Surface elevation change on ice caps in the Qaanaaq region, northwestern Greenland

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• 作者：Jun Saito^a ; ^b ; ^{j.saito1102@gmail.com" class="auth_mail" title="E-mail the corresponding author} ; Shin Sugiyama^a ; Shun Tsutaki^a ; ^c ; Takanobu Sawagaki^d
• 关键词：Greenland ; Ice caps ; Surface elevation change ; Albedo
• 刊名：Polar Science
• 出版年：2016
• 出版时间：September 2016
• 年：2016
• 卷：10
• 期：3
• 页码：239-248
• 全文大小：2959 K

文摘

A large number of glaciers and ice caps (GICs) are distributed along the Greenland coast, physically separated from the ice sheet. The total area of these GICs accounts for 5% of Greenland’s ice cover. Melt water input from the GICs to the ocean substantially contributed to sea-level rise over the last century. Here, we report surface elevation changes of six ice caps near Qaanaaq (77°28′N, 69°13′W) in northwestern Greenland based on photogrammetric analysis of stereo pair satellite images. We processed the images with a digital map plotting instrument to generate digital elevation models (DEMs) in 2006 and 2010 with a grid resolution of 500 m. Generated DEMs were compared to measure surface elevation changes between 2006 and 2010. Over the study area of the six ice caps, covering 1215 km², the mean rate of elevation change was −1.1 ± 0.1 m a⁻¹. This rate is significantly greater than that previously reported for the 2003–2008 period (−0.6 ± 0.1 m a⁻¹) for GICs all of northwestern Greenland. This increased mass loss is consistent with the rise in summer temperatures in this region at a rate of 0.12 °C a⁻¹ for the 1997–2013 period.