{"id":97757,"date":"2021-12-06T17:56:12","date_gmt":"2021-12-06T23:56:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/?p=97757"},"modified":"2021-12-06T17:56:12","modified_gmt":"2021-12-06T23:56:12","slug":"new-glacier-records-show-westerly-winds-accelerate-ice-melt-massive-sea-level-rise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/new-glacier-records-show-westerly-winds-accelerate-ice-melt-massive-sea-level-rise\/","title":{"rendered":"New glacier records show westerly winds accelerate ice melt, massive sea level rise"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Poonam Narotam<\/strong>
\nMedill Reports<\/em><\/p>\n

Veteran climate scientist George Denton calls Pine Island Bay the \u201cweak underbelly\u201d of the western Antarctic ice sheet. Increased melting at the bases of Pine Island and Thwaites glaciers into this bay makes them susceptible to collapse in coming decades<\/a>, which would raise global sea levels by 11.5 feet (3.5 meters) and flood most major coastal cities and islands.<\/p>\n

Global warming, driven by ever-rising carbon dioxide levels from fossil fuel emissions, is nearing a tipping point that raises the threat for massive melting of the ice sheet. United Nations officials, who organized the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow this fall, are calling for countries to reduce CO2 emissions by 45% below 2010 levels by 2030 to keep temperature rise below the tipping point. But COP26 closed for this session and no commitment was made on this safety net.<\/p>\n

At another recent conference, Denton and other glacier scientists introduced a new theory for abrupt climate change that ended the last ice age, research that betters our understanding of glacier melt today. The powerhouse behind their theory is in the westerly winds. Today, the westerlies\u2019 movement and an unprecedented level of human-driven CO2 emissions together accelerate warming that can collapse the western Antarctic ice sheet.<\/p>\n

Denton gathered with climate scientists from all over the world at the annual Comer Climate Conference in October, before COP26, to present their latest research and swap solutions virtually over Zoom due to the COVID-19 pandemic.<\/p>\n

Denton is a distinguished professor at the University of Maine\u2019s School of Earth and Climate Sciences and Climate Change Institute. He has studied glaciers all over the world for 63 years. He nurtured a strong group of glaciologists who study past glacier behaviors, said Thomas Lowell, once Denton\u2019s master\u2019s student and now a geology professor at the University of Cincinnati.<\/p>\n

\u201cDriven by George’s example, we’re motivated to understand big-scale questions on the ice age and the interaction of climate from a glaciated world to an unglaciated world,\u201d Lowell said.<\/p>\n

Many of Denton\u2019s students have mentored new generations of scientists in turn. Denton currently studies New Zealand\u2019s Southern Alps, where he was conducting field work when the pandemic started. New Zealand\u2019s strict border closure prohibited him from leaving but allowed him to continue his research.<\/p>\n

\u201cI felt like I wasn’t wasting my life here,\u201d Denton said. \u201cIf I were home, I wouldn’t be able to do anything.\u201d<\/p>\n

In a paper published in April<\/a>, Denton proposed the \u201cZealandia Switch\u201d theory of how the last ice age started and ended. Lowell said digging into another layer of the \u201conion\u201d of glacier research spurred a \u201cbig rethinking\u201d of understanding Earth\u2019s whole climate system.<\/p>\n

The long-held Milankovitch theory (named for Serbian scientist Milutin Milankovitch) hypothesized a century ago that ice ages were primarily caused by fluctuations in the amount of solar heat trapped in Earth\u2019s atmosphere (insolation), which shifts as the planet\u2019s orbital position relative to the sun changes over long periods of time.<\/p>\n

Brenda Hall, another University of Maine School of Earth and Climate Sciences and Climate Change Institute professor and prior Denton student, said glaciers in the Northern Hemisphere should grow as those in the Southern Hemisphere shrink, and vice versa, according to the Milankovitch theory.<\/p>\n

Glacier records in the Northern Hemisphere support this theory. But through different studies, Denton, Hall and Lowell found evidence \u201cthe Milankovitch theory doesn\u2019t work so well\u201d to explain patterns in Southern Hemisphere glaciation, Lowell said.<\/p>\n

Hall said glaciers grew in the Falkland Islands, an archipelago off the coast of Argentina, during Heinrich stadials, Northern Hemisphere cold periods established by studies of the Greenland ice core and North Atlantic marine sediments.<\/p>\n

\"Falkland
The Falkland Islands are one of the few land masses situated at a specific latitude in the Southern Hemisphere. \u201cThis latitude figures prominently in various hypotheses about abrupt climate change that involve shifting the Southern Hemisphere westerlies,\u201d Brenda Hall said in an email. She dated these cirques in 2016. (Brenda Hall\/UNIVERSITY OF MAINE)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cWhat we found was that the glaciation there bears no relationship at all to insolation, which is actually rather interesting,\u201d Hall said. She and Lowell published their study<\/a> in December 2020.<\/p>\n

Instead, Denton\u2019s Southern Hemisphere research produced evidence suggesting the westerlies, the world\u2019s strongest wind system, cause abrupt climate changes that trigger glaciers to form and melt.<\/p>\n

The westerlies either move towards the poles, stimulating global warming, or toward the equator, stimulating global cooling and ice ages, according to Denton\u2019s \u201cZealandia Switch\u201d study.<\/p>\n

\"Map
George Denton\u2019s Zealandia Switch theory suggests that when the westerly winds move toward the poles, the planet warms. The red color in this diagram of poleward-shifted westerly winds featured in Denton\u2019s study indicates a warming of upper ocean temperatures relative to a preindustrial simulation. (George Denton et al.\/UNIVERSITY OF MAINE)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Denton said the Southern Hemisphere westerlies are bound by New Zealand\u2019s Tasman Glacier in the north and Antarctica\u2019s Pine Island Bay glaciers in the south. His study shows the westerlies\u2019 movement toward the poles causes the air around New Zealand to warm, melting the Tasman Glacier from above.<\/p>\n

Poleward-shifted westerlies also cause upwelling of warm water in the Southern Ocean, \u201cthe only place in the world where upwelling water is warmer than the surface water,\u201d Denton said. These heated waters flow underneath the Pine Island Bay glaciers, melting them from below.<\/p>\n

Denton\u2019s theory is the increased atmospheric carbon dioxide today forced the global climate system \u2013 and the southern westerlies \u2013 into the same poleward mode that sparked the end of the last ice age and \u201cthat’s causing renewed collapse of the glaciers in both Antarctica and New Zealand.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to Denton\u2019s research, excess atmospheric CO2 caused by fossil fuel emissions made the Southern Hemisphere\u2019s westerlies swifter, vaguer and farther south in the past few decades.<\/p>\n

\u201cNew Zealand glaciers have collapsed and there’s increased melting around the west Antarctic ice sheet,\u201d Denton said.<\/p>\n

This group of glacier historians plans to dig deeper into this new way of understanding abrupt climate changes. While Denton is continuing his research in New Zealand, Lowell and Hall, both based in Maine, are laying plans for improving glacier records in the Falkland Islands.<\/p>\n

\u201cClimate changes rapidly,\u201d Lowell said. \u201cIf the Zealandia concept is right \u2026 once that change is afoot, that’s it. You can debate anything you want. It’s all defensive playing at that point. There’s no offense. That scares the bejesus out of me.\u201d<\/p>\n

Poonam Narotam is a health, science, and environment reporter at Medill. You can follow her on Twitter at <\/i>@namsorama.<\/i><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Poonam Narotam Medill Reports Veteran climate scientist George Denton calls Pine Island Bay the \u201cweak underbelly\u201d of the western Antarctic ice sheet. Increased melting at the bases of Pine Island and Thwaites glaciers into this bay makes them susceptible to collapse in coming decades, which would raise global sea levels by 11.5 feet (3.5 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":789,"featured_media":97764,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5152,28,29,30],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-97757","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-fall-2021","category-general-interest","category-health-and-science","category-public-affairs"],"yoast_head":"\nNew glacier records show westerly winds accelerate ice melt, massive sea level rise - Medill Reports Chicago<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/new-glacier-records-show-westerly-winds-accelerate-ice-melt-massive-sea-level-rise\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"New glacier records show westerly winds accelerate ice melt, massive sea level rise - Medill Reports Chicago\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"By Poonam Narotam Medill Reports Veteran climate scientist George Denton calls Pine Island Bay the \u201cweak underbelly\u201d of the western Antarctic ice sheet. 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Increased melting at the bases of Pine Island and Thwaites glaciers into this bay makes them susceptible to collapse in coming decades, which would raise global sea levels by 11.5 feet (3.5 […]","og_url":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/new-glacier-records-show-westerly-winds-accelerate-ice-melt-massive-sea-level-rise\/","og_site_name":"Medill Reports Chicago","article_published_time":"2021-12-06T23:56:12+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1100,"height":825,"url":"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/wp-media-folder-medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2021\/12\/Black-Tarn-11-Brenda-Hall_adobespark.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"poonamnarotam2022","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"poonamnarotam2022","Est. reading time":"6 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/new-glacier-records-show-westerly-winds-accelerate-ice-melt-massive-sea-level-rise\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/new-glacier-records-show-westerly-winds-accelerate-ice-melt-massive-sea-level-rise\/"},"author":{"name":"poonamnarotam2022","@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#\/schema\/person\/239a24a3b61907662292c88594fac5b0"},"headline":"New glacier records show westerly winds accelerate ice melt, massive sea level rise","datePublished":"2021-12-06T23:56:12+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/new-glacier-records-show-westerly-winds-accelerate-ice-melt-massive-sea-level-rise\/"},"wordCount":1129,"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/new-glacier-records-show-westerly-winds-accelerate-ice-melt-massive-sea-level-rise\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/wp-media-folder-medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2021\/12\/Black-Tarn-11-Brenda-Hall_adobespark.jpg","articleSection":["Fall 2021","General Interest","Health and Science","Public Affairs"],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/new-glacier-records-show-westerly-winds-accelerate-ice-melt-massive-sea-level-rise\/","url":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/new-glacier-records-show-westerly-winds-accelerate-ice-melt-massive-sea-level-rise\/","name":"New glacier records show westerly winds accelerate ice melt, massive sea level rise - Medill Reports Chicago","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/new-glacier-records-show-westerly-winds-accelerate-ice-melt-massive-sea-level-rise\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/new-glacier-records-show-westerly-winds-accelerate-ice-melt-massive-sea-level-rise\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/wp-media-folder-medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2021\/12\/Black-Tarn-11-Brenda-Hall_adobespark.jpg","datePublished":"2021-12-06T23:56:12+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#\/schema\/person\/239a24a3b61907662292c88594fac5b0"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/new-glacier-records-show-westerly-winds-accelerate-ice-melt-massive-sea-level-rise\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/new-glacier-records-show-westerly-winds-accelerate-ice-melt-massive-sea-level-rise\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/new-glacier-records-show-westerly-winds-accelerate-ice-melt-massive-sea-level-rise\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/wp-media-folder-medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2021\/12\/Black-Tarn-11-Brenda-Hall_adobespark.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/wp-media-folder-medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2021\/12\/Black-Tarn-11-Brenda-Hall_adobespark.jpg","width":1100,"height":825,"caption":"University of Maine Professor Brenda Hall started developing a chronology of glaciers in the Falkland Islands in 2013. Hall said constructing strong glacier records in the Southern Hemisphere to compare with records in the Northern Hemisphere is key to understanding how the world ended up in an ice age at the same time, which isn\u2019t possible under the Milankovitch theory. Hall dated the glaciers that created the Black Tarn in Mount Usborne in a 2018 field expedition to the Falklands. 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