First Hydrometeorological Measurements from Inglefield Land, NW Greenland

Keywords: Greenland, surface mass balance, proglacial, regional climate model validation
Session Type: Virtual Paper Abstract
Day: Sunday
Session Start / End Time: 2/27/2022 09:40 AM (Eastern Time (US & Canada)) - 2/27/2022 11:00 AM (Eastern Time (US & Canada))
Room: Virtual 48

Abstract

While mass loss from the Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS) is a primary contributor to sea level rise, estimates of future ice sheet losses contain substantial uncertainties. One source of uncertainty is lack of adequate field validation datasets in vulnerable northern environments, particularly those suited for surface mass balance (SMB) model validation. SMB models are the current leading approach to sea level rise projection and anticipate continued dominance of runoff as a mass loss pathway. To obtain flow and weather datasets suitable for SMB runoff model validation and refinement, we have installed a cluster of high quality field instruments at the Minturn Elv, a proglacial river site in Inglefield Land, NW Greenland. Novel meteorological, hydrological, and time lapse camera datasets are recorded; instrumentation includes a vented water level stage recorder, single shot and scanning lidars, time lapse cameras, and in situ ADCP discharge and terrestrial scanning lidar measurements. The cluster provides discharge and weather data and the opportunity to evaluate experimental methods for measuring river stage in polar regions. At Inglefield, proglacial runoff is dominated by SMB processes on the ice surface, without interference from subglacial hydrology, uniquely advantaging the location for SMB studies. The instrument cluster offers an adverse, high-latitude environment validation dataset for regional climate modeling, one of the few collected outside of Southwest Greenland.