Author’s corresponding address:

• Main Authors: Jason E. Box, David H. Bromwich, Bruce A. Veenhuis, Le-sheng Bai, Julienne C, Jeffrey C. Rogers, Konrad Steffen, T. Haran, Sheng-hung Wang
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: 2005
• Subjects: Greenland; glacier; Ice Sheet
• 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

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