Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: Recent studies have argued that air temperatures over many mountain glaciers are decoupled from their surroundings, leading to a local cooling which could slow down melting. Here we use a compilation of on-glacier meteorological observations to assess the extent to which this relationship changes under warming. Statistical modelling of the potential temperature decoupling of the world’s mountain glaciers indicates that currently glacier boundary layers warm ~0.83 °C on average for every degree of ambient temperature rise. Future projections under shared socioeconomic pathway (SSP) climate scenarios SSP 2-4.5 and SSP 5-8.5 indicate that decoupling, and thus relative cooling over glaciers, is maximized during the 2020s and 2030s, before widespread glacier retreat acts to recouple above-glacier air temperatures with its surroundings. This nonlinear feedback will lead to an increased sensitivity to warming from midcentury, with glaciers losing their capacity to affect the local climate and cool themselves.
Source: Nature Climate Change
Institutions: Institute of Science and Technology Austria, University of Fribourg, University of Zurich, Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research, University of Alaska Fairbanks, Water Research Institute, National Research Council, Istituto di Scienze Polari, University of Padua, Northumbria University
Language: English
Subfield: Atmospheric Science
Field: Earth and Planetary Sciences
Domain: Physical Sciences
SDG: Climate action
Open Access status: hybrid
Estimated APC paid: $12,690
Awards: G2038056483, G434337789, IST-BRIDGE: International postdoctoral program, G503348230, G5318613220, Understanding snow, glacier and rivers response to climate in High Mountain Asia (ASCENT), Global Air TEMPerature ESTimation on high mountain glaciers, Global Air TEMPerature ESTimation on high mountain glaciers, G7358480839, G7936142223, IST-BRIDGE: International postdoctoral program
OpenAlex ID: W4415024953