Himalayan glaciers not melting because of climate change, report finds
Himalayan glaciers are actually advancing rather than retreating, claims the first major study since a controversial UN report said they would be melted within quarter of a century.
From the Telegraph By Dean Nelson, New Delhi and Richard Alleyne
Researchers have discovered that contrary to popular belief half of the ice flows in the Karakoram range of the mountains are actually growing rather than shrinking.
The discovery adds a new twist to the row over whether global warming is causing the world’s highest mountain range to lose its ice cover.
It further challenges claims made in a 2007 report by the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change that the glaciers would be gone by 2035.
Full story at the Telegraph here, (h/t to many readers) below is the science behind the story.
==========================================================
From University of California, Santa Barbara: Scientists Find that Debris on Certain Himalayan Glaciers May Prevent Melting
(Santa Barbara, Calif.) –– A new scientific study shows that debris coverage –– pebbles, rocks, and debris from surrounding mountains –– may be a missing link in the understanding of the decline of glaciers. Debris is distinct from soot and dust, according to the scientists.
Melting of glaciers in the Himalayan Mountains affects water supplies for hundreds of millions of people living in South and Central Asia. Experts have stated that global warming is a key element in the melting of glaciers worldwide.
Bodo Bookhagen, assistant professor in the Department of Geography at UC Santa Barbara, co-authored a paper on this topic in Nature Geoscience, published this week. The first author is Dirk Scherler, Bookhagen’s graduate student from Germany, who performed part of this research while studying at UCSB.
“With the aid of new remote-sensing methods and satellite images, we identified debris coverage to be an important contributor to glacial advance and retreat behaviors,” said Bookhagen. “This parameter has been almost completely neglected in previous Himalayan and other mountainous region studies, although its impact has been known for some time.”
The finding is one more element in a worldwide political controversy involving global warming. “Controversy about the current state and future evolution of Himalayan glaciers has been stirred up by erroneous reports by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC),” according to the paper.
“There is no ‘stereotypical’ Himalayan glacier,” said Bookhagen. “This is in clear contrast to the IPCC reports that lumps all Himalayan glaciers together.”
Bookhagen noted that glaciers in the Karakoram region of Northwestern Himalaya are mostly stagnating. However, glaciers in the Western, Central, and Eastern Himalaya are retreating, with the highest retreat rates –– approximately 8 meters per year –– in the Western Himalayan Mountains. The authors found that half of the studied glaciers in the Karakoram region are stable or advancing, whereas about two-thirds are in retreat elsewhere throughout High Asia. This is in contrast to the prevailing notion that all glaciers in the tropics are retreating.
Bookhagen explained the difference between debris and coverage by soot and dust on glaciers: “The debris cover has the opposite effect of soot and dust on glaciers. Debris coverage thickness above 2 centimeters, or about a half an inch, ‘shields’ the glacier and prevents melting. This is the case for many Himalayan glaciers that are surrounded by towering mountains that almost continuously shed pebbles, debris, and rocks onto the glacier.”
Thus, glaciers in the steep Himalaya are not only affected by temperature and precipitation, but also by debris coverage, and have no uniform and less predictable response, explained the authors. The debris coverage may be one of the missing links to creating a more coherent picture of glacial behavior throughout all mountains. The scientists contrast this Himalayan glacial study with glaciers from the gently dipping, low-relief Tibetan Plateau that have no debris coverage. Those glaciers behave in a different way, and their frontal changes can be explained by temperature and precipitation changes.
Bookhagen described results of another of his recent studies on this topic. He said that one of the key findings was that the Western Himalaya, including the Indus catchment and regions in Northern Pakistan and Northwestern India, depend heavily on seasonal snow and glacial melt waters, while Central Himalayan regions –– Western India and Nepal –– mostly depend on monsoonal rainfall.
The smaller seasonal water storage space in the Central Himalaya, which has only steep glaciers and no large snow fields, makes this region much more vulnerable to shifts in monsoonal strength and to glacial melting, explained Bookhagen. River discharge in these regions is crucial to sustain agriculture, hydropower, and drinking water. If the Indian monsoon season is weaker because of global atmospheric changes such as El Niño, then Central Nepal must primarily rely on water coming from the seasonal melting of glaciers and the small amount of snowmelt that is available.
“Retreating glaciers, and thus a reduction of seasonal water storage in this region, have a large impact on hundreds of millions of people living in the downstream section of these rivers,” said Bookhagen. “The mitigation and adaptation strategies in the Himalaya Mountains thus need to take into account the spatial climatic and topographic variability. There is no regional solution, but only different local strategies to the future water shortage. The geographic setting of High Asia poses political difficulties as future water treaties need to be carefully evaluated.”
###
“”””” Jimbo says:
January 27, 2011 at 12:59 pm
George E. Smith says:
January 27, 2011 at 9:41 am
“”””” Jimbo says:
…………….
“There’s that simulation word again.”
————
Hi George,
You are right to be worried about simulation. Here are some non-simulations of soot.
http://news-releases.uiowa.edu/2010/july/072710global-warming.html
http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/himalayan-soot.html “””””
Thanks Jimbo for those links. Oddly the NASA one talks more about the heating of the atmosphere by soot; presumably the atmosphere in the immediate proximity of the soot. And that wouldn’t surprise me, if the particles are small enough to persist at those altitudes, apparently high enough to not often get washed out by rain, they would have high surface area to mass, so presumably could reach quite high temperatures, so warm the surrounding air quite well.
Some of that soot of course will get washed out and is likely a source of the glacier soot. But it would seem that the glacier soot is more of a transient warmer (due to burial) but the airborne soot can continue to give, for as long as it remains airborne.
“”””” Billy Liar says:
January 27, 2011 at 12:50 pm
George E. Smith says:
January 27, 2011 at 9:53 am
…I’m not going to argue that glacial regions aren’t generally in retreat. I think that always happens when earth emerges from an ice age; and likely continues till it enters into another one.
That’s an interesting thought that I’ve often had; that during an interglacial the glaciers are generally in retreat. But what is the trigger for the onset of the next ice age? Could it be a lack of ice cover in the arctic with the consequent year round loss of ocean heat to space? “””””
Billy, I’m a total ignoramus when it comes to what causes ice ages. I’ve heard all the orbital shift hypotheses, and certainly can see how that can cause major changes in weather and climate; but have no idea how to determine if an ice age will occur.
I believe it is generally agreed that ice ages do not necessarily mean the whole planet is cold; but there certainly is a lot of water masquerading as land.
During ice ages, the sea levels supposedly drop severl hundred feet or metres, du to all the water locked up in ice (on land). That kind of sea level drop, has to create a whole bunch more land, and a whole bunch less oceans. That will also create vast changes in the movement of ocean currents since paths will be cutoff by new land.
And deep oceans are considerably more effective at capturing and storing heat than typical land is, so less oceans means less solar energy stored on earth. So I can see how an ice age severe glaciation and sea level fall can persist; but I don’t have any idea how to make that happen. Cloud levels could be lower; but with less ocean surface to capture the extra sunlight, it could stay cold anyway. I don’t plan to be around for the next one.
The pertinent results of the Alaska study were that thin debris, say around the edges of a slide, melted the ice below, but thicker debris retained it well down into the ablation zone (there was a “critical thickness” which depended in part on the geological composition and compaction characteristics of the debris), altering the surface configuration of the glacier differentially and hence its overall dynamics; the hydraulic internal meltwater system was significantly changed (BTW another item of recent controversy), also affecting the flow characteristics of the glacier all the way to its base; the mesoclimate of the ice, snow and and slide areas were altered, with complex feedbacks on the overall regime of the glacier (e.g. effects of snowfall on the debris vs. on the snow of the accumulation zone or ice of the ablation zone, and the effects of the disturbance of katabatic glacier winds by the slide). Hydrosphere (including cryosphere), atmosphere, lithosphere – all are interconnected. Observing what actually happens in the field (or in the atmosphere for that matter) can produce a positive feedback of expanded knowledge.
“”””” Tim Folkerts says:
January 27, 2011 at 12:53 pm
Anthony states that his blog is about ‘”Commentary on puzzling things …” “””””
Tim, I think it would be a mistake to presume, that Anthony approves, promotes or supports the stories that he posts here; or that he should. I think he IS responsible for the posting, of whatever he posts; but not necessarily for its content. So if something totally scurrilous suddenly appears about some no-no subject; we could reasonably ask ‘why’d y do dat?’
I do sometimes have a problem determining what is Anthony’s own output, in his own words, and would welcome a top line direct attribution; which typically is how the guest postings show up.
But I don’t expect Anthony to vet the articles or guest posts or citations for us. It is nice enough to have them brought to our attention; and no way we should assume that he goes along with everything in every article.
And as for his behavior policy I know of far less controversial websites that deal with other subjects, where the editorial policies are such that nobody can ever post anything at all contoversial; even if that controversy is germane to the subject of interest to that site. One such site whose host is as close a friend or aquaintance, as I have and he blows away anything he thinks will ruffle somebody’s feathers; specially if I write it.
From Ken Lowe on January 27, 2011 at 10:22 am:
Why burn fuel at all to stay warm?
You’re in a rural area. Got a standard deep drilled water well? Can you drill another? Then you’re a good candidate for a Geothermal Heat Pump, standing column well implementation (Wikipedia link). The payback period for GHP in general (see Economics section) when replacing heating oil is 3 years for Canada, 5 years for the US, and well-based is inherently a less-expensive lower-maintenance installation than those requiring earth moving and buried ground loops. Geothermal is very efficient and only natural gas can compete for heating, while said heat pump could also be used for cooling.
If building a new house, which may attractive over the long run rather than keeping the current one, you could ditch heating altogether. In a sane manner. Build a passive house like they’ve been doing in Germany, where the “heating” is a heat exchanger that recovers the heat from outgoing air, with all the remaining needed heat coming from occupants and appliances. At the time of writing of the linked article (December 2008) a passive house in Germany, with ready availability of the components, was only 5 to 7% more than conventional. You’re in the UK, part of the EU, so you should be able to readily get the supplies, and building professionals knowledgeable in the techniques should be available in the UK. Figure out what you could get from selling (or renting out) the old house, the cost of the new one, and especially the savings from not having to buy fuel oil, and see how financially advantageous it’ll be in your situation.
Both of those solutions will be better for the environment, and that’s with ignoring the sexed-up hype of the Terrorism-level Terrible Tragedies that CO2 inflicts. They will very likely be better for your wallet as well, which, by the color of American paper currency, is “green conservation” that is easy to support. Note also that you’re in the UK, which is on a forced march down the suicide path of non-nuclear “Renewable and/or Bust” thus you should expect rising carbon taxes, thus you’ll end up paying anyway what would be spent to make the switch (right before they outright outlaw planet-destroying heating oil), which makes the proposed solutions very attractive.
Anthony,
Regarding the snarky sniping that was beginning to take place towards you, my brother-in-law says “Illegitimi non carborundum.” Don’t let the bastards wear you down.
-CCR
JPeden says:
January 27, 2011 at 12:56 pm
“eadler:
The majority of glaciers are retreating. The press release does not contradict the idea that climate change is melting glaciers.
eadler, AGW implies B does not mean that B implies AGW. Moreover, since B in this case is the prevailing notion that all glaciers in the tropics are retreating according to erroneous reports by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), then because B is apparently not happening, AGW isn’t either, at least in regard to the Himalayan glaciers.”
This is a straw man argument. The theory, that there is AGW, does not imply that all glaciers in the tropics are retreating. Global data says that on average they are losing mass, and that is what would be expected. The fact that debris fields are protecting some of the glaciers does not contradict the theory of AGW. I agree that consistency with the theory of AGW does not constitute a logical “proof”. In fact there is no such thing as a logical proof of such a theory. Nothing in science is 100 percent certain and immutable. One cannot rule out the possibility that facts will emerge that show some aspects of an accepted scientific theory are wrong. That does not imply that science is useless.
The erroneous IPCC report that the Himalayan Glaciers would be gone by 2035 was never a conclusion entertained by IPCC scientists, and the chief of the IPCC apologized for this statement. It was a quote from a reporter’s 1999 interview of one Indian glaciologist, whe denies that he said it. It reflects unprofessional behavior on the part of the person who inserted the statement into the IPCC report. It is unfortunate, but global warming skeptic bloggers do this sort of thing repeatedly.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article6994774.ece
More about ice:
As a kid one of my chores was to fetch blocks of ice, by wheelbarrow, from the railroad depot to an ice house. Were slivers of cold ice ever good on a hot day! A glacier is not the same as a block of ice, just as an ocean is not the same as a bucket of water (used to water-boy those, too). Glaciers are often called “rivers of ice” and their motion described as “viscous flow”, but their actual mode of deformation is quite different. They move by plastic flow, and that is dependent on pressure. Add weight (like a moraine or a debris slide or a fall of snow) and you get acceleration. If one part of the glacier speeds up and another doesn’t, you get…a very complex system of stresses and strains! Furthermore, glaciers don’t just carry a top load. Debris can be hidden – entrained within the ice mass and at the bottom of the glacier, the “ground moraine” that does much of the down-cutting erosion that creates those scenic valleys. Eventually it will emerge down-glacier. Another anomaly: the body of the glacier moves, at varying rates, but the upper layer just goes along for the ride. It is brittle, so it cracks, and you get those menacing crevasses (note the picture at the head of the posting above). That incredibly uneven and ever-changing surface tends to complicate the albedo and absorption situations enormously!
eadler says:
January 27, 2011 at 6:02 pm
It [Himalayan glaciers gone by 2035] reflects unprofessional behavior on the part of the person who inserted the statement into the IPCC report. It is unfortunate, but global warming skeptic bloggers do this sort of thing repeatedly.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article6994774.ece
Huh, “skeptic bloggers do this sort of thing repeatedly” = unprofessionally insert incorrect items into their reports? From your own link:
Georg Kaser, a leading Austrian glaciologist who contributed to the 2007 [ipcc] report, described the glacier mistake as huge and said that he had warned colleagues about it months before publication.
[my bold]
Interesting maybe the Glacier insulation factor is alive and well, I’m informed are many glaciers that have been road bedded and blacktopped over acting as an insulation barrier, one such one is a part of the Interstate Hwy 86 between Portland and Hood river running along the Columbia river Gorge (Great wind surfing and a beautiful part of the USA) part of the area is in a constant state of glacier creep that cracks the road surface constantly with water run off into the Columbia river gorge. A local person told me about this covering of glacier tails many years ago and it has stuck in my mind. Can anybody fill me in on this or is it folklore?
Ken Lowe says:
January 27, 2011 at 10:22 am
Yes, since the Earth is suffering from a CO2 famine, you should use as much oil as possible, and make sure that all your electric supply comes from coal-fired generating plants.
REPLY: Well that’s where we differ. I admit and fix my error, you willfully create an error where none existed and continue with it for spite – Anthony
This is what you characterise as admitting to and fixing an error:
REPLY: I’m aware of this, but as people routinely point out to me, I’m responsible for my own blog content. The fact that Cook allows this in any main post is the issue. I’ve made a note in parenthesis to make it a bit clearer – Anthony
You’re right about one thing, we do differ. Still, I’m in your house and should play by your rules.
I am aware that the gross misrepresentations I attributed to Anthony Watts properly belong to The Telegraph’s Dean Nelson and Richard Alleyne, but would point out that Mr Watts accepts responsibility for his own own blog content. The fact that Watts allows such gross misrepresentations in any main post is the issue.
Sincerely,
Kevin MacDonald.
REPLY: I’m aware that you continue to change your identity and email address to avoid binning, while also using a proxy server to hide your identity. Why should we pay any attention to your views when you fabricate things just to get your point across? – Anthony
Kevin MacDonald, being a government drone, simply has no understanding of how an entity like WUWT operates.
Smokey says:
January 28, 2011 at 9:14 am
Kevin MacDonald, being a government drone, simply has no understanding of how an entity like WUWT operates.
Fed up with the straw man fallacies Smokey, thought you’d move on to the ad hom’s?
Your post also seems to imply that you can see this e-mail address, I hope that’s not the case.
Good guess, huh? This isn’t the only place you post. And what ‘straw man fallacies’ would you be referring to?
Smokey said on January 28, 2011 at 9:14 am:
Oh I don’t know, he seems to have mastered changing his handle to avoid his “banning” by making his posts less obvious to the moderation team, indicating he may have some understanding.
However, speaking as a mere guest, I have noticed others who had their comments blocked due to changing their handles too frequently, thus it appears Mr. MacDonald has likely run afoul of that bit of site etiquette, indicating that understanding is very tiny.
Are you posting here while using your government or otherwise publicly-funded provided-for-job internet account? If so, you might qualify for special treatment. ☺
REPLY: He’s also using a proxy server in the UK to hide his identity. Who knows who he is? – Anthony
2cm 1/2 inch. It is about 4/5ths of an inch. A significant difference.
eadler says:
“The erroneous IPCC report that the Himalayan Glaciers would be gone by 2035 was never a conclusion entertained by IPCC scientists, and the chief of the IPCC apologized for this statement.”
He apologised did he? Was that before or after he accused the Indian minister of ‘voodoo’ science for pointing it out?
Ted Gray asks about roads being built over glaciers. Good question. There are some very slow-moving “rock glaciers” (totally covered by debris, and sometimes a question if there is any ice under them at all) that might have been paved over. Don’t know about the Columbia gorge, but in Alaska the old Copper River and Northwestern Railway, built to haul ore down from Kennecott, was said to be built in part over a glacier. Maybe some sourdoughs know more about that.
Found in my previous post:
Changing handles and using proxy servers? What, does he think Homeland Security is going to try and track him down, starting from here?
Although, now that I think about it, there was that long stretch where I had to view WUWT unformatted, the style sheets weren’t loading from wordpress, that started before the November elections until just after Christmas, where I also couldn’t access the Breitbart “Big” sites at all, said sites being a Known Hotbed of anti-current administration anti-liberal hard right Extreme Conservatism… And both issues resolved at exactly the same time, like someone had decided to stop messing with my dial-up connection…
Nah, just coincidence. 😉
@ur momisugly Kadaka. You must be vitally important to the cause to have attracted so much attention. I would eschew solo walks in the woods and check round my car before driving if I were you……
@ur momisugly Grumpy Old Man on January 28, 2011 at 4:24 pm:
There is an alternate defensive maneuver worth pursuing, where one posts long ludicrous posts that would convince the casual drive-by government-employed reader that the commenter is a harmless crackpot, with enough pro-(C)AGW verbiage that an automated reading program (not understanding sarcasm, satire, and irony) would conclude the commenter must be supporting the Green Party Line. This would lead an average overworked government reviewer to believe the commenter must have been flagged in error.
And suddenly the commenter’s internet connection, being dial-up thus prone to errors caused by excessive network lag with the internet now retooled for no-delay high-speed, miraculously works again, and does seem faster than before, as if some delaying interference was removed. Then the commenter obliquely mentions the occurrence just in case, and describes a potential fix in the third person to throw off the robotic programs…
@ur momisugly kadakaJan28 1909
Lol. Far too Swiftian for Lefties.
Anthony,
UK proxy server? Among internet-researchable academics, there is a Dr. Kevin C. MacDonald at University College London (mentioned here, and here’s the UCL staff link). Institute of Archeology, Reader in African Archeology. Since (C)AGW is scheduled to incinerate Africa to dust, right after wiping the continent clean with violent frequent storms, that could indicate a possible animosity to those rejecting (C)AGW. Of course, your heckler could just be spoofing the identity of a respectable academic.
Searching is problematic due to the existence of Dr. Kevin B. MacDonald, who appears to be just another tenured nut.