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2 Polar MM5 regional climate model runs, calibrated by independent in-situ observations, demonstrate coherent regional patterns of Greenland ice sheet surface mass balance (SMB) change over a 17-year period characterized by warming (1988-2004). Both accumulation and melt rates increased, partly coun...
| Main Authors: | , , , , , , , , |
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| Other Authors: | |
| Format: | Text |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
2005
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.666.4021 http://polarmet.osu.edu/jbox/pubs/Box_et_al_2005_J_Climate.pdf |
| Summary: | 2 Polar MM5 regional climate model runs, calibrated by independent in-situ observations, demonstrate coherent regional patterns of Greenland ice sheet surface mass balance (SMB) change over a 17-year period characterized by warming (1988-2004). Both accumulation and melt rates increased, partly counteracting each other for an overall negligible SMB trend. However, a 30 % increase in melt water runoff over this period suggests the overall ice sheet mass balance has been increasingly negative, given observed melt water-induced flow acceleration. SMB temporal variability of the whole ice sheet is best represented by ablation zone variability, suggesting that increased melting dominates over increased accumulation in a warming scenario. The melt season grew in duration over nearly the entire ablation zone by up to 40 days, 10 days on average. Accumulation area ratio decreased by 3%. Albedo reductions are apparent in 5 years of MODIS-derived data (2000-2004). AVHRR-derived albedo changes (1988-1999) were less consistent spatially. A conservative assumption as to glacier discharge |
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