Andrew, The published bounds on Greenland mass loss (by Pfeffer) referred to in this thread assume (with good reason, so far) that mass loss is dominated by ice dynamics/kinematics, essentially the outflow through select outlet glaciers/gates into the warmer ocean. Simultaneously Greenland's albedo is decreasing, both of the "permanent" snow/ice (see Box et al.) and of the southern margin where some seasonal snow has disappeared. It is not hard to imagine that surface runoff _could_ lead to unforeseen feedbacks, but it's harder to imagine than a decade ago when moulins feeding basal lubrication were seen by some as likely to lead to quick destabilization. The intervening years have shown that the marginal ice dominates mass loss, but it is also true that albedo reductions were underestimated (no one expected the whole ice sheet to darken this quickly), and thus plausible that other radiative/thermodynamic effects have been underestimated. cz
Le lundi 28 janvier 2013 11:02:55 UTC-8, andrewjlockley a écrit : > > I try to avoid weighing in on subjects I don't know anything about, but > doesn't the below ignore albedo? > > If it's snowy in Greenland, the effect of rising temperatures will be more > limited than if there's less snow. > > Do we have any Albedo proxies? Do ice cores show flake size? > > A > >> >> -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "geoengineering" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/geoengineering?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
