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Geoid displacement about Greenland resulting from past and present‐day mass changes in the Greenland Ice Sheet
Author(s) -
Fleming K.,
Martinec Z.,
Hagedoorn J.
Publication year - 2004
Publication title -
geophysical research letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.007
H-Index - 273
eISSN - 1944-8007
pISSN - 0094-8276
DOI - 10.1029/2004gl019469
Subject(s) - geoid , geology , post glacial rebound , greenland ice sheet , geodesy , ice sheet , groenlandia , present day , elevation (ballistics) , last glacial maximum , glacial period , physical geography , climatology , geomorphology , geophysics , geography , measured depth , geometry , physics , astronomy , mathematics
Predictions are presented of secular changes in the geoid arising from glacial‐isostatic adjustment (GIA) following the Last Glacial Maximum and from present‐day mass changes in the Greenland Ice Sheet (GIS). Geoid displacement from ongoing GIA is dominated by ice‐load changes outside of Greenland at lower spherical‐harmonic degrees (<30), and modified at higher degrees by the recent (last few thousand years) GIS history. Ice‐margin mass changes dominate the present‐day GIS geoid response, although comparable signals are obtained when considering the uncertainty range in the higher‐elevation changes (>2000 m). Spatial variability is noted when the present‐day GIS response is expanded to degree and order 32. This is detectable by GRACE when assuming an optimistic accuracy, but is too small by a factor of ca . 3 for an alternate accuracy estimate. Present‐day GIS geoid displacement rates are generally less than the equivalent response from ice‐mass changes in Antarctica, Patagonia and Alaska.