Mass balance of the Amitsulôq ice cap, West Greenland

We present detailed mass balance measurements from the Amitsulôq ice cap in West Greenland spanning from 1982 to 1990. The data includes summer and winter balances from 26 stake locations distributed over five transects covering the whole ice cap. The mass balance measurements are combined with a re...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Ahlstrøm, Andreas P., Bøggild, Carl Egede, Olesen, Ole B., Petersen, Dorthe, Mohr, Johan Jacob
Format: Other Non-Article Part of Journal/Newspaper
Language:English
Published: 2007
Subjects:
Online Access:https://orbit.dtu.dk/en/publications/28e75c9f-6a6f-451e-b284-9260971a0fbb
Description
Summary:We present detailed mass balance measurements from the Amitsulôq ice cap in West Greenland spanning from 1982 to 1990. The data includes summer and winter balances from 26 stake locations distributed over five transects covering the whole ice cap. The mass balance measurements are combined with a recent satellite-derived digital elevation model to calculate the specific balance, which is in turn compared to discharge data from the adjacent Tasersiaq basin. The correlation between specific summer balance and discharge is R2 = 0.93 indicating that the basin discharge is dominated by glacial meltwater, linking the hydropower potential of the basin closely to the fate of the adjoining Greenland ice-sheet margin.