Two-timescale response of a large Antarctic ice shelf to climate change

Kaitlin A. Naughten (), Jan Rydt, Sebastian H. R. Rosier, Adrian Jenkins, Paul R. Holland and Jeff K. Ridley
Additional contact information
Kaitlin A. Naughten: British Antarctic Survey
Jan Rydt: Northumbria University
Sebastian H. R. Rosier: Northumbria University
Adrian Jenkins: Northumbria University
Paul R. Holland: British Antarctic Survey
Jeff K. Ridley: Met Office

Nature Communications, 2021, vol. 12, issue 1, 1-10

Abstract: Abstract A potentially irreversible threshold in Antarctic ice shelf melting would be crossed if the ocean cavity beneath the large Filchner–Ronne Ice Shelf were to become flooded with warm water from the deep ocean. Previous studies have identified this possibility, but there is great uncertainty as to how easily it could occur. Here, we show, using a coupled ice sheet-ocean model forced by climate change scenarios, that any increase in ice shelf melting is likely to be preceded by an extended period of reduced melting. Climate change weakens the circulation beneath the ice shelf, leading to colder water and reduced melting. Warm water begins to intrude into the cavity when global mean surface temperatures rise by approximately 7 °C above pre-industrial, which is unlikely to occur this century. However, this result should not be considered evidence that the region is unconditionally stable. Unless global temperatures plateau, increased melting will eventually prevail.

Date: 2021
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-021-22259-0 Abstract (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:natcom:v:12:y:2021:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-021-22259-0

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/ncomms/

DOI: 10.1038/s41467-021-22259-0

Access Statistics for this article

Nature Communications is currently edited by Nathalie Le Bot, Enda Bergin and Fiona Gillespie

More articles in Nature Communications from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().