The Energy and Mass Balance of Peruvian Glaciers
Peruvian glaciers are important contributors to dry season runoff for agriculture and hydropower, but they are at risk of disappearing due to climate change. We applied a physically based, energy balance melt model at five on-glacier sites within the Peruvian Cordilleras Blanca and Vilcanota. Net sh...
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American Geophysical Union
2021
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ftethz:oai:www.research-collection.ethz.ch:20.500.11850/520868 2023-05-15T16:38:11+02:00 The Energy and Mass Balance of Peruvian Glaciers Fyffe, Catriona L. Potter, Emily Fugger, Stefan Orr, Andrew Fatichi, Simone Medina, Katy Hellström, Robert Å. Bernat, Maud Aubry-Wake, Caroline Gurgiser, Wolfgang Baker Perry, Lester Suarez, Wilson Quincey, Duncan J. Pellicciotti, Francesca 2021-12-16 application/application/pdf https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11850/520868 https://doi.org/10.3929/ethz-b-000520868 en eng American Geophysical Union info:eu-repo/semantics/altIdentifier/doi/10.1029/2021JD034911 info:eu-repo/semantics/altIdentifier/wos/000729996000008 http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11850/520868 doi:10.3929/ethz-b-000520868 info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International CC-BY Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, 126 (23) energy balance Peruvian glaciers mass balance climate change Cordillera Blanca Cordillera Vilcanota info:eu-repo/semantics/article info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion 2021 ftethz https://doi.org/20.500.11850/520868 https://doi.org/10.3929/ethz-b-000520868 https://doi.org/10.1029/2021JD034911 2022-04-25T14:42:23Z Peruvian glaciers are important contributors to dry season runoff for agriculture and hydropower, but they are at risk of disappearing due to climate change. We applied a physically based, energy balance melt model at five on-glacier sites within the Peruvian Cordilleras Blanca and Vilcanota. Net shortwave radiation dominates the energy balance, and despite this flux being higher in the dry season, melt rates are lower due to losses from net longwave radiation and the latent heat flux. The sensible heat flux is a relatively small contributor to melt energy. At three of the sites the wet season snowpack was discontinuous, forming and melting within a daily to weekly timescale, and resulting in highly variable melt rates closely related to precipitation dynamics. Cold air temperatures due to a strong La Niña year at Shallap Glacier (Cordillera Blanca) resulted in a continuous wet season snowpack, significantly reducing wet season ablation. Sublimation was most important at the highest site in the accumulation zone of the Quelccaya Ice Cap (Cordillera Vilcanota), accounting for 81% of ablation, compared to 2%–4% for the other sites. Air temperature and precipitation inputs were perturbed to investigate the climate sensitivity of the five glaciers. At the lower sites warmer air temperatures resulted in a switch from snowfall to rain, so that ablation was increased via the decrease in albedo and increase in net shortwave radiation. At the top of Quelccaya Ice Cap warming caused melting to replace sublimation so that ablation increased nonlinearly with air temperature. ISSN:0148-0227 ISSN:2169-897X Article in Journal/Newspaper Ice cap ETH Zürich Research Collection |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
ETH Zürich Research Collection |
op_collection_id |
ftethz |
language |
English |
topic |
energy balance Peruvian glaciers mass balance climate change Cordillera Blanca Cordillera Vilcanota |
spellingShingle |
energy balance Peruvian glaciers mass balance climate change Cordillera Blanca Cordillera Vilcanota Fyffe, Catriona L. Potter, Emily Fugger, Stefan Orr, Andrew Fatichi, Simone Medina, Katy Hellström, Robert Å. Bernat, Maud Aubry-Wake, Caroline Gurgiser, Wolfgang Baker Perry, Lester Suarez, Wilson Quincey, Duncan J. Pellicciotti, Francesca The Energy and Mass Balance of Peruvian Glaciers |
topic_facet |
energy balance Peruvian glaciers mass balance climate change Cordillera Blanca Cordillera Vilcanota |
description |
Peruvian glaciers are important contributors to dry season runoff for agriculture and hydropower, but they are at risk of disappearing due to climate change. We applied a physically based, energy balance melt model at five on-glacier sites within the Peruvian Cordilleras Blanca and Vilcanota. Net shortwave radiation dominates the energy balance, and despite this flux being higher in the dry season, melt rates are lower due to losses from net longwave radiation and the latent heat flux. The sensible heat flux is a relatively small contributor to melt energy. At three of the sites the wet season snowpack was discontinuous, forming and melting within a daily to weekly timescale, and resulting in highly variable melt rates closely related to precipitation dynamics. Cold air temperatures due to a strong La Niña year at Shallap Glacier (Cordillera Blanca) resulted in a continuous wet season snowpack, significantly reducing wet season ablation. Sublimation was most important at the highest site in the accumulation zone of the Quelccaya Ice Cap (Cordillera Vilcanota), accounting for 81% of ablation, compared to 2%–4% for the other sites. Air temperature and precipitation inputs were perturbed to investigate the climate sensitivity of the five glaciers. At the lower sites warmer air temperatures resulted in a switch from snowfall to rain, so that ablation was increased via the decrease in albedo and increase in net shortwave radiation. At the top of Quelccaya Ice Cap warming caused melting to replace sublimation so that ablation increased nonlinearly with air temperature. ISSN:0148-0227 ISSN:2169-897X |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Fyffe, Catriona L. Potter, Emily Fugger, Stefan Orr, Andrew Fatichi, Simone Medina, Katy Hellström, Robert Å. Bernat, Maud Aubry-Wake, Caroline Gurgiser, Wolfgang Baker Perry, Lester Suarez, Wilson Quincey, Duncan J. Pellicciotti, Francesca |
author_facet |
Fyffe, Catriona L. Potter, Emily Fugger, Stefan Orr, Andrew Fatichi, Simone Medina, Katy Hellström, Robert Å. Bernat, Maud Aubry-Wake, Caroline Gurgiser, Wolfgang Baker Perry, Lester Suarez, Wilson Quincey, Duncan J. Pellicciotti, Francesca |
author_sort |
Fyffe, Catriona L. |
title |
The Energy and Mass Balance of Peruvian Glaciers |
title_short |
The Energy and Mass Balance of Peruvian Glaciers |
title_full |
The Energy and Mass Balance of Peruvian Glaciers |
title_fullStr |
The Energy and Mass Balance of Peruvian Glaciers |
title_full_unstemmed |
The Energy and Mass Balance of Peruvian Glaciers |
title_sort |
energy and mass balance of peruvian glaciers |
publisher |
American Geophysical Union |
publishDate |
2021 |
url |
https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11850/520868 https://doi.org/10.3929/ethz-b-000520868 |
genre |
Ice cap |
genre_facet |
Ice cap |
op_source |
Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, 126 (23) |
op_relation |
info:eu-repo/semantics/altIdentifier/doi/10.1029/2021JD034911 info:eu-repo/semantics/altIdentifier/wos/000729996000008 http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11850/520868 doi:10.3929/ethz-b-000520868 |
op_rights |
info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International |
op_rightsnorm |
CC-BY |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/20.500.11850/520868 https://doi.org/10.3929/ethz-b-000520868 https://doi.org/10.1029/2021JD034911 |
_version_ |
1766028470316433408 |