 70.8°W, ~5200-5670 m asl) is an important site for understanding tropical paleoclimate, mainly because of annually layered ice cores that provide an ~1800 year long record of tropical paleoclimatic conditions (e.g., Thompson et al., 2013). Here, we present a detailed record of QIC fluctuations using surficial deposits and lake sediments that extend back to late glacial time. We compare the late Holocene records of QIC 10Be-dated moraines and ice core data with lake sediments from a nearby glacially fed lake to establish the framework we use to interpret a Holocene long sediment record from a glacially fed lake. We also examine sediments from a nearby non-glacial lake to constrain non-glacial clastic input. We collected two ~5 m-long sediment cores, one from Laguna Challpacocha, which is currently fed by QIC meltwater, and one from the Laguna Yanacocha, which has not received QIC meltwater since ~12.3 ka. Changes in magnetic susceptibility, loss on ignition, bulk density and X-ray fluorescence chemistry combined with 14C and 210Pb chronologies provide information about sediment transported to the lakes. Retreat from the late Holocene extent defined by the 10Be-dated moraine record (~0.52 ka) is contemporaneous with a sharp transition from organic to clastic sedimentation in the Challpacocha core at ~ 0.52 ka. This implies that glacially-sourced clastic sedimentation, as tracked by loss on ignition, Ti counts and bulk density, increased during ice cap recession. Based on these same proxy data, we suggest the following Holocene history of QIC: QIC receded from the Challpacocha basin by ~10.6 ka. Increased clastic sedimentation at 8.2 - 4.1, 3.6 - 2.7 ka and from 0.55 ka - present are interpreted as times of ice cap recession. The increased clastic sedimentation at ~8.2 - 4.1 ka is consistent with surficial deposits near the present-day ice margin that indicate that at ~7.0 - 4.6 ka QIC was smaller than at present (Buffen et al

Spatial pattern of mass loss processes across the Greenland Ice Sheet from the Little Ice Age to 2010

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Kjaer, K. H.; Korsgaard, N. J.; Kjeldsen, K. K.

The Greenland Ice Sheet loses mass through surface meltwater runoff and discharge from marine terminating outlet glaciers. The spatial variability and magnitude of these processes have been studied and described in detail for the past decades. Here, we combine the mass loss between the LIA to 2010...... these components are variable between the different sectors of the GrIS, e.g. in the southeast sector of the GrIS we find substantial mass loss, possibly driven by high precipitation rates but also the presence of a large number of marine terminating glaciers. Furthermore many areas currently undergoing changes...

Multi-proxy Organic Geochemical Reconstruction of Holocene Hydroclimate Near the Western Greenland Ice Sheet Margin

Science.gov (United States)

Cluett, A.; Thomas, E. K.

2017-12-01

Anthropogenic warming is projected to drive profound change to the Arctic hydrological cycle within the century, most notably in the intensification of rainfall, with potential feedbacks to the climate system and cryosphere. However, the relationship between hydroclimate and cryosphere variability is poorly constrained in the long-term due to a scarcity of high-resolution hydroclimate records from the Arctic. We analyze the stable hydrogen isotopes (dD) of leaf wax biomarkers from lacustrine sediments spanning the Holocene to 9000 cal. year B.P. from Lake Gus (67.032ºN, 52.427ºW, 300 m a.s.l.; informal name), a small lake approximately 90 km from the modern western margin of the Greenland Ice Sheet. We interpret the signal of aquatic leaf wax isotopes in the context of a survey of 100 modern lake water samples from western Greenland across an aridity gradient to better understand the combined climatological and hydrological controls on lake water dD in the study area. We compare variability of aquatic and terrestrial leaf wax isotopes to infer changes in relative moisture throughout the Holocene, and complement our leaf wax record with analysis of glycerol dialkyl glycerol tetraethers (GDGTs) and alkenones, to produce records of summer temperature. Pairing temperature and leaf wax isotope records provides a means to constrain the changing dD-temperature relationship throughout the Holocene and infer moisture source variability. In combination, these proxies produce a comprehensive hydroclimate record at approximately centennial scale to evaluate shifts in relative moisture, temperature, and moisture source, and to investigate the interaction between hydroclimate and Greenland Ice Sheet margin fluctuations through the Holocene.

Evolution of a Greenland Ice sheet Including Shelves and Regional Sea Level Variations

Science.gov (United States)

Bradley, Sarah; Reerink, Thomas; van de Wal, Roderik S. W.; Helsen, Michiel; Goelzer, Heiko

2016-04-01

Observational evidence, including offshore moraines and marine sediment cores infer that at the Last Glacial maximum (LGM) the Greenland ice sheet (GIS) grounded out across the Davis Strait into Baffin Bay, with fast flowing ice streams extending out to the continental shelf break along the NW margin. These observations lead to a number of questions as to weather the GIS and Laurentide ice sheet (LIS) coalesced during glacial maximums, and if so, did a significant ice shelf develop across Baffin Bay and how would such a configuration impact on the relative contribution of these ice sheets to eustatic sea level (ESL). Most previous paleo ice sheet modelling simulations of the GIS recreated an ice sheet that either did not extend out onto the continental shelf or utilised a simplified marine ice parameterisation to recreate an extended GIS, and therefore did not fully include ice shelf dynamics. In this study we simulate the evolution of the GIS from 220 kyr BP to present day using IMAU-ice; a 3D thermodynamical ice sheet model which fully accounts for grounded and floating ice, calculates grounding line migration and ice shelf dynamics. As there are few observational estimates of the long-term (yrs) sub marine basal melting rates (mbm) for the GIS, we developed a mbm parameterization within IMAU-ice controlled primarily by changes in paleo water depth. We also investigate the influence of the LIS on the GIS evolution by including relative sea level forcing's derived from a Glacial Isostatic Adjustment model. We will present results of how changes in the mbm directly impacts on the ice sheet dynamics, timing and spatial extent of the GIS at the glacial maximums, but also on the rate of retreat and spatial extent at the Last interglacial (LIG) minimum. Results indicate that with the inclusion of ice shelf dynamics, a larger GIS is generated which is grounded out into Davis strait, up to a water depth of -750 m, but significantly reduces the GIS contribution to Last

Microalgal composition and primary production in Arctic sea ice: a seasonal study from Kobbeijord (Kangerluarsunnguaq), West Greenland

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Mikkelsen, Ditte Marie; Rysgaard, Søren; Glud, Ronnie N.

2008-01-01

We investigated the microalgal community in sea ice and in the water column of Kobbefjord, west Greenland, through an entire sea ice season, Temporal variation in physical (photosynthetically active radiation [PAR), temperature, brine volume) and chemical (salinity, nutrient concentration......) properties confirmed that sea ice is a very dynamic habitat. Nevertheless, a viable sea ice algal comuunity was present throughout the year, with a species succession from flagellate dominance (dinoflagellates and cryptophytes) in December to February, followed by Chaetoceros simplex (a centric diatom...... (maxima of 1.8 and 2.6 mu g chl](-1) in March and May, respectively). Primary production mirrored biomass dynamic, which had 2 seasonal peaks of ca. 21 and 15 mg Cm-2 d(-1). Integrated primary production over 7 mo was 0.8 g Cm-2 in sea ice and 94.4 g C m(-2) in the water column, with the vast majority...

Microalgal composition and primary production in Arctic sea ice: a seasonal study from Kobbeijord (Kangerluarsunnguaq), West Greenland

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Mikkelsen, Ditte Marie; Rysgaard, Søren; Glud, Ronnie N.

2008-01-01

We investigated the microalgal community in sea ice and in the water column of Kobbefjord, west Greenland, through an entire sea ice season, Temporal variation in physical (photosynthetically active radiation [PAR), temperature, brine volume) and chemical (salinity, nutrient concentration...... (maxima of 1.8 and 2.6 mu g chl](-1) in March and May, respectively). Primary production mirrored biomass dynamic, which had 2 seasonal peaks of ca. 21 and 15 mg Cm-2 d(-1). Integrated primary production over 7 mo was 0.8 g Cm-2 in sea ice and 94.4 g C m(-2) in the water column, with the vast majority......) properties confirmed that sea ice is a very dynamic habitat. Nevertheless, a viable sea ice algal comuunity was present throughout the year, with a species succession from flagellate dominance (dinoflagellates and cryptophytes) in December to February, followed by Chaetoceros simplex (a centric diatom...

A Bayesian Retrieval of Greenland Ice Sheet Internal Temperature from Ultra-wideband Software-defined Microwave Radiometer (UWBRAD) Measurements

Science.gov (United States)

Duan, Y.; Durand, M. T.; Jezek, K. C.; Yardim, C.; Bringer, A.; Aksoy, M.; Johnson, J. T.

2017-12-01

The ultra-wideband software-defined microwave radiometer (UWBRAD) is designed to provide ice sheet internal temperature product via measuring low frequency microwave emission. Twelve channels ranging from 0.5 to 2.0 GHz are covered by the instrument. A Greenland air-borne demonstration was demonstrated in September 2016, provided first demonstration of Ultra-wideband radiometer observations of geophysical scenes, including ice sheets. Another flight is planned for September 2017 for acquiring measurements in central ice sheet. A Bayesian framework is designed to retrieve the ice sheet internal temperature from simulated UWBRAD brightness temperature (Tb) measurements over Greenland flight path with limited prior information of the ground. A 1-D heat-flow model, the Robin Model, was used to model the ice sheet internal temperature profile with ground information. Synthetic UWBRAD Tb observations was generated via the partially coherent radiation transfer model, which utilizes the Robin model temperature profile and an exponential fit of ice density from Borehole measurement as input, and corrupted with noise. The effective surface temperature, geothermal heat flux, the variance of upper layer ice density, and the variance of fine scale density variation at deeper ice sheet were treated as unknown variables within the retrieval framework. Each parameter is defined with its possible range and set to be uniformly distributed. The Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) approach is applied to make the unknown parameters randomly walk in the parameter space. We investigate whether the variables can be improved over priors using the MCMC approach and contribute to the temperature retrieval theoretically. UWBRAD measurements near camp century from 2016 was also treated with the MCMC to examine the framework with scattering effect. The fine scale density fluctuation is an important parameter. It is the most sensitive yet highly unknown parameter in the estimation framework

Different bulk and active bacterial communities in cryoconite from the margin and interior of the Greenland ice sheet

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Stibal, Marek; Schostag, Morten; Cameron, Karen A.

2015-01-01

composition of cryoconite over a melt season at two contrasting sites at the margin and in the interior of the Greenland ice sheet, using sequence analysis and quantitative polymerase chain reaction of coextracted 16S rDNA and rRNA. Significant differences were found between bulk (rDNA) and potentially active...

Holocene environmental changes and climate development in Greenland

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Engels, Stefan; Helmens, Karin

2010-12-01

The primary aim of this report is to give an overview of the Holocene environmental and climatic changes in Greenland and to describe the development of the periglacial environment during the Holocene. Special emphasis is given to the influence of the ice sheet on its surroundings, both in terms of time (with respect to the response of the biosphere to deglaciation or ice sheet proximity) and in space (through the influence of the ice sheet on the regional climate, more specifically on temperature and aridity). Published records are reviewed, and regional trends are summarized. A range of different natural archives is available for such studies, including ice-core data, marine records, and continental sources of information, including peat profiles and lacustrine records. Because of the high number of lakes in all ice-free areas of Greenland, the lacustrine records offer the opportunity to get a spatial overview of past changes in environment and climate as well. This report focuses on (palaeo-) ecological studies, as it is intended to assemble basic information for future studies on adaptation of the biosphere to changes in climate. There is a bias towards pollen- and macro-remain-based reconstructions of past changes, as these dominate performed palaeoecological studies in Greenland; unfortunately, only a limited number of studies exist that include more modern proxies such as diatoms or chironomids (climate-indicators), but where available in the literature, these have been included. The report starts with an introduction where the current climatic and biological zonation of Greenland is discussed together with an overview of the geology of Greenland (on the full geological timescale) in order to put the following sections in perspective. Chapter 2 discusses the ice sheet history of Greenland from the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) onward where special emphasis is given to the spatial variability of deglaciation at the onset of the Holocene. To enhance the

Holocene environmental changes and climate development in Greenland

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Engels, Stefan; Helmens, Karin (Dept. of Physical Geography and Quaternary Geology, Stockholm Univ., Stockholm (Sweden))

2010-12-15

The primary aim of this report is to give an overview of the Holocene environmental and climatic changes in Greenland and to describe the development of the periglacial environment during the Holocene. Special emphasis is given to the influence of the ice sheet on its surroundings, both in terms of time (with respect to the response of the biosphere to deglaciation or ice sheet proximity) and in space (through the influence of the ice sheet on the regional climate, more specifically on temperature and aridity). Published records are reviewed, and regional trends are summarized. A range of different natural archives is available for such studies, including ice-core data, marine records, and continental sources of information, including peat profiles and lacustrine records. Because of the high number of lakes in all ice-free areas of Greenland, the lacustrine records offer the opportunity to get a spatial overview of past changes in environment and climate as well. This report focuses on (palaeo-) ecological studies, as it is intended to assemble basic information for future studies on adaptation of the biosphere to changes in climate. There is a bias towards pollen- and macro-remain-based reconstructions of past changes, as these dominate performed palaeoecological studies in Greenland; unfortunately, only a limited number of studies exist that include more modern proxies such as diatoms or chironomids (climate-indicators), but where available in the literature, these have been included. The report starts with an introduction where the current climatic and biological zonation of Greenland is discussed together with an overview of the geology of Greenland (on the full geological timescale) in order to put the following sections in perspective. Chapter 2 discusses the ice sheet history of Greenland from the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) onward where special emphasis is given to the spatial variability of deglaciation at the onset of the Holocene. To enhance the

Deglacial History and Paleoceanography of the Umanak System, West Greenland

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Sheldon, Christina; Jennings, Anne; Andrews, John

2012-01-01

A record of Greenland Ice Sheet (GIS) and ice-stream history, ice-sheet ocean interactions and paleoclimate from the Last Glacial Maximum to present is preserved in the sediments of the Umanak fjord, shelf trough and trough mouth fan system of central West Greenland. The objective of this study....... This evidence of Atlantic Water carried in the WGC precedes lithological evidence of ice stream retreat from the shelf edge (an influx of coarse IRD beginning 62 cm above the first Atlantic Water assemblage) indicating the presence of the WGC at the shelf edge prior to initial deglaciation. Both the slope...... is to document the timing and rate of ice retreat and the role of the West Greenland Current (WGC) in initiating or sustaining ice retreat. During cruise JR175 of the UK ship RRS James Clark Ross in 2009, sediment cores and geophysical data were collected from the Umanak System to document the glacial history...

A Climate-Data Record (CDR) of the "Clear Sky" Surface Temperature of the Greenland Ice Sheet

Science.gov (United States)

Hall, Dorothy K.; Comiso, J. C.; DiGirolamo, N. E.; Shuman, C. A.

2011-01-01

To quantify the ice-surface temperature (IST) we are developing a climate-data record (CDR) of monthly IST of the Greenland ice sheet, from 1982 to the present using Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR) and Moderate-Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) data at 5-km resolution. "Clear-sky" surface temperature increases have been measured from the early 1980s to the early 2000s in the Arctic using AVHRR data, showing increases ranging from 0.57-0.02 (Wang and Key, 2005) to 0.72 0.10 deg C per decade (Comiso, 2006). Arctic warming has implications for ice-sheet mass balance because much of the periphery of the ice sheet is near 0 deg C in the melt season and is thus vulnerable to more extensive melting (Hanna et al., 2008). The algorithm used for this work has a long history of measuring IST in the Arctic with AVHRR (Key and Haefliger, 1992). The data are currently available from 1981 to 2004 in the AVHRR Polar Pathfinder (APP) dataset (Fowler et al., 2000). J. Key1NOAA modified the AVHRR algorithm for use with MODIS (Hall et al., 2004). The MODIS algorithm is now being processed over Greenland. Issues being addressed in the production of the CDR are: time-series bias caused by cloud cover, and cross-calibration between AVHRR and MODIS instruments. Because of uncertainties, time series of satellite ISTs do not necessarily correspond with actual surface temperatures. The CDR will be validated by comparing results with in-situ (see Koenig and Hall, in press) and automatic-weather station data (e.g., Shuman et al., 2001).

Abdominal Wall Defects in Greenland 1989-2015.

Science.gov (United States)

Bugge, Merete; Drachmann, Gitte; Kern, Peder; Budtz-Jørgensen, Esben; Eiberg, Hans; Olsen, Britta; Tommerup, Niels; Nielsen, Inge-Merete

2017-07-03

In the last decades, an increasing rate of gastroschisis but not of omphalocele has been reported worldwide. Greenland is the world's largest island, but 80% is covered by an ice cap, it has a small population of around 56,000 peoples (as of 2016). The occurrence of abdominal wall defects has never been investigated in Greenland. The present study is based on data retrieved from three nationwide and two local registries in the Greenlandic health care system over 27 years (1989-2015). We identified 33 infants with abdominal wall defects born in the study time period. All cases were reclassified to 28 cases of gastroschisis, four cases of omphalocele, and there was 1 infant in the indeterminate group. The point prevalence at birth for gastroschisis increased significantly from 8 to 35 (average 10.7) per 10,000 liveborn and -stillborn infants. Mothers below 20 years of age represented 23% of all cases and the prevalence for this group was 17 per 10,000 liveborn and stillborn. Perinatal mortality for infants with gastroschisis was high (18%), and 1 year survival was 71%. For omphalocele, the prevalence varied from 8 to 11 per 10,000 liveborn and stillborn infants. There was no increasing rate in the period, further highlighting an etiological difference between gastroschisis and omphalocele. This study confirms the increasing prevalence of gastroschisis in Greenland in the period from 1989 to 2015. The average was 10.7 per 10,000 liveborn and -stillborn infants and, to the best of our knowledge, this is the highest prevalence ever reported. Birth Defects Research 109:836-842, 2017. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Periodic outburst floods from an ice-dammed lake in East Greenland.

Science.gov (United States)

Grinsted, Aslak; Hvidberg, Christine S; Campos, Néstor; Dahl-Jensen, Dorthe

2017-08-30

We report evidence of four cycles of outburst floods from Catalina Lake, an ice-dammed lake in East Greenland, identified in satellite imagery between 1966-2016. The lake measures 20-25 km 2 , and lake level drops 130-150 m in each event, corresponding to a water volume of 2.6-3.4 Gt, and a release of potential energy of 10 16  J, among the largest outburst floods reported in historical times. The drainage cycle has shortened systematically, and the lake filling rate has increased over each cycle, suggesting that the drainage pattern is changing due to climate warming with possible implications for environmental conditions in Scoresbysund fjord.

Mapping Greenland's Firn Aquifer using L-band Microwave Radiometry

Science.gov (United States)

Miller, J.; Bringer, A.; Jezek, K. C.; Johnson, J. T.; Scambos, T. A.; Long, D. G.

2016-12-01

Greenland's recently discovered firn aquifer is one of the most interesting, yet still mysterious, components of the ice sheet system. Many open questions remain regarding timescales of refreezing and/or englacial drainage of liquid meltwater, and the connections of firn aquifers to the subglacial hydrological system. If liquid meltwater production at the surface of the Greenland ice sheet continues to increase, subsequent increases in the volume of mobile liquid meltwater retained within Greenland's firn aquifer may increase the possibility of crevasse-deepening via hydrofracture. Hydrofracture is an important component of supraglacial lake drainage leading to at least temporary accelerated flow velocities and ice sheet mass balance changes. Firn aquifers may also support hydrofracture-induced drainage and thus are potentially capable of significantly influencing ice sheet mass balance and sea level rise. Spaceborne L-band microwave radiometers provide an innovative tool for ice-sheet wide mapping of the spatiotemporal variability of Greenland's firn aquifer. Both refreezing and englacial drainage may be observable given the sensitivity of the microwave response to the upper surface of liquid meltwater retained within snow and firn pore space as well as the ability of L band instruments to probe the ice sheet from the surface to the firn-ice transition at pore close-off depth. Here we combine L-band (1.4 GHz) brightness temperature observations from multiple sources to demonstrate the potential of mapping firn aquifers on ice sheets using L-band microwave radiometry. Data sources include the interferometric MIRAS instrument aboard ESA's Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity (SMOS) satellite mission and the radiometer aboard NASA's Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP) satellite mission. We will also present mulit-frequency L-band brightness temperature data (0.5-2 GHz) that will be collected over several firn aquifer areas on the Greenland ice sheet by the Ohio State

Coastal glaciers advanced onto Jameson Land, East Greenland during the late glacial–early Holocene Milne Land Stade

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Helena Alexanderson

2014-01-01

Full Text Available We report on 10Be and optically stimulated luminescence ages from moraines and glaciolacustrine sediments on eastern Jameson Land, East Greenland. Sampled landforms and sediment are associated with advances of outlet glaciers from the local Liverpool Land ice cap situated in the coastal Scoresby Sund region. Previous studies have tentatively correlated these advances with the Milne Land Stade moraines, which are prominent moraine sets deposited by mountain glaciers in the inner Scoresby Sund region. Recent constraints on the formation of the outer and inner of these moraines have suggested two advances of local glaciers, one prior to or during the Younger Dryas and another during the Preboreal. In this paper, we test the correlation of the Liverpool Land glacial advance with the Milne Land Stade. Our results show that outlet glaciers from the Liverpool Land ice cap reached ice-marginal positions marked by moraines in east-facing valleys on Jameson Land sometime during late glacial–early Holocene time (ca. 13–11 Kya. This confirms the correlation of these moraines with the Milne Land Stade moraines described elsewhere in the Scoresby Sund region.

Implications for carbon processing beneath the Greenland Ice Sheet from dissolved CO2 and CH4 concentrations of subglacial discharge

Science.gov (United States)

Pain, A.; Martin, J.; Martin, E. E.

2017-12-01

Subglacial carbon processes are of increasing interest as warming induces ice melting and increases fluxes of glacial meltwater into proglacial rivers and the coastal ocean. Meltwater may serve as an atmospheric source or sink of carbon dioxide (CO2) or methane (CH4), depending on the magnitudes of subglacial organic carbon (OC) remineralization, which produces CO2 and CH4, and mineral weathering reactions, which consume CO2 but not CH4. We report wide variability in dissolved CO2 and CH4 concentrations at the beginning of the melt season (May-June 2017) between three sites draining land-terminating glaciers of the Greenland Ice Sheet. Two sites, located along the Watson River in western Greenland, drain the Isunnguata and Russell Glaciers and contained 1060 and 400 ppm CO2, respectively. In-situ CO2 flux measurements indicated that the Isunnguata was a source of atmospheric CO2, while the Russell was a sink. Both sites had elevated CH4 concentrations, at 325 and 25 ppm CH4, respectively, suggesting active anaerobic OC remineralization beneath the ice sheet. Dissolved CO2 and CH4 reached atmospheric equilibrium within 2.6 and 8.6 km downstream of Isunnguata and Russell discharge sites, respectively. These changes reflect rapid gas exchange with the atmosphere and/or CO2 consumption via instream mineral weathering. The third site, draining the Kiagtut Sermiat in southern Greenland, had about half atmospheric CO2 concentrations (250 ppm), but approximately atmospheric CH4 concentrations (2.1 ppm). Downstream CO2 flux measurements indicated ingassing of CO2 over the entire 10-km length of the proglacial river. CO2 undersaturation may be due to more readily weathered lithologies underlying the Kiagtut Sermiat compared to Watson River sites, but low CH4 concentrations also suggest limited contributions of CO2 and CH4 from OC remineralization. These results suggest that carbon processing beneath the Greenland Ice Sheet may be more variable than previously recognized

(CH4)-C-14 Measurements in Greenland Ice: Investigating Last Glacial Termination CH4 Sources

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Petrenko, V. V.; Smith, A. M.; Brook, E. J.

2009-01-01

by direct cosmogenic C-14 production in ice. C-14 of CO was measured to better understand this process and correct the sample (CH4)-C-14. Corrected results suggest that wetland sources were likely responsible for the majority of the Younger Dryas-Preboreal CH4 rise.......The cause of a large increase of atmospheric methane concentration during the Younger Dryas-Preboreal abrupt climatic transition (similar to 11,600 years ago) has been the subject of much debate. The carbon-14 (C-14) content of methane ((CH4)-C-14) should distinguish between wetland and clathrate...... contributions to this increase. We present measurements of (CH4)-C-14 in glacial ice, targeting this transition, performed by using ice samples obtained from an ablation site in west Greenland. Measured (CH4)-C-14 values were higher than predicted under any scenario. Sample (CH4)-C-14 appears to be elevated...

Evidence of local and regional freshening of Northeast Greenland coastal waters

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Sejr, Mikael K.; Stedmon, Colin A; Bendtsen, Jørgen

2017-01-01

The supply of freshwater to fjord systems in Greenland is increasing as a result of climate change-induced acceleration in ice sheet melt. However, insight into the marine implications of the melt water is impaired by lack of observations demonstrating the fate of freshwater along the Greenland...... coast and providing evaluation basis for ocean models. Here we present 13 years of summer measurements along a 120 km transect in Young Sound, Northeast Greenland and show that sub-surface coastal waters are decreasing in salinity with an average rate of 0.12 ± 0.05 per year. This is the first...... observational evidence of a significant freshening on decadal scale of the waters surrounding the ice sheet and comes from a region where ice sheet melt has been less significant. It implies that ice sheet dynamics in Northeast Greenland could be of key importance as freshwater is retained in southward flowing...

Meltwater-induced changes in the structure and behavior of Greenland's firn

Science.gov (United States)

MacFerrin, M. J.; Machguth, H.; van As, D.; Charalampidis, C.; Heilig, A.; Vandecrux, B.; Stevens, C.; Abdalati, W.

2017-12-01

As surface melt increases across the Greenland ice sheet in a warming climate, Greenland's accumulation zone has absorbed a progressively greater volume of water. In low-accumulation regions lacking perennial aquifers, this meltwater has refrozen into subsurface ice, which is now fundamentally altering the structure of near-surface firn layers. Here we present an extensive collection of firn cores, in situ radar, NASA IceBridge radar, thermistor string measurements, in situ FirnCover compaction data and regional climate model results to illustrate several distinct ways that Greenland's percolation zone is being fundamentally altered by increasing surface melt. The bulk density of the top 20 meters' firn in the wet-snow facies has increased by up to 40% in the past 50 years, due primarily to an up to six-fold increase in firn ice content. Firn compaction rates have changed both in their annual magnitude and have been delayed in their seasonal phase by up to three months, driven primarily by an increased release of latent heat as water refreezes at depth. When firn exceeds a threshold of excess melt in which seasonal snow can no longer accommodate summer melt, individual refrozen ice layers at depth have annealed together to form low-permeability ice slabs (LPISs). These multi-meter thick layers of ice perched over porous firn block percolation to depth and increase the size of the runoff zone. LPISs are a type of "hybrid facies" capable both of running water off the surface, while continuing to slowly compact porous firn at depth. Currently LPISs cover approximately 5% of Greenland's current accumulation zone, but we project them to extend across 15-50% of the accumulation zone by 2100 under different forcing scenarios. These observed changes in the structure and behavior of Greenland's firn have serious implications for future runoff of the ice sheet. Additionally, they challenge modern assumptions which we use to quantify the mass balance of the Greenland ice

Antarctic and Greenland ice sheet mass balance products from satellite gravimetry

Science.gov (United States)

Horwath, Martin; Groh, Andreas; Horvath, Alexander; Forsberg, René; Meister, Rakia; Barletta, Valentina R.; Shepherd, Andrew

2017-04-01

Because of their important role in the Earth's climate system, ESA's Climate Change Initiative (CCI) has identified both the Antarctic Ice Sheet (AIS) and the Greenland Ice Sheet (GIS) as Essential Climate Variables (ECV). Since respondents of a user survey indicated that the ice sheet mass balance is one of the most important ECV data products needed to better understand climate change, the AIS_cci and the GIS_cci project provide Gravimetric Mass Balance (GMB) products based on satellite gravimetry data. The GMB products are derived from GRACE (Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment) monthly solutions of release ITSG-Grace2016 produced at TU Graz. GMB basin products (i.e. time series of monthly mass changes for the entire ice sheets and selected drainage basins) and GMB gridded products (e.g. mass balance estimates with a formal resolution of about 50km, covering the entire ice sheets) are generated for the period from 2002 until present. The first GMB product was released in mid 2016. Here we present an extended and updated version of the ESA CCI GMB products, which are freely available through data portals hosted by the projects (https://data1.geo.tu-dresden.de/ais_gmb, http://products.esa-icesheets-cci.org/products/downloadlist/GMB). Since the initial product release, the applied processing strategies have been improved in order to further reduce GRACE errors and to enhance the separation of signals super-imposed to the ice mass changes. While a regional integration approach is used by the AIS_cci project, the GMB products of the GIS_cci project are derived using a point mass inversion. The differences between both approaches are investigated through the example of the GIS, where an alternative GMB product was generated using the regional integration approach implemented by the AIS_cci. Finally, we present the latest mass balance estimates for both ice sheets as well as their corresponding contributions to global sea level rise.

Towards monitoring surface and subsurface lakes on the Greenland Ice Sheet using Sentinel-1 SAR and Landsat-8 OLI imagery

Science.gov (United States)

Miles, Katie E.; Willis, Ian C.; Benedek, Corinne L.; Williamson, Andrew G.; Tedesco, Marco

2017-07-01

Supraglacial lakes are an important component of the Greenland Ice Sheet’s mass balance and hydrology, with their drainage affecting ice dynamics. This study uses imagery from the recently launched Sentinel-1A Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) satellite to investigate supraglacial lakes in West Greenland. A semi-automated algorithm is developed to detect surface lakes from Sentinel-1 images during the 2015 summer. A combined Landsat-8 and Sentinel-1 dataset, which has a comparable temporal resolution to MODIS (3 days versus daily) but a higher spatial resolution (25-40 m versus 250-500 m), is then used together with a fully-automated lake drainage detection algorithm. Rapid (days) and slow (> 4 days) drainages are investigated for both small (summer. Drainage events of small lakes occur at lower elevations (mean 159 m), and slightly earlier (mean 4.5 days) in the melt season than those of large lakes. The analysis is extended manually into the early winter to calculate the dates and elevations of lake freeze-through more precisely than is possible with optical imagery (mean 30 August; 1270 m mean elevation). Finally, the Sentinel-1 imagery is used to detect subsurface lakes and, for the first time, their dates of appearance and freeze-through (mean 9 August and 7 October, respectively). These subsurface lakes occur at higher elevations than the surface lakes detected in this study (mean 1593 m and 1185 m, respectively). Sentinel-1 imagery therefore provides great potential for tracking melting, water movement and freezing within both the firn zone and ablation area of the Greenland Ice Sheet.

Greenland ice-sheet contribution to sea-level rise buffered by meltwater storage in firn.

Science.gov (United States)

Harper, J; Humphrey, N; Pfeffer, W T; Brown, J; Fettweis, X

2012-11-08

Surface melt on the Greenland ice sheet has shown increasing trends in areal extent and duration since the beginning of the satellite era. Records for melt were broken in 2005, 2007, 2010 and 2012. Much of the increased surface melt is occurring in the percolation zone, a region of the accumulation area that is perennially covered by snow and firn (partly compacted snow). The fate of melt water in the percolation zone is poorly constrained: some may travel away from its point of origin and eventually influence the ice sheet's flow dynamics and mass balance and the global sea level, whereas some may simply infiltrate into cold snow or firn and refreeze with none of these effects. Here we quantify the existing water storage capacity of the percolation zone of the Greenland ice sheet and show the potential for hundreds of gigatonnes of meltwater storage. We collected in situ observations of firn structure and meltwater retention along a roughly 85-kilometre-long transect of the melting accumulation area. Our data show that repeated infiltration events in which melt water penetrates deeply (more than 10 metres) eventually fill all pore space with water. As future surface melt intensifies under Arctic warming, a fraction of melt water that would otherwise contribute to sea-level rise will fill existing pore space of the percolation zone. We estimate the lower and upper bounds of this storage sink to be 322 ± 44 gigatonnes and  1,289(+388)(-252) gigatonnes, respectively. Furthermore, we find that decades are required to fill this pore space under a range of plausible future climate conditions. Hence, routing of surface melt water into filling the pore space of the firn column will delay expansion of the area contributing to sea-level rise, although once the pore space is filled it cannot quickly be regenerated.

Response of faults to climate-driven changes in ice and water volumes on Earth's surface.

Science.gov (United States)

Hampel, Andrea; Hetzel, Ralf; Maniatis, Georgios

2010-05-28

Numerical models including one or more faults in a rheologically stratified lithosphere show that climate-induced variations in ice and water volumes on Earth's surface considerably affect the slip evolution of both thrust and normal faults. In general, the slip rate and hence the seismicity of a fault decreases during loading and increases during unloading. Here, we present several case studies to show that a postglacial slip rate increase occurred on faults worldwide in regions where ice caps and lakes decayed at the end of the last glaciation. Of note is that the postglacial amplification of seismicity was not restricted to the areas beneath the large Laurentide and Fennoscandian ice sheets but also occurred in regions affected by smaller ice caps or lakes, e.g. the Basin-and-Range Province. Our results do not only have important consequences for the interpretation of palaeoseismological records from faults in these regions but also for the evaluation of the future seismicity in regions currently affected by deglaciation like Greenland and Antarctica: shrinkage of the modern ice sheets owing to global warming may ultimately lead to an increase in earthquake frequency in these regions.

The Effect of Solar Forcing on the Greenland Ice Sheet during the Holocene - A Model Study

Science.gov (United States)

Bügelmayer, Marianne; Roche, Didier; Renssen, Hans

2014-05-01

Abrupt climate changes did not only happen during glacials but also during interglacials such as the Holocene. Marine sediments provide evidence for the periodic occurrence of centennial-scale events with enhanced iceberg discharge during the past 11.000 years (Bond et al., 2001). These events were chronologically linked to reduced solar activity as reconstructed using cosmogenic isotopes (Bond et al., 2001), indicating that even an external forcing that is considered to be small, has a potential impact on climate due to several feedback mechanisms (Renssen et al., 2006). The interactions between climate and solar irradiance have been investigated using numerical models (e.g. Haigh, 1996; Renssen et al, 2006), but so far without dynamically computing the Greenland ice sheet and iceberg calving. Thus, the impact of solar variations on iceberg discharge and the underlying mechanisms have not been analysed so far. To analyse the effect of variations in solar activity on the Greenland ice sheet (GIS) and the iceberg calving, as well as possible feedback mechanisms that enhance the impact of the total solar irradiance, we use the earth system model of intermediate complexity (iLOVECLIM, Roche et al., 2013), coupled to the ice sheet/ice shelf model GRISLI (Ritz et al., 2001) and to a dynamic-thermodynamic iceberg module (Jongma et al., 2009, Bügelmayer et al., 2014) to perform transient experiments of the last 6000 years. The experiments are conducted applying reconstructed atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations, volcanic aerosol loads, orbital parameters and variations in the total solar irradiance. We present the response of the coupled model to different solar irradiance scenarios to evaluate modeled GIS sensitivity to relatively modest variations in radiative forcing. Moreover, we investigate the dependence of the model results on the chosen model sensitivity. References: Bond, G., Kromer, B., Beer, J., Muscheler, R., Evans, M. N., Showers, W., … Bonani, G

Sea Ice Retreat and its Impact on the Intensity of Open-Ocean Convection in the Greenland and Iceland Seas

Science.gov (United States)

Moore, K.; Våge, K.; Pickart, R. S.; Renfrew, I.

2016-12-01

The air-sea transfer of heat and freshwater plays a critical role in the global climate system. This is particularly true for the Greenland and Iceland Seas, where these fluxes drive ocean convection that contributes to Denmark Strait Overflow Water, the densest component of the lower limb of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC). This buoyancy transfer is most pronounced during the winter downstream of the ice edge, where the cold and dry Arctic air first comes in contact with the relatively warm ocean surface. Here we show that the wintertime retreat of sea ice in the region, combined with different rates of warming for the atmosphere and sea surface of the Greenland and Iceland Seas, has resulted in statistically significant reductions of approximately 20% in the magnitude of the winter air-sea heat fluxes since 1979. Furthermore, it is demonstrated that modes of climate variability other than the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) are required to fully characterize the regional air-sea interaction in this region. Mixed-layer model simulations imply that a continued decrease in atmospheric forcing will exceed a threshold for the Greenland Sea whereby convection will become depth limited, reducing the ventilation of mid-depth waters in the Nordic Seas. In the Iceland Sea, further reductions have the potential to decrease the supply of the densest overflow waters to the AMOC.

The modelled liquid water balance of the Greenland Ice Sheet

Science.gov (United States)

Steger, Christian R.; Reijmer, Carleen H.; van den Broeke, Michiel R.

2017-11-01

Recent studies indicate that the surface mass balance will dominate the Greenland Ice Sheet's (GrIS) contribution to 21st century sea level rise. Consequently, it is crucial to understand the liquid water balance (LWB) of the ice sheet and its response to increasing surface melt. We therefore analyse a firn simulation conducted with the SNOWPACK model for the GrIS and over the period 1960-2014 with a special focus on the LWB and refreezing. Evaluations of the simulated refreezing climate with GRACE and firn temperature observations indicate a good model-observation agreement. Results of the LWB analysis reveal a spatially uniform increase in surface melt (0.16 m w.e. a-1) during 1990-2014. As a response, refreezing and run-off also indicate positive changes during this period (0.05 and 0.11 m w.e. a-1, respectively), where refreezing increases at only half the rate of run-off, implying that the majority of the additional liquid input runs off the ice sheet. This pattern of refreeze and run-off is spatially variable. For instance, in the south-eastern part of the GrIS, most of the additional liquid input is buffered in the firn layer due to relatively high snowfall rates. Modelled increase in refreezing leads to a decrease in firn air content and to a substantial increase in near-surface firn temperature. On the western side of the ice sheet, modelled firn temperature increases are highest in the lower accumulation zone and are primarily caused by the exceptional melt season of 2012. On the eastern side, simulated firn temperature increases are more gradual and are associated with the migration of firn aquifers to higher elevations.

Modelling Greenland icebergs

Science.gov (United States)

Marson, Juliana M.; Myers, Paul G.; Hu, Xianmin

2017-04-01

The Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) is well known for carrying heat from low to high latitudes, moderating local temperatures. Numerical studies have examined the AMOC's variability under the influence of freshwater input to subduction and deep convections sites. However, an important source of freshwater has often been overlooked or misrepresented: icebergs. While liquid runoff decreases the ocean salinity near the coast, icebergs are a gradual and remote source of freshwater - a difference that affects sea ice cover, temperature, and salinity distribution in ocean models. Icebergs originated from the Greenland ice sheet, in particular, can affect the subduction process in Labrador Sea by decreasing surface water density. Our study aims to evaluate the distribution of icebergs originated from Greenland and their contribution to freshwater input in the North Atlantic. To do that, we use an interactive iceberg module coupled with the Nucleus for European Modelling of the Ocean (NEMO v3.4), which will calve icebergs from Greenland according to rates established by Bamber et al. (2012). Details on the distribution and trajectory of icebergs within the model may also be of use for understanding potential navigation threats, as shipping increases in northern waters.

Annual Greenland Accumulation Rates (2009-2012) from Airborne Snow Radar

Science.gov (United States)

Koenig, Lora S.; Ivanoff, Alvaro; Alexander, Patrick M.; MacGregor, Joseph A.; Fettweis, Xavier; Panzer, Ben; Paden, John D.; Forster, Richard R.; Das, Indrani; McConnell, Joseph R.;

Increasing mass loss from Greenland's Mittivakkat Gletscher

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Hasholt, Bent; Mernild, S.H.; Knudsen, N.T.

2011-01-01

Warming in the Arctic during the past several decades has caused glaciers to thin and retreat, and recent mass loss from the Greenland Ice Sheet is well documented. Local glaciers peripheral to the ice sheet are also retreating, but few mass-balance observations are available to quantify that ret...... a local phenomenon, but are indicative of glacier changes in the broader region. Mass-balance observations for the MG therefore provide unique documentation of the general retreat of Southeast Greenland's local glaciers under ongoing climate warming....

Improved GRACE regional mass balance estimates of the Greenland Ice Sheet cross-validated with the input-output method (discussion paper)

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Xu, Z.; Schrama, E.J.O.; Van der Wal, W.; Van den Broeke, M.; Enderlin, E.M.

2015-01-01

In this study, we use satellite gravimetry data from the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) to estimate regional mass changes of the Greenland ice sheet (GrIS) and neighbouring glaciated regions using a least-squares inversion approach. We also consider results from the input-output

Seasonal velocities of eight major marine-terminating outlet glaciers of the Greenland ice sheet from continuous in situ GPS instruments

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Ahlstrøm, A. P.; Andersen, S. B.; Andersen, M. L.

2013-01-01

We present 17 velocity records derived from in situ stand-alone single-frequency Global Positioning System (GPS) receivers placed on eight marine-terminating ice sheet outlet glaciers in South, West and North Greenland, covering varying parts of the period summer 2009 to summer 2012. Common to all...

Growth of plants on the Late Weichselian ice-sheet during Greenland interstadial-1?

Science.gov (United States)

Zale, R.; Huang, Y.-T.; Bigler, C.; Wood, J. R.; Dalén, L.; Wang, X.-R.; Segerström, U.; Klaminder, J.

2018-04-01

Unglaciated forelands and summits protruding from ice-sheets are commonly portrayed as areas where plants first establish at the end of glacial cycles. But is this prevailing view of ice-free refugia too simplistic? Here, we present findings suggesting that surface debris supported plant communities far beyond the rim of the Late Weichselian Ice-sheet during Greenland interstadial 1 (GI-1 or Bølling-Allerød interstadial). We base our interpretations upon findings from terrigenous sediments largely resembling 'plant-trash' deposits in North America (known to form as vegetation established on stagnant ice became buried along with glacial debris during the deglaciation). In our studied deposit, we found macrofossils (N = 10) overlapping with the deglaciation period of the area (9.5-10 cal kyr BP) as well as samples (N = 2) with ages ranging between 12.9 and 13.3 cal kyr BP. The latter ages indicate growth of at least graminoids during the GI-1 interstadial when the site was near the geographic center of the degrading ice-sheet. We suggest that exposure of englacial material during GI-1 created patches of supraglacial debris capable of supporting vascular plants three millennia before deglaciation. The composition and resilience of this early plant community remain uncertain. Yet, the younger group of macrofossils, in combination with pollen and ancient DNA analyses of inclusions, imply that shrubs (Salix sp., Betula sp. and Ericaceae sp) and even tree species (Larix) were present in the debris during the final deglaciation stage.

A Satellite-Derived Climate-Quality Data Record of the Clear-Sky Surface Temperature of the Greenland Ice Sheet

Science.gov (United States)

Hall, Dorothy K.; Comiso, Josefino C.; DiGirolamo, Nikolo E.; Shuman, Christopher A.; Key, Jeffrey R.; Koenig, Lora S.

2012-01-01

We have developed a climate-quality data record of the clear-sky surface temperature of the Greenland Ice Sheet using the Moderate-Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) ice-surface temperature (1ST) algorithm. A climate-data record (CDR) is a time series of measurements of sufficient length, consistency, and continuity to determine climate variability and change. We present daily and monthly MODIS ISTs of the Greenland Ice Sheet beginning on 1 March 2000 and continuing through 31 December 2010 at 6.25-km spatial resolution on a polar stereographic grid. This record will be elevated in status to a CDR when at least nine more years of data become available either from MODIS Terra or Aqua, or from the Visible Infrared Imager Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) to be launched in October 2011. Our ultimate goal is to develop a CDR that starts in 1981 with the Advanced Very High Resolution (AVHRR) Polar Pathfinder (APP) dataset and continues with MODIS data from 2000 to the present, and into the VIIRS era. Differences in the APP and MODIS cloud masks have so far precluded the current 1ST records from spanning both the APP and MODIS time series in a seamless manner though this will be revisited when the APP dataset has been reprocessed. The complete MODIS 1ST daily and monthly data record is available online.

Balance Mass Flux and Velocity Across the Equilibrium Line in Ice Drainage Systems of Greenland

Science.gov (United States)

Zwally, H. Jay; Giovinetto, Mario B.; Koblinsky, Chester J. (Technical Monitor)

2001-01-01

Estimates of balance mass flux and the depth-averaged ice velocity through the cross-section aligned with the equilibrium line are produced for each of six drainage systems in Greenland. (The equilibrium line, which lies at approximately 1200 m elevation on the ice sheet, is the boundary between the area of net snow accumulation at higher elevations and the areas of net melting at lower elevations around the ice sheet.) Ice drainage divides and six major drainage systems are delineated using surface topography from ERS (European Remote Sensing) radar altimeter data. The net accumulation rate in the accumulation zone bounded by the equilibrium line is 399 Gt/yr and net ablation rate in the remaining area is 231 Gt/yr. (1 GigaTon of ice is 1090 kM(exp 3). The mean balance mass flux and depth-averaged ice velocity at the cross-section aligned with the modeled equilibrium line are 0.1011 Gt kM(exp -2)/yr and 0.111 km/yr, respectively, with little variation in these values from system to system. The ratio of the ice mass above the equilibrium line to the rate of mass output implies an effective exchange time of approximately 6000 years for total mass exchange. The range of exchange times, from a low of 3 ka in the SE drainage system to 14 ka in the NE, suggests a rank as to which regions of the ice sheet may respond more rapidly to climate fluctuations.

Ice-sheet flow conditions deduced from mechanical tests of ice core

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Miyamoto, Atsushi; Narita, Hideki; Hondoh, Takeo

1999-01-01

Uniaxial compression tests were performed on samples of the Greenland Ice Core Project (GRIP) deep ice core, both in the field and later in a cold-room laboratory, in order to understand the ice-flow behavior of large ice sheets. Experiments were conducted under conditions of constant strain rate....... It was revealed that cloudy bands affect ice-deformation processes, but the details remain unclear. Udgivelsesdato: June......Uniaxial compression tests were performed on samples of the Greenland Ice Core Project (GRIP) deep ice core, both in the field and later in a cold-room laboratory, in order to understand the ice-flow behavior of large ice sheets. Experiments were conducted under conditions of constant strain rate......-core samples with basal planes parallel to the horizontal plane of the ice sheet. The ice-flow enhancement factors show a gradual increase with depth down to approximately 2000 m. These results can be interpreted in terms of an increase in the fourth-order Schmid factor. Below 2000 m depth, the flow...

Increasing meltwater discharge from the Nuuk region of the Greenland ice sheet and implications for mass balance (1960-2012)

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

van As, Dirk; Langer Andersen, Morten; Petersen, Dorthe

2014-01-01

We assess the runoff and surface mass balance (SMB) of the Greenland ice sheet in the Nuuk region (southwest) using output of two regional climate models (RCMs) evaluated by observations. The region encompasses six glaciers that drain into Godthåbsfjord. RCM data (1960-2012) are resampled to a high...... spatial resolution to include the narrow (relative to the native grid spacing) glacier trunks in the ice mask. Comparing RCM gridded results with automaticweather station (AWS) point measurements reveals that locally models can underestimate ablation andoverestimate accumulation by up to tens of per cent...

Heat sources for glacial ice melt in a West Greenland tidewater outlet glacier fjord: The role of subglacial freshwater discharge

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Bendtsen, Jørgen; Mortensen, John; Lennert, Kunuk

2015-01-01

The melting of tidewater outlet glaciers from the Greenland Ice Sheet contributes significantly to global sea level rise. Accelerated mass loss is related to melt-processes in front of calving glaciers, yet the role of ocean heat transports is poorly understood. Here we present the first direct...... of the area near the glacier showed that ice melt was mainly due to ocean heat transport and that direct plume-associated melt was only important in periods with high meltwater discharge rates of ~100 m3 s−1. Ocean mixing outside of the plume area was thus the primary heat source for melting glacier ice....

Siple Dome ice reveals two modes of millennial CO2 change during the last ice age

Science.gov (United States)

Ahn, Jinho; Brook, Edward J.

2014-01-01

Reconstruction of atmospheric CO2 during times of past abrupt climate change may help us better understand climate-carbon cycle feedbacks. Previous ice core studies reveal simultaneous increases in atmospheric CO2 and Antarctic temperature during times when Greenland and the northern hemisphere experienced very long, cold stadial conditions during the last ice age. Whether this relationship extends to all of the numerous stadial events in the Greenland ice core record has not been clear. Here we present a high-resolution record of atmospheric CO2 from the Siple Dome ice core, Antarctica for part of the last ice age. We find that CO2 does not significantly change during the short Greenlandic stadial events, implying that the climate system perturbation that produced the short stadials was not strong enough to substantially alter the carbon cycle. PMID:24781344

Winter Camp: A Blog from the Greenland Summit, Part II

Science.gov (United States)

Koenig, Lora

2009-01-01

An earlier issue presents the first half of the author's experience living and working at the National Science Foundation's (NSF) Greenland Summit Camp. The author is a remote-sensing glaciologist at NASA s Goddard Space Flight Center. She took measurements that will be used to validate data collected by NASA s Aqua, Terra, and Ice, Clouds, and land Elevation Satellite (ICESat) satellites with ground-truth measurements of the Greenland Ice Sheet she made at Summit Camp from November 2008-February 2009. This article presents excerpts from the second half of her stay and work at the Greenland Summit.

Extreme Low Light Requirement for Algae Growth Underneath Sea Ice: A Case Study From Station Nord, NE Greenland

Science.gov (United States)

Hancke, Kasper; Lund-Hansen, Lars C.; Lamare, Maxim L.; Højlund Pedersen, Stine; King, Martin D.; Andersen, Per; Sorrell, Brian K.

2018-02-01

Microalgae colonizing the underside of sea ice in spring are a key component of the Arctic foodweb as they drive early primary production and transport of carbon from the atmosphere to the ocean interior. Onset of the spring bloom of ice algae is typically limited by the availability of light, and the current consensus is that a few tens-of-centimeters of snow is enough to prevent sufficient solar radiation to reach underneath the sea ice. We challenge this consensus, and investigated the onset and the light requirement of an ice algae spring bloom, and the importance of snow optical properties for light penetration. Colonization by ice algae began in May under >1 m of first-year sea ice with ˜1 m thick snow cover on top, in NE Greenland. The initial growth of ice algae began at extremely low irradiance (automated high-frequency temperature profiles. We propose that changes in snow optical properties, caused by temperature-driven snow metamorphosis, was the primary driver for allowing sufficient light to penetrate through the thick snow and initiate algae growth below the sea ice. This was supported by radiative-transfer modeling of light attenuation. Implications are an earlier productivity by ice algae in Arctic sea ice than recognized previously.

Arctic Ocean UNCLOS Article 76 Work for Greenland Starts on Land

Science.gov (United States)

Dahl-Jensen, T.; Marcussen, C.; Jackson, R.; Voss, P.

2005-12-01

One of the most lonely and desolate stretches of coastline on the planet has become the target for UNCLOS article 76 related research. The Danish Continental Shelf Project has launched a work program to investigate the possibilities for Greenland to claim an area outside the 200 nm limit in the Arctic Ocean. The role of the Lomonosov Ridge as a Natural Prolongation of Greenland/Canada is an important issue, and in order to better evaluate the connection between Greenland and the Lomonosov Ridge the nature of not only the ridge but also of Northern Greenland is the target of deep crustal investigations. The North Greenland Fold belt covers the ice-free part of North Greenland and continues west in the Canadian Arctic. The foldbelt was formed during the Ellesmerian orogeny, where sediments from the Franklinian Basin where compressed and deformed. The deep structure of basin and its subsequent closure are broadly unknown. Three broad band earthquake seismological stations where installed in North Greenland to supplement the existing stations at Alert (Canada) and Station Nord to the east, and the first data was available summer 2005. Crustal thickness data from these first results are presented. Plans for the spring 2006 consist of wide-angle acquisition on the sea ice from the Greenland-Canadian mainland out onto the Lomonosov Ridge, a joint Danish - Canadian project with a 400 km long profile over difficult ice conditions, 18 tons of explosives, three helicopters, a Twin Otter and about 30 participants.

Estimating Greenland ice sheet surface mass balance contribution to future sea level rise using the regional atmospheric climate model MAR

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Fettweis, X.; Franco, B.; Tedesco, M.; van Angelen, J.H.; Lenaerts, J.T.M.; van den Broeke, M.R.; Gallee, H

2012-01-01

We report future projections of Surface Mass Balance (SMB) over the Greenland ice sheet (GrIS) obtained with the regional climate model MAR, forced by the outputs of three CMIP5 General Circulation Models (GCMs) when considering two different warming scenarios (RCP 4.5 and RCP 8.5). The GCMs

High spatial variation in terrestrial arthropod species diversity and composition near the Greenland ice cap

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Hansen, Rikke Reisner; Hansen, Oskar Liset Pryds; Bowden, Joseph James

2016-01-01

Arthropods form a major part of the terrestrial species diversity in the Arctic, and are particularly sensitive to temporal changes in the abiotic environment. It is assumed that most Arctic arthropods are habitat generalists and that their diversity patterns exhibit low spatial variation....... The empirical basis for this assumption, however, is weak. We examine the degree of spatial variation in species diversity and assemblage structure among five habitat types at two sites of similar abiotic conditions and plant species composition in southwest Greenland, using standardized field collection...... methods for spiders, beetles and butterflies. We employed non-metric multidimensional scaling, species richness estimation, community dissimilarity and indicator species analysis to test for local (within site)- and regional (between site)-scale differences in arthropod communities. To identify specific...

Life on thin ice: Insights from Uummannaq, Greenland for connecting climate science with Arctic communities

Science.gov (United States)

Baztan, Juan; Cordier, Mateo; Huctin, Jean-Michel; Zhu, Zhiwei; Vanderlinden, Jean-Paul

2017-09-01

What are the links between mainstream climate science and local community knowledge? This study takes the example of Greenland, considered one of the regions most impacted by climate change, and Inuit people, characterized as being highly adaptive to environmental change, to explore this question. The study is based on 10 years of anthropological participatory research in Uummannaq, Northwest Greenland, along with two fieldwork periods in October 2014 and April 2015, and a quantitative bibliometric analysis of the international literature on sea ice - a central subject of concern identified by Uummannaq community members during the fieldwork periods. Community members' perceptions of currently available scientific climate knowledge were also collected during the fieldwork. This was done to determine if community members consider available scientific knowledge salient and if it covers issues they consider relevant. The bibliometric analysis of the sea ice literature provided additional insight into the degree to which scientific knowledge about climate change provides information relevant for the community. Our results contribute to the ongoing debate on the missing connections between community worldviews, cultural values, livelihood needs, interests and climate science. Our results show that more scientific research efforts should consider local-level needs in order to produce local-scale knowledge that is more salient, credible and legitimate for communities experiencing climate change. In Uummannaq, as in many Inuit communities with similar conditions, more research should be done on sea ice thickness in winter and in areas through which local populations travel. This paper supports the growing evidence that whenever possible, climate change research should focus on environmental features that matter to communities, at temporal and spatial scales relevant to them, in order to foster community adaptations to change. We recommend such research be connected to and

Climate Variability, Melt-Flow Acceleration, and Ice Quakes at the Western Slope of the Greenland Ice Sheet

Science.gov (United States)

Steffen, K.; Zwally, J. H.; Rial, J. A.; Behar, A.; Huff, R.

2006-12-01

The Greenland ice sheet experienced surface melt increase over the past 15 years with record melt years in 1987, 1991, 1998, 2002 and 2005. For the western part of the ice sheet the melt area increased by 30 percent (1979-2005). Monthly mean air temperatures increased in spring and fall by 0.23 deg. C per year since 1990, extending the length of melt and total ablation. Winter air temperatures increased by as much as 0.5 deg. C per year during the past 15 years. The equilibrium line altitude ranged between 400 and 1530 m above sea level at 70 deg. north along the western slope of the ice sheet for the past 15 years, equaling a horizontal distance of 100 km. The ELA has been below the Swiss Camp (1100 m elevation) in the nineties, and since 1997 moved above the Swiss Camp height. An increase in ELA leads to an increase in melt water run-off which has been verified by regional model studies (high-resolution re-analysis). Interannual variability of snow accumulation varies from 0.3 to 2.0 m, whereas snow and ice ablation ranges from 0 to 1.5 m water equivalent at Swiss Camp during 1990-2005. A GPS network (10 stations) monitors ice velocity, acceleration, and surface height change at high temporal resolution throughout the year. The network covers a range of 500 and 1500 m above sea level, close to the Ilulissat Icefjord World Heritage region. The ice sheet continued to accelerate during the height of the melt season with short-term velocity increases up to 100 percent, and vertical uplift rates of 0.5 m. There seems to be a good correlation between the change in ice velocity and total surface melt, suggesting that melt water penetrates to great depth through moulins and cracks, lubricating the bottom of the ice sheet. A new bore-hole video movie will be shown from a 110 m deep moulin close to Swiss Camp. A PASSCAL array of 10 portable, 3-component seismic stations deployed around Swiss Camp from May to August 2006 detected numerous microearthquakes within the ice

Evaluation of a 12-km Satellite-Era Reanalysis of Surface Mass Balance for the Greenland Ice Sheet

Science.gov (United States)

Cullather, R. I.; Nowicki, S.; Zhao, B.; Max, S.

2016-12-01

The recent contribution to sea level change from the Greenland Ice Sheet is thought to be strongly driven by surface processes including melt and runoff. Global reanalyses are potential means of reconstructing the historical time series of ice sheet surface mass balance (SMB), but lack spatial resolution needed to resolve ablation areas along the periphery of the ice sheet. In this work, the Modern-Era Retrospective analysis for Research and Applications, version 2 (MERRA-2) is used to examine the spatial and temporal variability of surface melt over the Greenland Ice Sheet. MERRA-2 is produced for the period 1980 to the present at a grid spacing of ½° latitude by ⅝° longitude, and includes snow hydrology processes including compaction, meltwater percolation and refreezing, runoff, and a prognostic surface albedo. The configuration of the MERRA-2 system allows for the background model - the Goddard Earth Observing System model, version 5 (GEOS-5) - to be carried in phase space through analyzed states via the computation of analysis increments, a capability referred to as "replay". Here, a MERRA-2 replay integration is conducted in which atmospheric forcing fields are interpolated and adjusted to sub- atmospheric grid-scale resolution. These adjustments include lapse-rate effects on temperature, humidity, precipitation, and other atmospheric variables that are known to have a strong elevation dependency over ice sheets. The surface coupling is performed such that mass and energy are conserved. The atmospheric forcing influences the surface representation, which operates on land surface tiles with an approximate 12-km spacing. This produces a high-resolution, downscaled SMB which is interactively coupled to the reanalysis model. We compare the downscaled SMB product with other reanalyses, regional climate model values, and a second MERRA-2 replay in which the background model has been replaced with a 12-km, non-hydrostatic version of GEOS-5. The assessment

Predicting the Geothermal Heat Flux in Greenland: A Machine Learning Approach

Science.gov (United States)

Rezvanbehbahani, Soroush; Stearns, Leigh A.; Kadivar, Amir; Walker, J. Doug; van der Veen, C. J.

2017-12-01

Geothermal heat flux (GHF) is a crucial boundary condition for making accurate predictions of ice sheet mass loss, yet it is poorly known in Greenland due to inaccessibility of the bedrock. Here we use a machine learning algorithm on a large collection of relevant geologic features and global GHF measurements and produce a GHF map of Greenland that we argue is within ˜15% accuracy. The main features of our predicted GHF map include a large region with high GHF in central-north Greenland surrounding the NorthGRIP ice core site, and hot spots in the Jakobshavn Isbræ catchment, upstream of Petermann Gletscher, and near the terminus of Nioghalvfjerdsfjorden glacier. Our model also captures the trajectory of Greenland movement over the Icelandic plume by predicting a stripe of elevated GHF in central-east Greenland. Finally, we show that our model can produce substantially more accurate predictions if additional measurements of GHF in Greenland are provided.

Measured and modelled absolute gravity changes in Greenland

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Nielsen, Jens Emil; Forsberg, René; Strykowski, Gabriel

2014-01-01

in Greenland. Theresult is compared with the initial measurements of absolute gravity (AG) change at selected GreenlandNetwork (GNET) sites.We find that observations are highly influenced by the direct attraction from the ice and ocean. Thisis especially evident in the measurements conducted at the GNET...

The Greenland ice sheet - a model for its culmination and decay during and after the last glacial maximum

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Funder, Svend Visby; Hansen, Louise

1996-01-01

there was little change at all. The driving factor during this step was calving caused by rising sea level. This lasted until c. 10 ka, but may have been consumated before the Younger Dryas. The second step began with a glacier-readvance between 10 and 9.5 ka, and after this the fjord glaciers began to retreat....... Maximum Holocene uplift was attained in areas of the 10 ka ice margin, indicating that the uplift is essentially a response to the melting and unloading of ice that began at this time. In suppport of this, recent results in West, North and East Greenland indicate that the...

JAWS: Just Add Water System - A device for detection of nucleic acids in Martian ice caps

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Hansen, Anders J.; Willerslev, Eske; Mørk, Søren

2002-01-01

with a regulation of pH and salt concentrations e.g. the MOD systems and could be installed on a planetary probe melting its way down the Martian ice caps e.g. the NASA Cryobot. JAWS can be used for detection of remains of ancient life preserved in the Martian ice as well as for detection of contamination brought...... to the planet from Earth....

Toward Monitoring Surface and Subsurface Lakes on the Greenland Ice Sheet Using Sentinel-1 SAR and Landsat-8 OLI Imagery

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Katie E. Miles

2017-07-01

Full Text Available Supraglacial lakes are an important component of the Greenland Ice Sheet's mass balance and hydrology, with their drainage affecting ice dynamics. This study uses imagery from the recently launched Sentinel-1A Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR satellite to investigate supraglacial lakes in West Greenland. A semi-automated algorithm is developed to detect surface lakes from Sentinel-1 images during the 2015 summer. A combined Landsat-8 and Sentinel-1 dataset, which has a comparable temporal resolution to MODIS (3 days vs. daily but a higher spatial resolution (25–40 vs. 250–500 m, is then used together with a fully automated lake drainage detection algorithm. Rapid (<4 days and slow (>4 days drainages are investigated for both small (<0.125 km2, the minimum size detectable by MODIS and large (≥0.125 km2 lakes through the summer. Drainage events of small lakes occur at lower elevations (mean 159 m, and slightly earlier (mean 4.5 days in the melt season than those of large lakes. The analysis is extended manually into the early winter to calculate the dates and elevations of lake freeze-through more precisely than is possible with optical imagery (mean 30 August; 1,270 m mean elevation. Finally, the Sentinel-1 imagery is used to detect subsurface lakes and, for the first time, their dates of appearance and freeze-through (mean 9 August and 7 October, respectively. These subsurface lakes occur at higher elevations than the surface lakes detected in this study (mean 1,593 and 1,185 m, respectively. Sentinel-1 imagery therefore provides great potential for tracking melting, water movement and freezing within both the firn zone and ablation area of the Greenland Ice Sheet.

Correlation of Greenland ice-core isotope profiles and the terrestrial record of the Alpine Rhine glacier for the period 32-15 ka

NARCIS (Netherlands)

de Jong, M.G.G.; de Graaff, L.W.S.; Seijmonsbergen, A.C.; Böhm, A.R.

2011-01-01

We present a newly extended stratigraphic subdivision of the Greenland NGRIP, GRIP and GISP2 ice cores for the period 32-15 ka. Our classification emphasizes the multiscale nature of the climatic oscillations. Spectral trend analysis of isotopic data supports this interpretation. We compare this

Observations of runoff and sediment and dissolved loads from the Greenland Ice Sheet at Kangerlussuaq, West Greenland, 2007 to 2010

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Hasholt, Bent; Mikkelsen, Andreas Peter Bech; Nielsen, Morten Holtegaard

2012-01-01

Observations from 2007 to 2010 of runoff, sediment and solute delivery from a segment of the Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS) and the proglacial landscape draining into the fjord at Kangerlussuaq are presented. The observations include at least three jökulhlaups and extreme recordings from 2010...... previously published for 2007 and 2008. The average effective erosion from the catchment was 0.28 mm (min. 0.18 and max. 0.45 mm). The erosion is larger than indicated from most other locations along the GrIS, but in the same order of magnitude as erosion in other glaciated areas at the same latitude, e.......g. Norway. The sandur in the proglacial area acts as a sediment sink for a lot of the sediments from the GrIS....

Volcanic influence on centennial to millennial Holocene Greenland temperature change.

Science.gov (United States)

Kobashi, Takuro; Menviel, Laurie; Jeltsch-Thömmes, Aurich; Vinther, Bo M; Box, Jason E; Muscheler, Raimund; Nakaegawa, Toshiyuki; Pfister, Patrik L; Döring, Michael; Leuenberger, Markus; Wanner, Heinz; Ohmura, Atsumu

2017-05-03

Solar variability has been hypothesized to be a major driver of North Atlantic millennial-scale climate variations through the Holocene along with orbitally induced insolation change. However, another important climate driver, volcanic forcing has generally been underestimated prior to the past 2,500 years partly owing to the lack of proper proxy temperature records. Here, we reconstruct seasonally unbiased and physically constrained Greenland Summit temperatures over the Holocene using argon and nitrogen isotopes within trapped air in a Greenland ice core (GISP2). We show that a series of volcanic eruptions through the Holocene played an important role in driving centennial to millennial-scale temperature changes in Greenland. The reconstructed Greenland temperature exhibits significant millennial correlations with K + and Na + ions in the GISP2 ice core (proxies for atmospheric circulation patterns), and δ 18 O of Oman and Chinese Dongge cave stalagmites (proxies for monsoon activity), indicating that the reconstructed temperature contains hemispheric signals. Climate model simulations forced with the volcanic forcing further suggest that a series of large volcanic eruptions induced hemispheric-wide centennial to millennial-scale variability through ocean/sea-ice feedbacks. Therefore, we conclude that volcanic activity played a critical role in driving centennial to millennial-scale Holocene temperature variability in Greenland and likely beyond.

Snowmelt on the Greenland Ice Sheet as Derived From Passive Microwave Satellite Data

Science.gov (United States)

Abdalati, Waleed; Steffen, Konrad

1997-01-01

The melt extent of the snow on the Greenland ice sheet is of considerable importance to the ice sheet's mass and energy balance, as well as Arctic and global climates. By comparing passive microwave satellite data to field observations, variations in melt extent have been detected by establishing melt thresholds in the cross-polarized gradient ratio (XPGR). The XPGR, defined as the normalized difference between the 19-GHz horizontal channel and the 37-GHz vertical channel of the Special Sensor Microwave/Imager (SSM/I), exploits the different effects of snow wetness on different frequencies and polarizations and establishes a distinct melt signal. Using this XPGR melt signal, seasonal and interannual variations in snowmelt extent of the ice sheet are studied. The melt is found to be most extensive on the western side of the ice sheet and peaks in late July. Moreover, there is a notable increasing trend in melt area between the years 1979 and 1991 of 4.4% per year, which came to an abrupt halt in 1992 after the eruption of Mt. Pinatubo. A similar trend is observed in the temperatures at six coastal stations. The relationship between the warming trend and increasing melt trend between 1979 and 1991 suggests that a 1 C temperature rise corresponds to an increase in melt area of 73000 sq km, which in general exceeds one standard deviation of the natural melt area variability.

Catch history and status of the harbour seal (Phoca vitulina in Greenland

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Aqqalu Rosving-Asvid

2010-09-01

Full Text Available The number of harbour seals (Phoca vitulina in West Greenland declined rapidly after the 1950s and the seals have now abandoned their traditional haulout locations along the Greenland west coast. However, in recent years, a previously undetected group of about 60-100 harbour seals has been observed approximately 80 km upstream in a large river, and some traditional hauloutlocations are still in use near the south-eastern tip of Greenland. A small number of harbour seals is caught annually far from any of these locations, indicating that other groups might live unnoticed. Catch statistics provide the best evidence of the presence and locations of these remnant harbour seals. Therefore efforts were made to validate the recent catch statistics and to describe the catch history for the past 60 years. The catch statistics were also used to estimate plausibleranges of past and present numbers of harbour seals based on the assumption that hunting has caused the observed decline. The total number of harbour seals in Greenland according to these estimates was about 3,000 in 1950 and fewer than 1,000 in 2007. The number of harbour seals caught in the southernmost part of Greenland has, unlike in the rest of Greenland, increased significantly in some of the recent years. This change seems to be related to changes in the amount of drift ice. Drift ice reduces the frequency of contact between hunters and harbour seals in South Greenland and above normal quantities of drift ice from the mid 1960s to the mid 1980s probably allowed these seals to increase in numbers. Record low inflow of drift ice in some of the recent years, however, has resulted in record high catches, which likely have reduced the seals again. The remaining harbour seals in Greenland are few and without protection these sealsare potentially in danger of extinction.

Depositional evolution of the Melville Bay trough-mouth fan, NW Greenland

Science.gov (United States)

Knutz, Paul; Gregersen, Ulrik

2015-04-01

The continental margin of NW Greenland bordering northern Baffin Bay is characterized by major sediment accumulations, known as Trough-Mouth Fans (TMF). The fan depocentres represent intense sediment dispersal at the terminus of ice streams that during cold climate periods provided major drainage routes of the northern Greenland Ice Sheet into Baffin Bay. The imprint of paleo-icestreams is seen by erosional troughs crossing a >250 km broad shelf region, which caps a series of sedimentary basins containing thick Mesozoic-Tertiary strata packages. This presentation provides an overview of the seismic stratigraphic division, depositional architecture and examples of seismic facies of the Melville Bay TMF using a 5-10 km grid of industry-quality 2D seismic data (TGS). The focus will primarily be on the inception and early stage of glacial fan development. Comparing the present-day topography with the regional geology shows that the paleo-icestreams exploited the Cenozoic infill of former rift basins that are more conducive to erosion than the adjoining ridges and structural highs. The TMF sequence is constructed by a series of progradational seismic units that represent successive steps in location of ice stream terminus and associated depocenters. The slope fronts of the prograding units show abundant signatures of sediment instability and mass-wasting but evidence of along-slope current-driven processes is also recognized presumably linked to interglacial sea level high-stands. The topset of each unit is characterized by planar erosion that merges landward into hummocky positive geometries with low internal reflectivity. These features are generally interpreted as subglacial landforms, e.g. terminal moraines and ice-contact deposits, associated with grounding zone wedges. Unlike the most recent TMF units deposited in front of the present trough, the oldest glacigenic units have built out from a Neogene sediment prism that forms the core of modern shallow-water banks

Rapid dynamic thinning events during 1985-2010 on Upernavik Isstrøm, West Greenland

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Khan, Shfaqat Abbas; Kjær, Kurt H.; Korsgaard, Niels Jákup

Many glaciers along the southeast and northwest coast of Greenland have accelerated, increasing the ice sheet's contribution to global sea-level rise. Here, we map elevation changes on Upernavik Isstrøm (UI), West Greenland, during 2003-2009 using high-resolution Ice, Cloud and land Elevation...

Mapping ice-bonded permafrost with electrical methods in Sisimiut, West Greenland

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Ingeman-Nielsen, Thomas

2006-01-01

Permafrost delineation and thickness determination is of great importance in engineering related projects in arctic areas. In this paper, 2D geoelectrical measurements are applied and evaluated for permafrost mapping in an area in West Greenland. Multi-electrode resistivity profiles (MEP) have been...... collected and are compared with borehole information. It is shown that the permafrost thickness in this case is grossly overestimated by a factor of two to three. The difference between the inverted 2D resistivity sections and the borehole information is explained by macro-anisotropy due to the presence...... of horizontal ice-lenses in the frozen clay deposits. It is concluded that where the resistivity method perform well for lateral permafrost mapping, great care should be taken in evaluating permafrost thickness based on 2D resistivity profiles alone. Additional information from boreholes or other geophysical...

Ocean tidal loading affecting precise geodetic observations on Greenland: Error account of surface deformations by tidal gravity measurements

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Jentzsch, G.; Knudsen, Per; Ramatschi, M.

2000-01-01

Air-borne and satellite based altimetry are used to monitor the Greenland ice-cap. Since these measurements are related to fiducial sites at the coast, the robustness of the height differences depends on the stability of these reference points. To benefit from the accuracy of these methods...... on the centimeter level, station corrections regarding the Earth tides and the ocean tidal loading have to be applied. Models for global corrections esp. for the body tides are available and sufficient, but local corrections regarding the effect of the adjacent shelf area still have to be inferred from additional...... observations. Near the coast ocean tidal loading causes additional vertical deformations in the order of 1 to 10 cm Therefore, tidal gravity measurements were carried out at four fiducial sites around Greenland in order to provide corrections for the kinematic part of the coordinates of these sites. Starting...

Improved regional sea-level estimates from Ice Sheets, Glaciers and land water storage using GRACE time series and other data

Science.gov (United States)

He, Z.; Velicogna, I.; Hsu, C. W.; Rignot, E. J.; Mouginot, J.; Scheuchl, B.; Fettweis, X.; van den Broeke, M. R.

2017-12-01

Changes in ice sheets, glaciers and ice caps (GIC) and land water mass cause regional sea level variations that differ significantly from a uniform re-distribution of mass over the ocean, with a decrease in sea level compared to the global mean sea level contribution (GMSL) near the sources of mass added to the ocean and an increase up to 30% larger than the GMSL in the far field. The corresponding sea level fingerprints (SLF) are difficult to separate from ocean dynamics on short time and spatial scales but as ice melt continues, the SLF signal will become increasingly dominant in the pattern of regional sea level rise. It has been anticipated that it will be another few decades before the land ice SLF could be identified in the pattern of regional sea level rise. Here, we combine 40 years of observations of ice sheet mass balance for Antarctica (1975-present) and Greenland (1978-present), along with surface mass balance reconstructions of glacier and ice caps mass balance (GIC) from 1970s to present to determine the contribution to the SLF from melting land ice (MAR and RACMO). We compare the results with observations from GRACE for the time period 2002 to present for evaluation of our approach. Land hydrology is constrained by GRACE data for the period 2002-present and by the GLDAS-NOAH land hydrology model for the longer time period. Over the long time period, we find that the contribution from land ice dominates. We quantify the contribution to the total SLF from Greenland and Antarctica in various parts of the world over the past 40 years. More important, we compare the cumulative signal from SLF with tide gauge records around the world, corrected for earth dynamics, to determine whether the land ice SLF can be detected in that record. Early results will be reported at the meeting. This work was performed at UC Irvine and at Caltech's Jet Propulsion Laboratory under a contract with NASA's Cryospheric Science Program.