Mass balance of the Greenland Ice Sheet from 1992 to 2018

Mass balance of the Greenland Ice Sheet from 1992 to 2018

2019-12-18 16:16:50

In recent decades, the Greenland Ice Sheet has been a major contributor to global sea-level rise1,2, and it is expected to be so in the future3. Although increases in glacier flow4–6 and surface melting7–9 have been driven by oceanic10–12 and atmospheric13,14 warming, the degree and trajectory of today’s imbalance remain uncertain. Here we compare and combine 26 individual satellite measurements of changes in the ice sheet’s volume, flow and gravitational potential to produce a reconciled estimate of its mass balance. Although the ice sheet was close to a state of balance in the 1990s, annual losses have risen since then, peaking at 335 ± 62 billion tonnes per year in 2011. In all, Greenland lost 3,800 ± 339 billion tonnes of ice between 1992 and 2018, causing the mean sea level to rise by 10.6 ± 0.9 millimetres. Using three regional climate models, we show that reduced surface mass balance has driven 1,971 ± 555 billion tonnes (52%) of the ice loss owing to increased meltwater runoff. The remaining 1,827 ± 538 billion tonnes (48%) of ice loss was due to increased glacier discharge, which rose from 41 ± 37 billion tonnes per year in the 1990s to 87 ± 25 billion tonnes per year since then. Between 2013 and 2017, the total rate of ice loss slowed to 217 ± 32 billion tonnes per year, on average, as atmospheric circulation favoured cooler conditions15 and as ocean temperatures fell at the terminus of Jakobshavn Isbræ16. Cumulative ice losses from Greenland as a whole have been close to the IPCC’s predicted rates for their high-end climate warming scenario17, which forecast an additional 50 to 120 millimetres of global sea-level rise by 2100 when compared to their central estimate.

Abstract

In recent decades, the Greenland Ice Sheet has been a major contributor to global sea-level rise1,2, and it is expected to be so in the future3. Although increases in glacier flow4–6 and surface melting7–9 have been driven by oceanic10–12 and atmospheric13,14 warming, the degree and trajectory of today’s imbalance remain uncertain. Here we compare and combine 26 individual satellite measurements of changes in the ice sheet’s volume, flow and gravitational potential to produce a reconciled estimate of its mass balance. Although the ice sheet was close to a state of balance in the 1990s, annual losses have risen since then, peaking at 335 ± 62 billion tonnes per year in 2011. In all, Greenland lost 3,800 ± 339 billion tonnes of ice between 1992 and 2018, causing the mean sea level to rise by 10.6 ± 0.9 millimetres. Using three regional climate models, we show that reduced surface mass balance has driven 1,971 ± 555 billion tonnes (52%) of the ice loss owing to increased meltwater runoff. The remaining 1,827 ± 538 billion tonnes (48%) of ice loss was due to increased glacier discharge, which rose from 41 ± 37 billion tonnes per year in the 1990s to 87 ± 25 billion tonnes per year since then. Between 2013 and 2017, the total rate of ice loss slowed to 217 ± 32 billion tonnes per year, on average, as atmospheric circulation favoured cooler conditions15 and as ocean temperatures fell at the terminus of Jakobshavn Isbræ16. Cumulative ice losses from Greenland as a whole have been close to the IPCC’s predicted rates for their high-end climate warming scenario17, which forecast an additional 50 to 120 millimetres of global sea-level rise by 2100 when compared to their central estimate.

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Author information

Affiliations

  1. Centre for Polar Observation and Modelling, University of Leeds, Leeds, UK
    • Andrew Shepherd
    • , Kate Briggs
    • , Anna E. Hogg
    • , Ines Otosaka
    •  & Thomas Slater
  2. NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA
    • Erik Ivins
    • , Eric Rignot
    • , Isabella Velicogna
    • , Nicole Schlegel
    • , Alex Gardner
    • , Johan Nilsson
    • , Matthieu Talpe
    •  & David Wiese
  3. Department of Earth System Science, University of California, Irvine, CA, USA
    • Eric Rignot
    • , Isabella Velicogna
    • , A Geruo
    • , Yara Mohajerani
    • , Jeremie Mouginot
    • , Bernd Scheuchl
    •  & Tyler Sutterley
  4. Department of Earth and Space Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA
    • Ben Smith
    •  & Ian Joughin
  5. Institute for Marine and Atmospheric Research, Utrecht University, Utrecht, The Netherlands
    • Michiel van den Broeke
    • , Brice Noël
    • , Willem Jan van de Berg
    • , Melchior van Wessem
    •  & Bert Wouters
  6. Department of Geography, Durham University, Durham, UK
    • Pippa Whitehouse
    •  & Grace Nield
  7. Institute of Environmental Geosciences, Université Grenoble Alpes, Grenoble, France
    • Gerhard Krinner
    • , Hubert Gallee
    •  & Jeremie Mouginot
  8. Cryospheric Sciences Laboratory, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD, USA
    • Sophie Nowicki
    • , Denis Felikson
    • , Bryant Loomis
    •  & Scott Luthcke
  9. School of Geographical Sciences, University of Bristol, Bristol, UK
    • Tony Payne
  10. Earth Science and Observation Center, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO, USA
    • Ted Scambos
  11. Department of Geography, University of Liège, Liège, Belgium
    • Cécile Agosta
    •  & Xavier Fettweis
  12. Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland, Copenhagen, Denmark
    • Andreas Ahlstrøm
    • , William Colgan
    •  & Kristian K. Kjeldsen
  13. Department of Geology, State University of New York at Buffalo, Buffalo, NY, USA
    • Greg Babonis
    •  & Beata Csatho
  14. DTU Space, National Space Institute, Technical University of Denmark, Kongens Lyngby, Denmark
    • Valentina R. Barletta
    • , Rene Forsberg
    • , Shfaqat Khan
    • , Louise Sandberg Sørensen
    •  & Sebastian B. Simonsen
  15. Department of Geosciences and Natural Resource Management, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
    • Anders A. Bjørk
  16. LEGOS, Université de Toulouse, Toulouse, France
    • Alejandro Blazquez
  17. College of Marine Sciences, University of South Florida, Tampa, FL, USA
    • Jennifer Bonin
  18. Global Modeling and Assimilation Office, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD, USA
    • Richard Cullather
  19. ESA-ESRIN, Frascati, Italy
    • Marcus E. Engdahl
  20. Mullard Space Science Laboratory, University College London, Holmbury St Mary, UK
    • Lin Gilbert
    •  & Alan Muir
  21. School of Geosciences, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK
    • Noel Gourmelen
  22. Institute for Planetary Geodesy, Technische Universität Dresden, Dresden, Germany
    • Andreas Groh
    • , Martin Horwath
    •  & Ludwig Schröder
  23. Daniel Guggenheim School of Aerospace Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA, USA
    • Brian Gunter
  24. School of Geography, University of Lincoln, Lincoln, UK
    • Edward Hanna
  25. Department of Geosciences, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, USA
    • Christopher Harig
  26. Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research, Bremerhaven, Germany
    • Veit Helm
    • , Ingo Sasgen
    •  & Ludwig Schröder
  27. Institute of Astronomical and Physical Geodesy, Technical University Munich, Munich, Germany
    • Alexander Horvath
  28. GeoGenetics, Globe Institute, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
    • Kristian K. Kjeldsen
  29. Deutscher Wetterdienst, Offenbach, Germany
    • Hannes Konrad
  30. Danish Meteorological Institute, Copenhagen, Denmark
    • Peter L. Langen
    •  & Ruth Mottram
  31. Department of Physics and Physical Oceanography, Memorial University of Newfoundland, St. Johns, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada
    • Benoit Lecavalier
    •  & Lev Tarasov
  32. University of Lancaster, Lancaster, UK
    • Malcolm McMillan
  33. Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia, Roma, Italy
    • Daniele Melini
  34. Nansen Environmental and Remote Sensing Centre, Bergen, Norway
    • Sebastian Mernild
  35. Faculty of Engineering and Science, Western Norway University of Applied Sciences, Sogndal, Norway
    • Sebastian Mernild
  36. Direction of Antarctic and Sub-Antarctic Programs, Universidad de Magallanes, Punta Arenas, Chile
    • Sebastian Mernild
  37. Geophysical Institute, University of Bergen, Bergen, Norway
    • Sebastian Mernild
  38. School of Engineering, Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK
    • Philip Moore
  39. isardSAT, Barcelona, Spain
    • Gorka Moyano
    •  & Mark E. Pattle
  40. ENVEO, Innsbruck, Austria
    • Thomas Nagler
    • , Helmut Rott
    •  & Jan Wuite
  41. Department of Physics, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
    • W. Richard Peltier
  42. Center for Space Research, University of Texas, Austin, TX, USA
    • Nadège Pie
    •  & Himanshu Save
  43. Institute of Geodesy and Geoinformation, University of Bonn, Bonn, Germany
    • Roelof Rietbroek
  44. Department of Space Engineering, Delft University of Technology, Delft, The Netherlands
    • Ernst Schrama
    •  & Wouter van der Wal
  45. Department of Earth Science Education, Seoul National University, Seoul, South Korea
    • Ki-Weon Seo
  46. Dipartimento di Scienze Pure e Applicate, Università di Urbino “Carlo Bo”, Urbino, Italy
    • Giorgio Spada
  47. Department of Civil Engineering, Delft University of Technology, Delft, The Netherlands
    • Wouter van der Wal
    •  & Bert Wouters
  48. Geodetic Institute, Univerity of Stuttgart, Stuttgart, Germany
    • Bramha Dutt Vishwakarma
  49. Department of Computer Science, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, UK
    • David Wilton
  50. NASA Headquarters, Washington, D.C., USA
    • Thomas Wagner

Consortia

The IMBIE Team

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Andrew Shepherd.

Additional information

*A list of participants and their affiliations appears at the end of the paper.

Supplementary information

Supplementary Table 1

Details of satellite datasets used in this study. This file contains: 1.1 Data sets and methods employed by participants of the gravimetry experiment group; 1.2 Data sets and methods employed by participants of the radar and laser altimetry experiment group; 1.3 Data sets and methods employed by participants of the mass budget experiment group; and Supplementary references.

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Cite this article

Shepherd, A., Ivins, E., Rignot, E. et al. Mass balance of the Greenland Ice Sheet from 1992 to 2018. Nature (2019) doi:10.1038/s41586-019-1855-2

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