Author: olmac

June 21. An equinox, the summer solstice, estival solstice or midsummer. It not overly important what term you use, it is the day whereby one of Earth’s poles has its maximum tilt toward the Sun. It happens twice yearly, once in each hemisphere (Northern and Southern). For the Alpine Glacier Project it forms a point whereby one can judge the onset of the summer ablation period with previous years. Something we’ve been doing for 50 years.

Today is June 21. “The longest day”. A day to enjoy the maximum amount of available daylight, but we are far from celebrating. Traditionally, summer and winter solstices helped mark the changing of the seasons. However, today’s meteorologists officially use temperature records instead to draw lines between the seasons. That said, this week alone, Yellowstone National  Park is closed due to a 1 in 500 year flood event, whilst Iran soared to 52.2°C (in the shade!) – one of the highest pre-solstice temperature readings ever. Our changing climate could not be more real. Yesterday Mawsynram in India recorded 1003.6mm of rain in 24 hours, whilst Pensicola, USA set another new all-time record high temperature of 40.56°C. And so it goes on.  Rainfall and temperature records broken frequently, globally. 

Here in Switzerland, the changing climate is having what can only be described as a catastrophic impact on the mass balance of glaciers. Minimal winter snow cover (which protects the ice through reflecting the increasingly powerful radiation from the sun) quickly melted, increasingly high temperatures melt ice higher up the mountains. As a result what we see today is a stark image. Snow cover and ice melt akin to mid-August, not mid-June!

Scale is lost in the mountains, Gornergletscher was once 500m thick. But let’s contrast a few images…

To show the difference in snow cover at this time of year, here we have 18^th June 2019 and 18^th June 2022. Both taken from the Gornergrat looking toward Grentz and Gorner glaciers and the Monte Rosa Massif.

Let’s reflect and contrast 50 years looking from the Gornergrat toward the Theodulgletscher, which descends from the west side of the snowdomed capped Breithorn (4,164 meters). The picture on the left was taken in 1970, on the right in 2022. The loss of ice is significant, close to 1.2km of length loss with significant volumetric loss too.  

Zayd Abid-Waheed, Ph.D candidate at the University of Salford reflects on what changing climate may mean for Alpine glaciers.

“Significant glacial retreat in the European Alps is an inevitable reality that scientists within the cryosphere have been gripping with for the last half century of research. Often viewed as the canary in the mine for the glacial impacts of climate change; the extent to which ice is to be lost and has been lost already can lead to a challenging outlook for Europe’s frozen water towers.

The extent of glacial retreat in fact is so marked that even if countries fall within the goals of keeping global temperature increase below 2^oC within the “optimal climate scenario” there would still an expected loss of glacierized area (35%), volume (20%) and runoff (70%) by the year 2100 (Salzmann, et al., 2012). The largest glacier in Switzerland and the Alps the Grosser Aletschgletscher would by 2150 have essentially the same extent of glacial retreat with the 2^oC goal as it would in 2098 without mitigation (Salzmann Et al., 2012). The ideal scenario globally regarding the UN goals is still a reality in which alpine glaciers do not survive. What does this mean for the Alps? What does this mean physically and socially, can anything be done?

Physically the loss of glacial mass and runoff will lead towards the growing change from a glacial environment to a proglacial and periglacial environment. As permanent ice stops becoming the defining part of the environment the geomorphological impacts of this shift that will occur over the next 100 years will see a dynamic and changing environment (as is the subject of my own research here at the AGP) but research suggests this will be a short-lived phenomena as shrinking glaciers eventually lead to lower flows even in seasonally higher discharge periods.

The impact socially and procedurally on economics of these physical phenomena is significant. Firstly, the retreat of the snow line will no doubt have impacts on tourism for the numerous resort towns within the alps, the peak skiing seasons shrinking alongside the available area for winter sports. This has led to often bizarre but none the less impressive undertakings to literally cover glaciers and snowfields with white insulating materials to retain as much snow as possible in areas of the Swiss and Italian alps. These methods of literally covering snow are currently limited to a few resorts however this mitigation is certain to gain popularity as the retreat sets in further in the Alps.

Regarding the economics of water availability and hydropower the impacts are of two facets. Firstly, the availability of water is likely to not be as affected by the loss of glaciers here in the Alps and whilst this is a concern in other areas of the world fed by glaciers; Switzerland need not fear scarcity of water due to a loss of glaciers at least according to current research and predictions. The other facet however is significantly more difficult to address, namely Switzerland’s own dependency, as a hydropower fuelled nation, principally supplied from glacial sources, future runoff reductions will no doubt present a challenge towards hydropower. As discussed in my own research this comes in the form of less water to generate hydropower but also more sediment rich water which only serves to reduce efficiency of hydropower infrastructure or occasionally cause total failure of aging structures installed during the last century. As such some engineers and researchers propose a replacement for the glacial water towers considering this problem, namely high mountain reservoirs in place of glaciers. This particularly dystopian and hard to imagine future of heavily engineered dams in the highest and often most beautiful and remote environments in Europe is not as far away as one may think. This would be the truest vision of an Alps without Glaciers.

With these predictions outlined across research the question remains: What can be done? With the inevitability of glacial retreat in the Swiss Alps the focus has long since shifted from trying to save these glaciers. The window of opportunity for that likely was gone before I was even born, rather we should focus on how to mitigate these inevitable changes in geomorphology and economic needs in a way that balances the human needs from these environments alongside sustainable and economically sound policy. Ensuring that research into solutions to the problems that this inevitable change presents works alongside natural processes, to the good of both the environment and the humans that depend on it. Such research has and always will be a major part of the Alpine Glacier Project and such philosophies of mitigation should be elevated and spread to governing bodies and authorities to deliver an Alps without glaciers that remains as beautiful for future generations as it has been for our own.”

The Alpine Glacier Project’s Dr Neil Entwistle appeared on episode 2 of BBC2’s The Lakes with Simon Reeve, broadcast on the 21st November.

In this episode, Simon talked to Neil who is trying to understand flooding in Carlisle, which he believes is caused by a mixture of climate change and the upstream flooding of artificially straightened rivers. The programme also looks into Neil’s project to restore the original boundaries of such rivers, which can also help to return wetlands like Foulshaw Moss to their former glory. 

The programme is available to watch on BBC IPlayer here.

Congratulations to the Alpine Glacier Project’s Zayd Abid-Waheed who will present a paper in the upcoming 3rd GAUC Graduate Forum & Global Youth Summit on Net-Zero Futures later this month.

The GAUC (Global Alliance Of Universities on Climate) states its aims are to “synergize the momentum of climate actions brought by the global major climate events including New York Climate Week, the 15th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (COP15), and the 26th UN Climate Change Conference of the Parties (COP26)”.

Organising the event are Columbia University, the University of Oxford, Yale University, and Tsinghua University, as part of the COP 26 Universities Network.

Zayd’s conference abstract follows below:

Hydropower Longevity: 2D Modelling of Sediment Dynamics in Climate Impacted Glacier Fed River Basins

Glaciers are a significant contributor of sediment into a hydrological system and, with the acceleration of deglaciation due to a changing climate, this presents an increased sediment load in high mountain areas. This represents a problem for glacier-fed hydropower schemes such those in Switzerland, which produce 56% of energy through hydropower. Sedimentation is the most common source of failure and inefficiency in hydropower, according to present research.

Prior research, however, suggests that periglacial and proglacial systems (environments located on the margin of past glaciers) through slope and depositional processes will lose much of the energy, and thereby sediment, before reaching hydropower infrastructure. However, this is theoretical and unobserved due to the difficulties of high mountain environments. Therefore, this paper aims to use innovative techniques to model the sediment dynamics of high mountain glacial catchments to identify the mechanics and validity of this phenomenon on multiple basins over time. This study also serves as a trailblazing and novel first test for the accuracy and limits of 2D modelling software in an extreme environment. The study further aims to investigate the climatic changes over time that these sedimentation patterns have had, using historic datasets to model and investigate how proximity of the historic glacial terminus affects trends using datasets stemming back to the Little Ice Age (1850).

Initial results on the single site of Findelngletscher, Switzerland, for this in-progress study show that, indeed, sediment connectivity acts in the self-managing status observed by other studies with significantly less sediment delivered to the hydropower inlet location, with much of the glacial sediment being dissipated in depositional alluvial systems. Further modelling is to be carried out to identify this trend over time as well as on the two additional catchments; Gornergletscher and Glacier d’Arolla, Switzerland, to identify how topography influences sediment connectivity in Alpine systems.

Finally….the 2021 field trip is underway. After the relaxation of travel restrictions from August 27th, with Switzerland added to the UK government green list, we’ve been able to start a small expedition to Findelen and Gorner glaciers to maintain the equipment, download data, and start out comparative photography project to show the extend of deglaciation in the Zermatt region.

• 

• 

Early indications are that whilst some data loggers reached capaity in July, the majority of data for the 2021 season are intact with equipment functioning properly. Weather conditions have been good – warm with cloud coverage between 0/8 and 3/8.

At Findelen, batteries have been changed for all of the logging sites, with data available from all loggers barring a couple. The glacier continues to retreat into the distance, a shadow of its former self as evidenced by the moraine extent in this image.