Occurrence of IRD in ODP Hole 151-909C

• Main Authors: Smith, Yvonne M, Hill, Daniel J, Dolan, Aisling M, Haywood, Alan M, Dowsett, Harry J, Risebrobakken, Bjørg
• Format: Dataset
• Language: English
• Published: PANGAEA 2017
• Subjects: 151-909C; AGE; Counting >150 µm fraction; DEPTH; sediment/rock; DRILL; Drilling/drill rig; DSDP/ODP/IODP sample designation; Ice rafted debris; Joides Resolution; Leg151; North Greenland Sea; Sample code/label; Arctic; Svalbard; Greenland; Norway; arctic cryosphere; Greenland Sea; Iceberg*; Nordic Seas; North Atlantic; North Greenland
• Online Access: https://doi.pangaea.de/10.1594/PANGAEA.884332; https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.884332

The Arctic cryosphere is changing and making significant contributions to 21st century sea level rise. The Pliocene epoch had similar CO2 levels to present and a warming comparable to model predictions for the end of this century, providing an opportunity to investigate the operation of Arctic climate in a warm world. The Late Pliocene has well documented climatic conditions. However, the state of the Arctic cryosphere remains partially constrained. Here, for the first time, we couple outputs from a Pliocene climate model with a thermodynamic iceberg model to simulate likely source regions for Ice Rafted Debris (IRD) found in the Nordic Seas from Marine Isotope Stage M2 to the mid Pliocene Warm Period (mPWP). We compare the fraction of melt given by the model scenarios with IRD data from four Ocean Drilling Program (ODP) sites within the Nordic Seas region. Marine sites 911A, 909C and 907A show a persistent occurrence of IRD that modeling results suggest is consistent with permanent ice on Svalbard. Our model results indicate that icebergs sourced from the east coast of Greenland do not reach the Nordic Seas sites during the warm late Pliocene, but instead travel south into the North Atlantic. Small amounts of IRD are found at Hole 642B in the Late Pliocene. Model results identify coastal Norway as the potential source, however this is inconsistent with current understanding of the Late Pliocene Scandinavian climate.