The daytime
glacier surface temperature typically has to be greater than the air temperature in order to close the energy budget; in consequence, melting can occur even when the air temperature remains below freezing.
Not exact matches
The analysis is based on the fact that as the world warmed following the coldest part of the last ice age 20,000 years ago, the ice deep inside the Antarctic
glaciers warmed more slowly than Earth's
surface, just as a frozen turkey put into a hot oven will still be cold inside even after the
surface has reached oven
temperature.
Rising summer air
temperatures are driving the
glacier toward the ocean, leaving its
surface heavily crevassed.
That's because the IPCC models only take into account
temperature changes at the
surface of
glaciers, but not the rapid melting that occurs when
glaciers calve and break up into the ocean, Rignot said.
Consistent with observed changes in
surface temperature, there has been an almost worldwide reduction in
glacier and small ice cap (not including Antarctica and Greenland) mass and extent in the 20th century; snow cover has decreased in many regions of the Northern Hemisphere; sea ice extents have decreased in the Arctic, particularly in spring and summer (Chapter 4); the oceans are warming; and sea level is rising (Chapter 5).
The research published in Nature Communications found that in the past, when ocean
temperatures around Antarctica became more layered - with a warm layer of water below a cold
surface layer - ice sheets and
glaciers melted much faster than when the cool and warm layers mixed more easily.
Thousands of studies conducted by researchers around the world have documented changes in
surface, atmospheric, and oceanic
temperatures; melting
glaciers; diminishing snow cover; shrinking sea ice; rising sea levels; ocean acidification; and increasing atmospheric water vapor.
This bundle contains 11 ready - to - use Ice Age Worksheets that are perfect for students who want to learn more about An ice age which is a period of long - term reduction in the
temperature of Earth's
surface and atmosphere, resulting in the presence or expansion of continental and polar ice sheets and alpine
glaciers.
The physical processes by which energy might be added into the
glacier material include: (A) convection between the
glacier surfaces and local surrounding atmosphere and water, (B) direct radiation onto the exposed
surfaces of the material, (C) addition of material that is at a
temperature higher than the melting
temperature onto the top of the
glacier (rain, say), (D) Sublimation of the ice directly into the atmosphere, and (E) conduction into the material from the contact areas between the
glacier and surrounding solid material.
would a plausible physical explanation be that the deep ocean and ice sheets are still responding somewhat to the post-glacial
temperature increase (eg, T - T0, 0 > 0), but that the faster components of SLR like the
surface oceans and
glaciers were actually responding to the decrease in
temperature since the early Holocene?
Naturally, one can do better with measurements of subsurface ocean
temperatures and
glacier volume (which affects latent heat content of the Earth), but the
surface temperature does pretty well for a start.
Detailed studies of the energy balance and ablation of the Zongo and Chacaltaya
glaciers support the importance of air
temperature increase, and identify the increase in downward infrared radiation as the main way that the effect of the warmer air is communicated to the
glacier surface [Wagnon et al. 1999; Francou et al, 2003].
Notably, the quote «Mölg and Hardy (2004) show that mass loss on the summit horizontal
glacier surfaces is mainly due to sublimation (i.e. turbulent latent heat flux) and is little affected by air
temperature through the turbulent sensible heat flux.»
That would also imply that (T - T0 (t)-RRB- must be negative during the pre-900 period when SLR = 0... would a plausible physical explanation be that the deep ocean and ice sheets are still responding somewhat to the post-glacial
temperature increase (eg, T - T0, 0 > 0), but that the faster components of SLR like the
surface oceans and
glaciers were actually responding to the decrease in
temperature since the early Holocene?
Though air
temperature has so far remained below freezing, melting has begun to occur, and the
glacier is suffering net ablation over its entire
surface.
However, changes in the distribution of snowfall through the year, conceivably linked to increases in sea
surface temperature, may have reduced the reflectivity of the
glacier and played an even bigger role in forcing the retreat than changes in air
temperature alone.
The story goes — warmer
temperatures, more
surface melting, more meltwater draining through moulins to
glacier base, lubricating
glacier bed, reducing friction, increasing velocity, and finally raising sea level.
Given all the independent lines of evidence pointing to average
surface warming over the last few decades (satellite measurements, ocean
temperatures, sea - level rise, retreating
glaciers, phenological changes, shifts in the ranges of
temperature - sensitive species), it is highly implausible that it would lead to more than very minor refinements to the current overall picture.
Climate models, on the other hand, have a successful track record — look at the melting Arctic, warming around Antarctica, the
surface temperature, the water feedback effect, the reduction in mountain
glaciers... etc..
We quantify sea - level commitment in the baseline case by building on Levermann et al. (10), who used physical simulations to model the SLR within a 2,000 - y envelope as the sum of the contributions of (i) ocean thermal expansion, based on six coupled climate models; (ii) mountain
glacier and ice cap melting, based on
surface mass balance and simplified ice dynamic models; (iii) Greenland ice sheet decay, based on a coupled regional climate model and ice sheet dynamic model; and (iv) Antarctic ice sheet decay, based on a continental - scale model parameterizing grounding line ice flux in relation to
temperature.
That can increase the sea
surface temperature and the air
temperature, leading to more rapid melting and thinning at the
glacier terminus.
The 2009 State of the Climate Report of the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) tells us that climate change is real because of rising
surface air
temperatures since 1880 over land and the ocean, ocean acidification, sea level rise,
glaciers melting, rising specific humidity, ocean heat content increasing, sea ice retreating,
glaciers diminishing, Northern Hemisphere snow cover decreasing, and so many other lines of evidence.
This can be affected by warming
temperatures, but also by changes in snowfall, increases in solar radiation absorption due to a decrease in cloud cover, and increases in the water vapor content of air near the earth's
surface.2, 14,15,16,17 In Cordillera Blanca, Peru, for example, one study of
glacier retreat between 1930 and 1950 linked the retreat to a decline in cloud cover and precipitation.18
More Scientific Evidence For CO2's Dubious Climate Impact Emerges Image Source: Robertson and Chilingar, 2017 According to the most basic precepts of anthropogenic global warming (AGW), variations in CO2 concentrations exert significant control on sea
surface temperatures,
glaciers, sea levels, and generalized climate dynamics (i.e., precipitation patterns).
Combine the satellite trend with the
surface observations and the umpteen non-
temperature based records that reflect
temperature change (from
glaciers to phenology to lake freeze dates to snow - cover extent in spring & fall to sea level rise to stratospheric temps) and the evidence for recent gradual warming is, well, unequivocal.
We conclude by underlining that the observed variation of
glacier surface and SLA changes could be explained by the increase of
temperature and decrease of precipitation in recent years.
This conclusion has subsequently been supported by an array of evidence that includes both additional large - scale
surface temperature reconstructions and pronounced changes in a variety of local proxy indicators, such as melting on icecaps and the retreat of
glaciers around the world, which in many cases appear to be unprecedented during at least the last 2000 years.
I'm very convinced that the physical process of global warming is continuing, which appears as a statistically significant increase of the global
surface and tropospheric
temperature anomaly over a time scale of about 20 years and longer and also as trends in other climate variables (e.g., global ocean heat content increase, Arctic and Antarctic ice decrease, mountain
glacier decrease on average and others), and I don't see any scientific evidence according to which this trend has been broken, recently.
In fact, we have multiple independent lines of evidence for warming, ranging from several different
temperature records (land, sea
surface, deep sea, atmosphere at different levels, several kinds of satellite,
glaciers, biologic responses...), all congruent.
6 Ice age — time in the past when continental
glaciers covered large parts of Earth's
surface Global warming — a gradual increase in the
temperature of Earth's atmosphere Greenhouse gas — Gases in the atmosphere, such as carbon dioxide, that trap solar energy Ozone hole — a large area of reduced ozone concentration in the stratosphere, found over Antarctica Chlorofluorocarbon — chlorine compounds that are the main cause of ozone depletion KEY TERMS
The evidence comes from direct measurements of rising
surface air
temperatures and subsurface ocean
temperatures and, indirectly, from increases in average global sea levels, retreating
glaciers, and changes in many physical and biological systems.
To say nothing of the warming trends also noticed in, for example: * ocean heat content * wasting
glaciers * Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheet mass loss * sea level rise due to all of the above * sea
surface temperatures * borehole
temperatures * troposphere warming (with stratosphere cooling) * Arctic sea ice reductions in volume and extent * permafrost thawing * ecosystem shifts involving plants, animals and insects
Greenland
glaciers fall into at least 4 common types, each with its own unique sensitivity to sea
surface temperature,
surface melting, meltwater lubrication, calving changes, etc..
Thousands of studies conducted by researchers around the world have documented changes in
surface, atmospheric, and oceanic
temperatures; melting
glaciers; diminishing snow cover; shrinking sea ice; rising sea levels; ocean acidification; and increasing atmospheric water vapor.
Record droughts in many areas of the world, the loss of arctic sea ice — what you see is an increasing trend that is superimposed on annual variablity (no bets on what happens next year, but the five - to - ten year average in global
temperatures, sea
surface temperatures, ocean heat content — those will increase — and ice sheet volumes, tropical
glacier volumes, sea ice extent will decrease.
Global, cyclic, decadal, climate patterns can be traced over the past millennium in
glacier fluctuations, oxygen isotope ratios in ice cores, sea
surface temperatures, and historic observations.
Even if the
temperature of the boundary layer were equal to the
temperature of the
glacier surface, sublimation could be sustained if (as is typically the case) the relative humidity of the boundary layer were less than 100 %.
These methods include inference of
surface temperature change from vertical
temperature profiles in the ground (bore holes) at many sites around the world, rate of
glacier retreat at many locations, and studies by several groups of the effect of urban and other local human influences on the global
temperature record.
Arctic sea ice, Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets, global
glacier mass, permafrost area, and Northern Hemisphere snow cover are all decreasing substantially, while ocean
surface temperatures, sea level, and ocean acidification are rising [36].