Warming ocean layers will undermine polar ice sheets

Warming ocean layers will undermine polar ice sheets

  12:32:00 AM    Science Lover

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Warming of the ocean's subsurface layers will melt underwater portions of the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets faster than previously thought, according to new University of Arizona-led research. Such melting would increase the sea level more than already projected.

This view of the seaward edge of Antarctica’s
floating Ross Ice Shelf shows a region where
the ice is cracking and may produce an iceberg.  
Credit: Michael Van Woert, NOAA NESDIS,
ORA.National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration/Department of Commerce.

The research, based on 19 state-of-the-art climate models, proposes a new mechanism by which global warming will accelerate the melting of the great ice sheets during this century and the next.

The subsurface ocean layers surrounding the polar ice sheets will warm substantially as global warming progresses, the scientists found. In addition to being exposed to warming air, underwater portions of the polar ice sheets and glaciers will be bathed in warming seawater.

The subsurface ocean along the Greenland coast could increase as much as 3.6 F (2 C) by 2100.

"To my knowledge, this study is the first to quantify and compare future ocean warming around the Greenland and the Antarctic ice sheets using an ensemble of models," said lead author Jianjun Yin, a UA assistant professor of geosciences.

Most previous research has focused on how increases in atmospheric temperatures would affect the ice sheets, he said.

"Ocean warming is very important compared to atmospheric warming because water has a much larger heat capacity than air," Yin said. "If you put an ice cube in a warm room, it will melt in several hours. But if you put an ice cube in a cup of warm water, it will disappear in just minutes."

Given a mid-level increase in greenhouse gases, the researchers found the ocean layer about 650 to 1,650 feet (200 to 500 meters) below the surface would warm, on average, about 1.8 F (1 C) by 2100.

This satellite image shows Greenland's Helheim glacier where it meets the sea. The glacier is on the left. Large and small icebergs pack the narrow fjord in the right part of the images. Bare ground appears brown or tan, while vegetation appears in shades of red. The Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER) on NASA’s Terra satellite took the image in June 2005. Higher-resolution image is here: http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=6207 Credit: NASA images created by Jesse Allen, Earth Observatory, using data provided courtesy of NASA/GSFC/METI/ERSDAC/JAROS, and the U.S./Japan ASTER Science Team.

Along the Greenland coast, that layer would warm twice as much, but along Antarctica would warm less, only 0.9 F (0.5 C).

"No one has noticed this discrepancy before – that the subsurface oceans surrounding Greenland and Antarctica warm very differently," Yin said.



Part of the warming in the North comes from the Gulf Stream carrying warm subtropical waters north. By contrast, the Antarctic Circumpolar Current blocks some of the subtropical warmth from entering the Antarctic's coastal waters.

Even so, the Antarctic ice sheet will be bathed in warming waters, the team writes.

Co-author Jonathan T. Overpeck said, "This does mean that both Greenland and Antarctica are probably going melt faster than the scientific community previously thought."

Overpeck, a UA professor of geosciences and co-director of UA's Institute of the Environment, said, "This paper adds to the evidence that we could have sea level rise by the end of this century of around 1 meter and a good deal more in succeeding centuries."

The paper by Yin, Overpeck and their colleagues, "Different Magnitudes of Projected Subsurface Ocean Warming Around Greenland and Antarctica," is scheduled for online publication in Nature Geoscience on July 3.

Their co-authors are UA assistant professor of geosciences Joellen L. Russell; Stephen M. Griffies and Ronald J. Stouffer of the National Oceanographic Atmospheric Administration's Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory in Princeton, N.J.; and Aixue Hu of the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo.

Other researchers have recently measured surprisingly high subsurface ocean temperatures along coastal glaciers in Greenland, Yin said. In addition, scientists have reported the Greenland and Antarctica glaciers that empty into the sea are moving faster.

Yin decided to figure out how much those subsurface currents would warm during this century and the next.

The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Aqua satellite captured this composite image of Antarctica’s ice-covered landscape on January 27, 2009. The surface appears rough where the Transantarctic Mountains curve in a shallow “s” from the shore of the Ross Sea to the Ronne Ice Shelf. The Polar Plateau in the center of the continent is smooth, shaded only by the faint shadow cast by clouds. The Weddell Sea is textured with chunks of sea ice. Download a high-resolution copy of the image here: http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=36839
Credit: NASA image courtesy the MODIS Rapid Response Team at NASA GSFC.

Glaciers are rivers of ice. Like rivers of liquid water, glaciers move downhill. Some glaciers melt before reaching the ocean, and others, called tidewater glaciers, flow all the way to the sea.

The face of a tidewater glacier visible from a boat is only part of it – much of the glacier's leading edge is underwater in a deep fjord.

Yin's research suggests Greenland's glaciers are being exposed to increasingly warm subsurface water that will melt the underwater portion of the glaciers. As a result, the tops of the glaciers will no longer have support and will topple into the sea, creating icebergs. In addition, as the undersides of the glaciers melt, that meltwater will speed the glaciers' movement into the sea by lubricating their undersides.

Ultimately, those glaciers will melt back so far they no longer reach the sea, the team writes.

In contrast, much more of the Antarctic ice sheet is based on land that is already below sea level. Therefore as the Antarctic ice sheet melts back, the leading edge of the ice sheet will continue to be underwater. As such warming and melting continues into the 22nd century and beyond, parts of the Antarctic ice sheet may disintegrate, the team writes.

Yin's next step is examining climate models that can zero in even further on the regional effects of climate warming on the subsurface ocean and the ice sheets.

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Small Fluctuations In Solar Activity, Large Influence On Climate

Small Fluctuations In Solar Activity, Large Influence On Climate

  10:27:00 AM    Science Lover

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Subtle connections between the 11-year solar cycle, the stratosphere, and the tropical Pacific Ocean work in sync to generate periodic weather patterns that affect much of the globe, according to research appearing this week in the journal Science. The study can help scientists get an edge on eventually predicting the intensity of certain climate phenomena, such as the Indian monsoon and tropical Pacific rainfall, years in advance.

Recently published research shows how newly discovered interactions between the Sun and the Earth affect our climate. (Credit: UCAR)

An international team of scientists led by the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) used more than a century of weather observations and three powerful computer models to tackle one of the more difficult questions in meteorology: if the total energy that reaches Earth from the Sun varies by only 0.1 percent across the approximately 11-year solar cycle, how can such a small variation drive major changes in weather patterns on Earth?

The answer, according to the new study, has to do with the Sun's impact on two seemingly unrelated regions. Chemicals in the stratosphere and sea surface temperatures in the Pacific Ocean respond during solar maximum in a way that amplifies the Sun's influence on some aspects of air movement. This can intensify winds and rainfall, change sea surface temperatures and cloud cover over certain tropical and subtropical regions, and ultimately influence global weather.

"The Sun, the stratosphere, and the oceans are connected in ways that can influence events such as winter rainfall in North America," says NCAR scientist Gerald Meehl, the lead author. "Understanding the role of the solar cycle can provide added insight as scientists work toward predicting regional weather patterns for the next couple of decades."

The study was funded by the National Science Foundation, NCAR's sponsor, and by the Department of Energy. It builds on several recent papers by Meehl and colleagues exploring the link between the peaks in the solar cycle and events on Earth that resemble some aspects of La Nina events, but are distinct from them. The larger amplitude La Nina and El Nino patterns are associated with changes in surface pressure that together are known as the Southern Oscillation.

The connection between peaks in solar energy and cooler water in the equatorial Pacific was first discovered by Harry Van Loon of NCAR and Colorado Research Associates, who is a co-author of the new paper.

Top down and bottom up

The new contribution by Meehl and his colleagues establishes how two mechanisms that physically connect changes in solar output to fluctuations in the Earth's climate can work together to amplify the response in the tropical Pacific.

The team first confirmed a theory that the slight increase in solar energy during the peak production of sunspots is absorbed by stratospheric ozone. The energy warms the air in the stratosphere over the tropics, where sunlight is most intense, while also stimulating the production of additional ozone there that absorbs even more solar energy. Since the stratosphere warms unevenly, with the most pronounced warming occurring at lower latitudes, stratospheric winds are altered and, through a chain of interconnected processes, end up strengthening tropical precipitation.

At the same time, the increased sunlight at solar maximum causes a slight warming of ocean surface waters across the subtropical Pacific, where Sun-blocking clouds are normally scarce. That small amount of extra heat leads to more evaporation, producing additional water vapor. In turn, the moisture is carried by trade winds to the normally rainy areas of the western tropical Pacific, fueling heavier rains and reinforcing the effects of the stratospheric mechanism.

The top-down influence of the stratosphere and the bottom-up influence of the ocean work together to intensify this loop and strengthen the trade winds. As more sunshine hits drier areas, these changes reinforce each other, leading to less clouds in the subtropics, allowing even more sunlight to reach the surface, and producing a positive feedback loop that further magnifies the climate response.

These stratospheric and ocean responses during solar maximum keep the equatorial eastern Pacific even cooler and drier than usual, producing conditions similar to a La Nina event. However, the cooling of about 1-2 degrees Fahrenheit is focused farther east than in a typical La Nina, is only about half as strong, and is associated with different wind patterns in the stratosphere.

Earth's response to the solar cycle continues for a year or two following peak sunspot activity. The La Nina-like pattern triggered by the solar maximum tends to evolve into a pattern similar to El Nino as slow-moving currents replace the cool water over the eastern tropical Pacific with warmer water. The ocean response is only about half as strong as with El Nino and the lagged warmth is not as consistent as the La Nina-like pattern that occurs during peaks in the solar cycle.

Enhancing ocean cooling

Solar maximum could potentially enhance a true La Nina event or dampen a true El Nino event. The La Nina of 1988-89 occurred near the peak of solar maximum. That La Nina became unusually strong and was associated with significant changes in weather patterns, such as an unusually mild and dry winter in the southwestern United States.

The Indian monsoon, Pacific sea surface temperatures and precipitation, and other regional climate patterns are largely driven by rising and sinking air in Earth's tropics and subtropics. Therefore the new study could help scientists use solar-cycle predictions to estimate how that circulation, and the regional climate patterns related to it, might vary over the next decade or two.

Three views, one answer

To tease out the elusive mechanisms that connect the Sun and Earth, the study team needed three computer models that provided overlapping views of the climate system.

One model, which analyzed the interactions between sea surface temperatures and lower atmosphere, produced a small cooling in the equatorial Pacific during solar maximum years. The second model, which simulated the stratospheric ozone response mechanism, produced some increases in tropical precipitation but on a much smaller scale than the observed patterns.

The third model contained ocean-atmosphere interactions as well as ozone. It showed, for the first time, that the two combined to produce a response in the tropical Pacific during peak solar years that was close to actual observations.

"With the help of increased computing power and improved models, as well as observational discoveries, we are uncovering more of how the mechanisms combine to connect solar variability to our weather and climate," Meehl says.

The University Corporation for Atmospheric Research manages the National Center for Atmospheric Research under sponsorship by the National Science Foundation.

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