[1] The manner by which meltwater drains through a glacier is critical to ice dynamics, runoff characteristics, and water quality. However, much of the contemporary knowledge relating to glacier hydrology has been based upon, and conditioned by, understanding gleaned from temperate valley glaciers. Globally, a significant proportion of glaciers and ice sheets exhibit nontemperate thermal regimes. The recent, growing concern over the future response of polar glaciers and ice sheets to forecasts of a warming climate and lengthening summer melt season necessitates recognition of the hydrological processes in these nontemperate ice masses. It is therefore timely to present an accessible review of the scientific progress in glacial hydrology where nontemperate conditions are dominant. This review provides an appraisal of the glaciological literature from nontemperate glaciers, examining supraglacial, englacial, and subglacial environments in sequence and their role in hydrological processes within glacierized catchments. In particular, the variability and complexity in glacier thermal regimes are discussed, illustrating how a unified model of drainage architecture is likely to remain elusive due to structural controls on the presence of water. Cold ice near glacier surfaces may reduce meltwater flux into the glacier interior, but observations suggest that the transient thermal layer of near surface ice holds a hydrological role as a depth-limited aquifer. Englacial flowpaths may arise from the deep incision of supraglacial streams or the propagation of hydrofractures, forms which are readily able to handle varied meltwater discharge or act as locations for water storage, and result in spatially discrete delivery of water to the subglacial environment. The influence of such drainage routes on seasonal meltwater release is explored, with reference to summer season upwellings and winter icing formation. Moreover, clear analogies emerge between nontemperate valley glacier and ice sheet hydrology, the discussion of which indicates how persistent reassessment of our conceptualization of glacier drainage systems is required. There is a clear emphasis that continued, integrated endeavors focused on process glaciology at nontemperate glaciers are a scientific imperative to augmenting the existing body of research centered on ice mass hydrology.
ABSTRACT, whilst the range is 110-13000 kg C km À2 a À1 for the northern hemisphere glacial data set. Transient CO 2 drawdown is therefore usually low in the Svalbard basins unless carbonate or basalt rocks are abundant. The analysis shows that a large area of uncertainty in the transient CO 2 drawdown estimates exists due to the non-stoichiometric release of solute during silicate hydrolysis. Silicate hydrolysis is particularly non-stoichiometric in basins where the extent of glacierization is high, which is most probably an artefact of high flushing rates through ice-marginal and subglacial environments where Kfeldspars are undergoing mechanical comminution.
Enhanced delivery of water-saturated, icemarginal sediments to the glacier surface is a response to glacier thinning that has the potential to increase both levels of sediment transfer through the glacier hydrological system and total basin sediment yields. Preliminary observations made during summer 2007 at Austre Brøggerbreen, Svalbard, confirm that ice-marginal debris flows in the upper reaches of the glacier are actively delivering sediments to the glacier surface, which may then be flushed into the glacier's hydrological system. During a four-day observation period, several stochastic pulses in water turbidity were observed at a single portal where solely supra-and englacial drainage emerge at the glacier margin. The erratic suspended sediment fluxes were hypothesized to originate from ice-marginal sources. Quantitative analysis of continuous turbidity and discharge data confirm that discharge is not driving these turbidity pulses and, combined with observational data, that the most likely origin is the delivery of water -saturated sediments to the glacier surface from ice-marginal, debris flows with subsequent transfer to the portal via the glacial drainage system. These observations illustrate the potential importance of the paraglacial component to the overall sediment cascade of deglaciating basins and highlight the need for careful interpretation of turbidity records, where stochastic pulses in turbidity may be attributed to sources and processes other than ice-marginal sediment inputs.
The formation of ice-cored moraines and push moraines is discussed in the light of glacier thermal regime and glacier dynamics. Data from two Svalbard valley glaciers, Erikbreen and Usherbreen are presented. On Erikbreen, fossil forms were investigated, while on Usherbreen a surge ending in 1985 caused the formation of new push-moraine ridges. The push moraines are considered as a soil-mechanical problem. In a theoretical discussion the stress transmitted by the glaciers to the proglacial sediments is estimated. On Usherbreen, the compressive flow results in deformation both in old front ridges and in undisturbed frozen sediment layers in the front sandur. Thus, folding, thrust faulting and overriding all occur. Deformation of proglacial sediments seems to be highly dependent on the mechanical properties of the sediments. The sediments are strongly influenced by permafrost conditions. The unfrozen water content in the sediments governs the deformability, which in turn is partly determined by pore-water salinity. The distribution of push moraines in Svalbard is therefore restricted to areas below the Holocene marine limit, and they occur most frequently in areas of sedimentary bedrock. This study concludes that push moraines and ice-cored moraines require permafrost conditions. Push-moraine ridges are not formed in direct contact with the glacier, so they are geomorphologically not moraines, but deformed permafrost sediments. A model for glacier debris sedimentation and deformation is outlined for Svalbard glaciers ending on land.
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