Meltwater runoff and glacier mass balance in the high Arctic: 1991–2022 simulations for Svalbard

• Published in: The Cryosphere
• Main Authors: L. S. Schmidt, T. V. Schuler, E. E. Thomas, S. Westermann
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Copernicus Publications 2023
• Subjects: Environmental sciences; GE1-350; Geology; QE1-996.5; Arctic; Svalbard; glacier; The Cryosphere
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-17-2941-2023; https://doaj.org/article/ed1ff3836d4b47c28d35ead45b80d8f3

The Arctic is undergoing increased warming compared to the global mean, which has major implications for freshwater runoff into the oceans from seasonal snow and glaciers. Here, we present high-resolution (2.5 km) simulations of glacier mass balance, runoff, and snow conditions on Svalbard from 1991–2022, one of the fastest warming regions in the world. The simulations are created using the CryoGrid community model forced by Copernicus Arctic Regional ReAnalysis (CARRA) (1991–2021) and AROME-ARCTIC forecasts (2016–2022). Updates to the water percolation and runoff schemes are implemented in the CryoGrid model for the simulations. In situ observations available for Svalbard, including automatic weather station data, stake measurements, and discharge observations, are used to carefully evaluate the quality of the simulations and model forcing. We find a slightly negative climatic mass balance (CMB) over the simulation period of − 0.08 m w . e . yr - 1 <svg:svg xmlns:svg="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="52pt" height="15pt" class="svg-formula" dspmath="mathimg" md5hash="8d84a44e8dceadc876a4f5187e80e616"><svg:image xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink" xlink:href="tc-17-2941-2023-ie00001.svg" width="52pt" height="15pt" src="tc-17-2941-2023-ie00001.png"/></svg:svg> but with no statistically significant trend. The most negative annual CMB is found for Nordenskiöldland ( − 0.73 m w . e . yr - 1 <svg:svg xmlns:svg="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="52pt" height="15pt" class="svg-formula" dspmath="mathimg" md5hash="79c2734b54b21dfe576cdb9add09f447"><svg:image xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink" xlink:href="tc-17-2941-2023-ie00002.svg" width="52pt" height="15pt" src="tc-17-2941-2023-ie00002.png"/></svg:svg> ), with a significant negative trend of − 0.27 m w . e . <svg:svg xmlns:svg="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="32pt" height="8pt" class="svg-formula" dspmath="mathimg" md5hash="53a7260869c21d86416d281790c9f913"><svg:image ...