Datasets in support of "Limits to future expansion of surface-melt-enhanced ice flow into the interior of western Greenland"

• Main Author: Poinar, Kristin
• Format: Dataset
• Language: English
• Published: 2015
• Subjects: Greenland; Ice Sheet
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/1773/27336

Description of this collection of datasets: Moulins are important conduits for surface meltwater to reach the bed of the Greenland Ice Sheet. It has been proposed that in a warming climate, newly formed moulins associated with the inland migration of supraglacial lakes could introduce surface melt to new regions of the bed, introducing or enhancing sliding there. By examining surface strain rates, we found that the upper limit to where crevasses, and therefore moulins, are likely to form is ~1600 m. This is also roughly the elevation above which lakes do not drain completely. Thus, meltwater above this elevation will largely flow tens of kilometers through surface streams into existing moulins downstream. Furthermore, results from a thermal ice-sheet model indicate that the ~1600-m crevassing limit is below the wet–frozen basal transition (~2000 m). Together, these datasets suggest that new supraglacial lakes will have a limited effect on the inland expansion of melt-induced seasonal acceleration. Description of the files: FrozenOver2000.dbf, FrozenOver2000.shp, FrozenOver2000.shx: Creator(s) of the data: Kristin Poinar --- Title of data: Lakes with floating ice cover in the summer of 2000. --- Date created: May 2014 --- Abstract: Supraglacial lakes with floating ice covers on the western Greenland Ice Sheet were identified using Landsat and Radarsat imagery. These shape files give the locations and approximate boundaries of all such lakes (570) in the year 2000. Description of the files: FrozenOver2010.dbf, FrozenOver2010.shp, FrozenOver2010.shx: Creator(s) of the data: Kristin Poinar --- Title of data: Lakes with floating ice cover in the summer of 2010. --- Date created: May 2014 --- Abstract: Supraglacial lakes with floating ice covers on the western Greenland Ice Sheet were identified using Landsat and Radarsat imagery. These shape files give the locations and approximate boundaries of all such lakes (387) in the year 2010. Description of the files: FrozenOver2013.dbf, FrozenOver2013.shp, ...