Twenty-first century ocean forcing of the Greenland ice sheet for modelling of sea level contribution
Changes in ocean temperature and salinity are expected to be an important determinant of the Greenland ice sheet's future sea level contribution. Yet, simulating the impact of these changes in continental-scale ice sheet models remains challenging due to the small scale of key physics, such as...
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ftdoajarticles:oai:doaj.org/article:df61d51e62c44aa6b45265180a0d75a5 2023-05-15T16:21:08+02:00 Twenty-first century ocean forcing of the Greenland ice sheet for modelling of sea level contribution D. A. Slater D. Felikson F. Straneo H. Goelzer C. M. Little M. Morlighem X. Fettweis S. Nowicki 2020-03-01T00:00:00Z https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-14-985-2020 https://doaj.org/article/df61d51e62c44aa6b45265180a0d75a5 EN eng Copernicus Publications https://www.the-cryosphere.net/14/985/2020/tc-14-985-2020.pdf https://doaj.org/toc/1994-0416 https://doaj.org/toc/1994-0424 doi:10.5194/tc-14-985-2020 1994-0416 1994-0424 https://doaj.org/article/df61d51e62c44aa6b45265180a0d75a5 The Cryosphere, Vol 14, Pp 985-1008 (2020) Environmental sciences GE1-350 Geology QE1-996.5 article 2020 ftdoajarticles https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-14-985-2020 2022-12-31T01:21:02Z Changes in ocean temperature and salinity are expected to be an important determinant of the Greenland ice sheet's future sea level contribution. Yet, simulating the impact of these changes in continental-scale ice sheet models remains challenging due to the small scale of key physics, such as fjord circulation and plume dynamics, and poor understanding of critical processes, such as calving and submarine melting. Here we present the ocean forcing strategy for Greenland ice sheet models taking part in the Ice Sheet Model Intercomparison Project for CMIP6 (ISMIP6), the primary community effort to provide 21st century sea level projections for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Sixth Assessment Report. Beginning from global atmosphere–ocean general circulation models, we describe two complementary approaches to provide ocean boundary conditions for Greenland ice sheet models, termed the “retreat” and “submarine melt” implementations. The retreat implementation parameterises glacier retreat as a function of projected subglacial discharge and ocean thermal forcing, is designed to be implementable by all ice sheet models and results in retreat of around 1 and 15 km by 2100 in RCP2.6 and 8.5 scenarios, respectively. The submarine melt implementation provides estimated submarine melting only, leaving the ice sheet model to solve for the resulting calving and glacier retreat and suggests submarine melt rates will change little under RCP2.6 but will approximately triple by 2100 under RCP8.5. Both implementations have necessarily made use of simplifying assumptions and poorly constrained parameterisations and, as such, further research on submarine melting, calving and fjord–shelf exchange should remain a priority. Nevertheless, the presented framework will allow an ensemble of Greenland ice sheet models to be systematically and consistently forced by the ocean for the first time and should result in a significant improvement in projections of the Greenland ice sheet's contribution to future sea level change. Article in Journal/Newspaper glacier Greenland Ice Sheet The Cryosphere Directory of Open Access Journals: DOAJ Articles Greenland The Cryosphere 14 3 985 1008 |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
Directory of Open Access Journals: DOAJ Articles |
op_collection_id |
ftdoajarticles |
language |
English |
topic |
Environmental sciences GE1-350 Geology QE1-996.5 |
spellingShingle |
Environmental sciences GE1-350 Geology QE1-996.5 D. A. Slater D. Felikson F. Straneo H. Goelzer C. M. Little M. Morlighem X. Fettweis S. Nowicki Twenty-first century ocean forcing of the Greenland ice sheet for modelling of sea level contribution |
topic_facet |
Environmental sciences GE1-350 Geology QE1-996.5 |
description |
Changes in ocean temperature and salinity are expected to be an important determinant of the Greenland ice sheet's future sea level contribution. Yet, simulating the impact of these changes in continental-scale ice sheet models remains challenging due to the small scale of key physics, such as fjord circulation and plume dynamics, and poor understanding of critical processes, such as calving and submarine melting. Here we present the ocean forcing strategy for Greenland ice sheet models taking part in the Ice Sheet Model Intercomparison Project for CMIP6 (ISMIP6), the primary community effort to provide 21st century sea level projections for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Sixth Assessment Report. Beginning from global atmosphere–ocean general circulation models, we describe two complementary approaches to provide ocean boundary conditions for Greenland ice sheet models, termed the “retreat” and “submarine melt” implementations. The retreat implementation parameterises glacier retreat as a function of projected subglacial discharge and ocean thermal forcing, is designed to be implementable by all ice sheet models and results in retreat of around 1 and 15 km by 2100 in RCP2.6 and 8.5 scenarios, respectively. The submarine melt implementation provides estimated submarine melting only, leaving the ice sheet model to solve for the resulting calving and glacier retreat and suggests submarine melt rates will change little under RCP2.6 but will approximately triple by 2100 under RCP8.5. Both implementations have necessarily made use of simplifying assumptions and poorly constrained parameterisations and, as such, further research on submarine melting, calving and fjord–shelf exchange should remain a priority. Nevertheless, the presented framework will allow an ensemble of Greenland ice sheet models to be systematically and consistently forced by the ocean for the first time and should result in a significant improvement in projections of the Greenland ice sheet's contribution to future sea level change. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
D. A. Slater D. Felikson F. Straneo H. Goelzer C. M. Little M. Morlighem X. Fettweis S. Nowicki |
author_facet |
D. A. Slater D. Felikson F. Straneo H. Goelzer C. M. Little M. Morlighem X. Fettweis S. Nowicki |
author_sort |
D. A. Slater |
title |
Twenty-first century ocean forcing of the Greenland ice sheet for modelling of sea level contribution |
title_short |
Twenty-first century ocean forcing of the Greenland ice sheet for modelling of sea level contribution |
title_full |
Twenty-first century ocean forcing of the Greenland ice sheet for modelling of sea level contribution |
title_fullStr |
Twenty-first century ocean forcing of the Greenland ice sheet for modelling of sea level contribution |
title_full_unstemmed |
Twenty-first century ocean forcing of the Greenland ice sheet for modelling of sea level contribution |
title_sort |
twenty-first century ocean forcing of the greenland ice sheet for modelling of sea level contribution |
publisher |
Copernicus Publications |
publishDate |
2020 |
url |
https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-14-985-2020 https://doaj.org/article/df61d51e62c44aa6b45265180a0d75a5 |
geographic |
Greenland |
geographic_facet |
Greenland |
genre |
glacier Greenland Ice Sheet The Cryosphere |
genre_facet |
glacier Greenland Ice Sheet The Cryosphere |
op_source |
The Cryosphere, Vol 14, Pp 985-1008 (2020) |
op_relation |
https://www.the-cryosphere.net/14/985/2020/tc-14-985-2020.pdf https://doaj.org/toc/1994-0416 https://doaj.org/toc/1994-0424 doi:10.5194/tc-14-985-2020 1994-0416 1994-0424 https://doaj.org/article/df61d51e62c44aa6b45265180a0d75a5 |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-14-985-2020 |
container_title |
The Cryosphere |
container_volume |
14 |
container_issue |
3 |
container_start_page |
985 |
op_container_end_page |
1008 |
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1766009150510202880 |