Glaciers are widely recognized as key indicators of climate change, and their meltwater plays an important role in hydropower production in Norway. Since the last glacier inventory was compiled in northern Norway in the 1970s, marked fluctuations in glacier length and mass balance have been reported for individual glaciers, and the current overall glacier state is thus not well known. Within the framework of the Global Land Ice Measurements from Space (GLIMS) initiative, we have created a new inventory for 489 glaciers in the Svartisen region, northern Norway, using a Landsat Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus (ETM+) satellite scene from 7 September 1999 and automated multispectral glacier mapping (thresholded band ratios). In addition, visual inspection and correction of the generated glacier outlines has been applied. Adverse snow conditions and uncertain drainage divides made glacier mapping challenging in some regions of the study site. Glacier outlines from 1968, as digitized from a topographic map, were used for a quantitative change assessment for a selection of 300 glaciers. The overall area change of this sample from 1968 to 1999 was close to zero, but with a strongly increasing scatter towards smaller glaciers, large area gains (>50%) for small glaciers (<1 km2), and an unexpected stronger relative area loss towards the wetter coast. The overall size changes are small (<1%) for the three largest ice masses in the study region (Vestisen, Østisen and Blåmannsisen).

We present data on ice texture, salinity, and δ18O obtained from identical sections of ice cores during the Winter Weddell Sea Project 1986 on RV Polarstern from July through August 1986, in the longitude range between 5°W. and 7°E. We find no uniquely definable relationship between δ18O values and ice texture in a particular section. However, most of the snow ice as well as some sections of frazil ice are found to have negative δ18O concentrations. This is due to varying degrees of admixtures of meteoric ice (snow) and sea-water during formation of snow ice. In contrast to common assumptions, our results seem to indicate that a snow cover contributes positively to sea-ice growth rather than slowing down the overall growth rate. Based on a simple model, we have estimated the contributions of meteoric ice (mean of 3 ± 3%) and the combined meteoric ice/sea-water fraction (a minimum of 7 ± 6%) to the total ice thickness for the majority of the sampled floes. Although this is only a moderate contribution to the overall mass balance, in the absence of congelation growth it nevertheless enhances ice growth in general. This hypothesis is independently supported by our snow- and ice-thickness data (Wadhams and others, 1987), which demonstrate that the depression of the snow/ice interface below the water line (i.e. a negative freeboard) and the formation of snow ice is a common occurrence in the Weddell Sea. Therefore, we hypothesize that the major part of the observed apparent increase in ice thickness between our inbound and outbound tracks of WWSP’86 may not be derived from “regular”, thermodynamically driven congelation growth, but rather from the snow-ice component in floes of the Weddell Sea.

Ice-core and snow data from the Amundsen, Bellingshausen and Weddell Seas, Antarctica, show that the formation of superimposed ice and the development of seawater-filled gap layers with high algal standing stocks is typical of the perennial sea ice in summer. The coarse-grained and dense snow had salinities mostly below 0.1‰. A layer of fresh superimposed ice had a mean thickness of 0.04–0.12 m. Gap layers 0.04–0.08 m thick extended downwards from 0.02 to 0.14 m below the water level. These gaps were populated by diatom standing stocks up to 439 μg L−1 chlorophyll a. We propose a comprehensive heuristic model of summer processes, where warming and the reversal of temperature gradients cause major transformations in snow and ice properties. The warming also causes the reopening of incompletely frozen slush layers caused by flood-freeze cycles during winter. Alternatively, superimposed ice forms at the cold interface between snow and slush in the case of flooding with negative freeboard. Combined, these explain the initial formation of gap layers by abiotic means alone. The upward growth of superimposed ice above the water level competes with a steady submergence of floes due to bottom and internal melting and accumulation of snow.

The current generation of continental-scale ice-sheet models cannot successfully reproduce the complex ice/water/sediment interactions of the West Antarctic ice sheet (WAIS) in a physically meaningful manner. The potential of a thin-film-based subglacial water-flow model for incorporation into a continental-scale coupled ice/water flow model of the WAIS is evaluated in this paper. The subglacial water-flow model is applied to the Ross Sea sector of the WAIS, in both a steady-state and time-dependent form, to derive the equilibrium water depth for the present-day configuration. The potential for coupling the model to an ice-flow model is then demonstrated, using a variable sliding parameter that is a function of the subglacial water depth. A coupled ice/water flow model, using the parameterization tested in this paper, could have the potential for reproducing the surface elevation, velocity and thermal regime of the WAIS successfully. These requirements are crucial in modelling the evolution of the WAIS, and must be addressed before reliable continental-scale predictive models can be utilized.

Seasonal and interannual variations in surface elevation at the Greenland summit are modeled using a new temperature-dependent formulation of firn densification and are compared with elevations from European Remote-sensing Satellite (ERS-1/-2) radar altimetry. The rate constant and activation energy, usually set as constants in the Arrhenius-type relation, are strongly temperature-dependent, based on measurements of crystal-growth rates. A multiplicative factor in the densification rate accounts for differences between densification and grain-growth rates and is chosen to match the modeled and measured density profiles from 0 to 40 m. The stronger temperature dependence produces a significant seasonal cycle in the densification rate in the upper firn. Much of the densification and consequent surface lowering occur within 3 months in late spring/early summer, followed by a build-up from accumulation. Modeled elevation changes, using automatic weather station measurements of temperature and accumulation and modeled precipitation, agree well with observations. The respective seasonal amplitudes are 18 and 25 cm peak-to-peak with minima in mid-summer. The minimum elevation in 1995 is driven mainly by a temporary accumulation decrease and secondarily by warmer temperatures. Increased compaction driven by a summer warming trend decreases the modeled elevation (1992–99) by 20 cm, but accumulation increases in latter years dominate the overall 4.2 cm a−1 trend.

The temperature field is derived for a sinusoidally varying surface temperature with varying solar radiation penetration. The growth rates of snow crystals are calculated to explain the rapidly growing layers of faceted crystals (i.e. depth hoar) that form just below the surface at high altitudes and in polar snow. The solutions also show that a layer of wet snow can exist just below the surface even on days when the surface temperature remains sub-freezing.

A network of passages situated along three-grain intersections enables water to percolate through temperate glacier ice. The deformability of the ice allows the passages to expand and contract in response to changes in pressure, and melting of the passage walls by heat generated by viscous dissipation and carried by above-freezing water causes the larger passages gradually to increase in size at the expense of the smaller ones. Thus, the behavior of the passages is primarily the result of three basic characteristics: (1) the capacity of the system continually adjusts, though not instantly, to fluctuations in the supply of melt water; (2) the direction of movement of the water is determined mainly by the ambient pressure in the ice, which in turn is governed primarily by the slope of the ice surface and secondarily by the local topography of the glacier bed; and, most important, (3) the network of passages tends in time to become arborescent, with a superglacial part much like an ordinary river system in a karst region, an englacial part comprised of tree-like systems of passages penetrating the ice from bed to surface, and a subglacial part consisting of tunnels in the ice carrying water and sediment along the glacier bed. These characteristics indicate that a sheet-like basal water layer under a glacier would normally be unstable, the stable form being tunnels; and they explain, among other things, why ice-marginal melt-water streams and lakes are so common, why eskers, which are generally considered to have formed in subglacial passages, trend in the general direction of ice flow with a tendency to follow valley floors and to cross divides at their lowest points, why they are typically discontinuous where they cross ridge crests, why they sometimes contain fragments from bedrock outcrops near the esker but not actually crossed by it, and why they seem to be formed mostly during the later stages of glaciation.

Slope instabilities caused by the disappearance of ice within alpine rock glaciers are an issue of increasing concern. Design of suitable counter-measures requires detailed knowledge of the internal structures of rock glaciers, which can be obtained using geophysical methods. We examine benefits and limitations of diffusive electromagnetics, geoelectrics, seismics and ground-penetrating radar (georadar) for determining the depth and lateral variability of the active layer, the distributions of ice and water, the occurrence of shear horizons and the bedrock topography. In particular, we highlight new developments in data acquisition and data analysis that allow 2-D or even 3-D structures within rock glaciers to be imaged. After describing peculiarities associated with acquiring appropriate geophysical datasets across rock glaciers and emphasizing the importance of state-of-the-art tomographic inversion algorithms, we demonstrate the applicability of 2-D imaging techniques using two case studies of rock glaciers in the eastern Swiss Alps. We present joint interpretations of geoelectric, seismic and georadar data, appropriately constrained by information extracted from boreholes. A key conclusion of our study is that the different geophysical images are largely complementary, with each image resolving a different suite of subsurface features. Based on our results, we propose a general template for the cost-effective and reliable geophysical characterization of mountain permafrost.

Continuous surface debris cover strongly reduces the ablation of glaciers, but high melt rates may occur at ice cliffs that are too steep to hold debris. This study assesses the contribution of ice-cliff backwasting to total ablation of Miage glacier, Mont Blanc massif, Italy, in 2010 and 2011, based on field measurements, physical melt models and mapping of ice cliffs using a high-resolution (1 m) digital elevation model (DEM). Short-term model calculations closely match the measured melt rates. A model sensitivity analysis indicates that the effects of cliff slope and albedo are more important for ablation than enhanced longwave incidence from sun-warmed debris or reduced turbulent fluxes at sheltered cliff bases. Analysis of the DEM indicates that ice cliffs account for at most 1.3% of the 1 m pixels in the glacier’s debris-covered zone, but application of a distributed model indicates that ice cliffs account for ~7.4% of total ablation. We conclude that ice cliffs make an important contribution to the ablation of debris-covered glaciers, even when their spatial extent is very small.

Shallow lakes cover >25% of Alaska’s Arctic Coastal Plain. These remain frozen and snow-covered from October to June. The lake snow is thinner, denser, harder and has less water equivalent than snow on the surrounding tundra. Itcontains less depth hoar than land snow, yet paradoxically is subject to stronger temperature gradients. It also has fewer layers and these have been more strongly affected by wind. Dunes and drifts are better developedon lakes; they have wavelengths of 5–20 m, compared to <5 m on land. Because of these differences, lake snow has roughly half the thermal insulating capacity of land snow. The winter mass balance on lakes is also different because (1) some snow falls into the water before the lakes freeze, (2) some snow accumulates in drifts surrounding the lakes, and (3) prevailing winds lead to increased erosion and thinner snow on the eastern lake sides. Physical models that extrapolate land snow over lakes without appropriate adjustments for depth, density, distribution and thermal properties will under-predict ice thickness and winter heat losses.

The southernmost glaciers in Europe are located on the Iberian, Apennine and Balkan Peninsulas in mid-latitudes between 41° N and 44° N at altitudes ranging from 2000 to 3000 m a.s.l. All these glaciers are a legacy of the Little Ice Age (LIA). They survive in a relatively warm environment (mean annual temperature 0°C to +1°C) due to local topographic controls and high levels of accumulation as a result of avalanche and wind-blown snow. In the Pirin Mountains, Bulgaria, Snezhnika glacieret has been cored, providing an archive of recent climate change. Small glaciers such as this respond quickly to climatic extremes. Since the LIA maximum during the 19th century, all southern European glaciers have retreated, losing 30–100% of their volume. However, despite the trend towards warmer years since the late 1970s, some glaciers still survive, even after some of the hottest summers on record. Predicted future warming, especially in summer, and drier conditions in the Mediterranean basin may result in the disappearance of all glacier features at these latitudes in Europe within the next few decades.

During El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) warm events, outer tropics glaciers usually experience a deficit of precipitation, an increase of air temperature and a strongly negative mass balance. At Glaciar Zongo, Bolivia, this was particularly striking during the vigorous 1997/98 El Niño event, one of the strongest of the century, and which resulted in an annual depth of runoff two-thirds higher than normal. We compare the energy balance on the glacier between two contrasting cycles, 1996/97 (La Niña year) and 1997/98 (El Niño year). Due to a 1.3°C increase of annual mean air temperature, the sensible-heat flux slightly increases from 6.1 to 9.8 W m−2 During the El Niño year, sublimation is reduced, leaving more energy for melting (LE = −18.1 W m−2 in 1996/97 and LE = −11.6 W m−2 in 1997/98). The main factor responsible for the dramatic increase in melting is the net all-wave radiation, which is three times higher in 1997/98 than in 1996/97 (48.7 and 15.8 W m−2, respectively). This sharp increase of net all-wave radiation is related to the decrease of albedo due to the precipitation deficit.

Ice-shelf thickness is an important boundary condition for ice-sheet and sub-ice-shelf cavity modelling. It is required near the grounding line to calculate the ice flux used to determine ice-sheet mass balance by comparison with the upstream accumulation. In this mass budget approach, the accuracy of the ice thickness is one of the limiting factors in the calculation. We present a satellite retrieval of the ice thickness for all Antarctic ice shelves using satellite radar altimeter data from the geodetic phases of the European Remote-sensing Satellite (ERS-1) during 1994–95 supplemented by ICESat data for regions south of the ERS-1 latitudinal limit. Surface elevations derived from these instruments are interpolated on to regular grids using kriging, and converted to ice thicknesses using a modelled firn-density correction. The availability of a new spatial variable firn-density correction significantly reduces the error in ice thickness as this was previously the dominant error source. Comparison to airborne data shows good agreement, particularly when compared to SOAR CASERTZ data on the largest ice shelves. Biases range from −13.0 m for areas where the assumption of hydrostatic equilibrium breaks down, to 53.4 m in regions where marine ice may be present.

We present a technique for in situ measurement of the vertical and spatial stratigraphic distribution of snow optical grain size with a coupled contact illumination probe and field spectroradiometer. Accurate measurements of optical-equivalent grain size are critical for modeling radiative properties of snow such as spectral albedo and microwave emission. Measurements of the spectral reflectance of the snow-pit surface are made at 2 cm intervals in the vertical plane under constant illumination and view geometries. We invert the integral of the continuum normalization of the ice absorption feature with maximum at 1.03 μm wavelength for optical-equivalent grain size using the validated model of Nolin and Dozier (2000) that has accuracy of ±10–50 μm across the grain-size range 50–900 μm. Results are presented for an alpine site in southwest Colorado, USA, across the ablation season and for a Greenland ice-sheet site at the onset of snowmelt. These results suggest that traditional measurements of grain size using a hand lens are nearly accurate only for rounded grains (R2 = 0.41, rmse = 160 μm); for polycrystals and faceted grains the hand-lens approach is very inaccurate (R2 = 0.03 and 0.24, rmse = 1206 and 1010 μm, respectively). We demonstrate an order-of- magnitude improvement in modeling of shortwave spectral albedo and net shortwave flux with contact spectroscopy measurements of grain-size stratigraphy over those from a hand lens.

An experimental programme has been carried out for studying temperate-ice sliding over rock surfaces with a wide range of roughnesses, for normal and shear stresses comparable to those expected under real ice masses. The limiting static shear stress for acceleration has been found to be directly proportional to the normal load giving a constant limiting coefficient of static friction characteristic of the surface. For a constant applied normal stress N and shear stress τb, well below the limiting static shear, a steady velocity Vb results which increases approximately proportionally to τb and decreases with increasing N and the roughness of the surface. For high normal stress the velocity becomes approximately proportional to the shear stress cubed and inversely proportional to the normal stress. As the shear stress increases acceleration sets in, which, for different roughness and normal loads, tends to occur for a constant value of the product τbVb. For some surfaces at high normal loads this acceleration was retarded by erosion. For constant-applied-velocity tests a steady shear stress resulted, which tended to become constant with high velocities, and which increased with increasing normal stress but with a reduced coefficient of sliding friction. The relevance of the results to the sliding of real ice masses is discussed with particular reference to the importance of the effect of the relative normal stress, above basal water pressure, to the sliding rate.

The major outlet glaciers that drain the eastern sector of the Amundsen Sea Embayment (Smith, Haynes, Thwaites and Pine Island) are among the largest, fastest-flowing and fastest-thinning glaciers in West Antarctica. Their recent ice-flow acceleration is linked to ocean-induced ice-shelf thinning, but may also arise from additional losses of ice-shelf buttressing that are not well understood. Here we present a comprehensive history of coastal change in the eastern Amundsen Sea Embayment between 1972 and 2011 derived mostly from Landsat imagery. The termini of all four major outlet glaciers have retreated, but retreat is most rapid along the ice-shelf margins, where progressive rifting has occurred. This pattern of retreat coincides with the recent acceleration of grounded ice and contributed to loss of ice-shelf buttressing. The observed pattern of margin-led gradual ice-shelf disintegration appears to be common in accelerating ocean-terminating outlet glaciers. We hypothesize that this pattern is part of a positive feedback between glacier acceleration and rift growth that could drive further buttressing loss in the eastern Amundsen Sea Embayment.

Alpine permafrost distribution is controlled by a great number of climatic, topographic and soil-specific factors, including snow cover, which plays a major role. In this study, a one-dimensional finite-element numerical model was developed to analyze the influence of individual snow-specific and climatic factors on the ground thermal regime. The results indicate that the most important factor is snow depth. Snow depths below the threshold value of 0.6 m lack sufficient insulation to prevent low atmospheric temperatures from cooling the soil. The date of first winter snow insulation and variations in mean annual air temperature (MAAT) are also shown to be important. Delays in early-winter snow insulation and in summer snow disappearance are shown to be of approximately equal significance to the ground thermal conditions. Numerical modelling also indicates that the duration of effective thermal resistance of snow cover governs the slope of the linear dependency between MAAT and mean annual ground surface temperatures (MAGST). Consequently, the most direct effect of a long-term rise in air temperatures on ground temperatures is predicted under a thin snow cover with early snowmelt in spring and/or where a large change in the date of total snowmelt occurs, in response to atmospheric warming.

Climate variables that control the annual cycle of the surface energy and mass balance on Zhadang glacier in the central Tibetan Plateau were examined over a 2 year period using a physically based energy-balance model forced by routine meteorological data. The modelled results agree with measured values of albedo, incoming longwave radiation, surface temperature and surface level of the glacier. For the whole observation period, the radiation component dominated (82%) the total surface energy heat fluxes. This was followed by turbulent sensible (10%) and latent heat (6%) fluxes. Subsurface heat flux represented a very minor proportion (2%) of the total heat flux. The sensitivity of specific mass balance was examined by perturbations of temperature (±1 K), relative humidity (±20%) and precipitation (±20%). The results indicate that the specific mass balance is more sensitive to changes in precipitation than to other variables. The main seasonal variations in the energy balance were in the two radiation components (net shortwave radiation and net longwave radiation) and these controlled whether surface melting occurred. A dramatic difference in summer mass balance between 2010 and 2011 indicates that the glacier surface mass balance was closely related to precipitation seasonality and form (proportion of snowfall and rainfall).

Recent snow accumulation rate is a key quantity for ice-core and mass-balance studies. Several accumulation measurement methods (stake farm, fin core, snow-radar profiling, surface morphology, remote sensing) were used, compared and integrated at eight sites along a transect from Terra Nova Bay to Dome C, East Antarctica, to provide information about the spatial and temporal variability of snow accumulation. Thirty-nine cores were dated by identifying tritium/b marker levels (1965_66) and non-sea-salt (nss) SO42_ spikes of the Tambora (Indonesia) volcanic event (1816) in order to provide information on temporal variability. Cores were linked by snow radar and global positioning system surveys to provide detailed information on spatial variability in snow accumulation. Stake-farm and ice-core accumulation rates are observed to differ significantly, but isochrones (snow radar) correlate well with ice-core derived accumulation. The accumulation/ablation pattern from stake measurements suggests that the annual local noise (metre scale) in snow accumulation can approach 2 years of ablation and more than four times the average annual accumulation, with no accumulation or ablation for a 5 year period in up to 40% of cases. The spatial variability of snow accumulation at the kilometre scale is one order of magnitude higher than temporal variability at the multi-decadal/secular scale. Stake measurements and firn cores at Dome C confirm an approximate 30% increase in accumulation over the last two centuries, with respect to the average over the last 5000 years

Several authors relate accumulation (or precipitation) at the glacier equilibrium-line altitude (ELA) to summer mean temperature using exponential or power-law functions. I analyze the accumulation–temperature relation at the ELA with a degree-day model using data from the 1992 paper by A. Ohmura and others. The dataset includes estimates at the ELA of winter balance and of ‘winter balance plus summer precipitation’ which represent respectively low and high estimates of annual accumulation, which is seldom measured. The Ohmura dataset only lists summer mean temperature, but I recover monthly temperatures for the whole year for 66 of the glaciers by assuming sinusoidal temperature variation through the year and using annual temperature range from a gridded climatology. Monthly degree-day sums are then estimated from monthly mean temperature and summed to give annual totals so degree-day factors for melting snow at the ELA are obtained. The degree-day factors fall close to those reported in the literature for glacier snowmelt, with averages of 3.5 ± 1.4 and 4.6 ± 1.4 mm d−1 K−1 for low- and high-accumulation estimates on the 66 glaciers. The degree-day model gives a family of accumulation–temperature curves that depend upon the annual temperature range, representing the contrast between maritime and continental climates.