PNAS, September 14 Extensive open fractures have developed in the ice shelves of the Pine Island and Thwaites glaciers in the West Antarctic Ice Sheet, potentially priming them for future collapse. No such crevasses existed at the beginning of satellite records in 1997, with rapidly growing crevasse-damaged areas by 2019, accelerating since 2016. These damaged […]
自然气候变化，9月14日。 北极正面临着从以冰冻圈为主的系统快速转变的高风险，促使研究人员敦促各国政府紧急减少温室气体排放，以避免失去其对全球气候系统的稳定作用。在当前高排放情景下，使用新的CMIP5 […]
Journal of Geophysical Research, July 11 On the other side of the Arctic, an earlier study this summer found that winter storms and warm near‐surface Atlantic water appear directly responsible for winter sea ice loss in the Whalers Bay area north of Svalbard. The amount of heat transported from the Atlantic Ocean, and storm frequency both […]
Science Advances, September 2 Summer sea ice minimums receive the most attention; but Arctic sea ice has been declining year-round, and new reconstructions place the 2018 winter maximum in the Bering Sea as the lowest in at least 5500 years. The 2018 and 2019 maximums were also 60-70% lower than the averages recorded since consistent […]
Journal of Glaciology, August 26 Up to 85% of the glaciers found in the Koshi River Basin could disappear by 2100 under the highest emission scenarios (RCP8.5). The Koshi River, a major tributary of the Ganges has a 50,000 km2 basin (the size of Costa Rica). Over 5% is covered by glaciers, and spreads across India, Nepal, […]
在索尔兹冰川（Thwaites Glacier）的冰舌下方收集到的新地图以及更远海域的地图显示，存在着深 (> 1000 米) 且宽 (> 20,000 米) 的海沟，这些海沟引导着温暖的洋水流进入冰层之下，加速了融化，最终可能导致其崩塌。索尔兹冰川是西南极冰盖（WAIS）的一部分，面积相当于英国大小，[…]
Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service, September 3 Arctic fire emissions – those directly caused by humans, as well as those from natural phenomena such as lightning strikes – already are one-third higher than the 2019 total, which itself broke the previous record. The CO2 released from these fires through the end of August totalled around 244 […]
Nature, August 26 Antarctic ice shelves – floating ice in contact with land ice – are both critical to maintaining ice sheet stability, and vulnerable to catastrophic fracturing from meltwater entering crevasses. Hydro-fracturing occurs when surface meltwater flows into and deepens pre-existing fractures, and is a potential mechanism driving sudden ice shelf collapse, as occurred with […]
冰冻圈，8月28日北冰洋部分地区的降雨事件在最近的几十年里几乎提前了4-6天，加速了北冰洋太平洋区域和西伯利亚以上欧亚边缘海的冰融化。这项研究结合了北极海岸有限的实地观测[...]
Nature Climate Change, August 31 The global volume of glacier lakes increased 48% between 1990 and 2018, to 156.5 km3, a volume that would cover the country of Liechtenstein by a lake 1 km deep. Glacial lakes are bodies of water fed by a glacier’s meltwater, and subject to sudden outburst events that unexpectedly can […]
Nature Climate Change, August 31 The Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets have increased global sea level by 12.3 mm from 2007 and 2017, matching the most pessimistic predictions of the IPCC’s most recent assessment report (AR5). In particular, this study indicated that current models underestimate the contribution of ice sheet surface melt. The comparison […]
The Cryosphere Discussion/Review, August 14 A paper placed in open review notes that the cryosphere globally has lost a total of 28 trillion tonnes of ice (28,000 Gt) in the past 23 years, with a significant acceleration of mass loss since the year 2000. The largest losses have occurred to (in approximate order) Arctic sea […]
Nature, August 19 For the first time, researchers have been able to close the “sea-level budget” (relative sources of sea-level rise), gaining new insights on the drivers of observed global mean sea-level rise over the past century. By re-examining the contributions of glaciers, ice sheets, thermal expansion, and land water storage, this study was able […]
Nature Communications, August 24 The floating Shirase Ice Tongue (a long and narrow projection of ice, connected an ice basin about the size of the United Kingdom) in Queen Maud Land, East Antarctica, has revealed surprisingly high basal melt rates of 7 to 16 m per year. These rates equal or surpass the melting rate underneath […]
Nature, August 20 The Greenland Ice Sheet lost a record-breaking 532 (± 58 Gt) of ice in 2019, up around 200 Gt in the early 2000s, when it first became clear that the ice sheet was losing mass. The two GRACE satellite missions also provided new insights on the sensitivity of the Greenland Ice Sheet to climate-related changes in […]