A new study published in Nature Geoscience used luminescence dating on an ice core from Northern Greenland’s Prudhoe ice dome. The results reveal that the ice sheet may well melt away by the end of the century if climate change persists.
Back in 2023, during a project led by GreenDrill and the University at Buffalo, rocks and sediments buried beneath the Greenland Ice Sheet were collected for research purposes. Now, results have been published regarding the analysis of a piece of ice core collected 508 metres below the surface of the so-called Prudhoe Dome, a 500-metre-thick ice dome roughly the size of Luxembourg attached to the northwestern Greenland Ice Sheet.
Disastrous consequences
Using a technique called luminescence dating, the scientists were able to determine that the surface below the dome was last exposed to daylight some 7,000 years ago. This indicates that the dome melted away completely during the early Holocene period, much more recent than previously thought.
According to the researchers, this suggests the ice dome is highly sensitive to mild temperatures.
“This is a time known for climate stability, when humans first began developing farming practices and taking steps toward civilisation. So, for natural, mild climate change of that era to have melted Prudhoe Dome and kept it retreated for potentially thousands of years, it may only be a matter of time before it begins peeling back again from today’s human-induced climate change”, stated co-author Jason Briner, professor and associate chair of Earth sciences.
Estimates put the temperatures during the early Holocene some 3-5°C higher than today in the region, not the Prudhoe ice dome. According to the authors, “this range of summer temperatures is similar to projections of warming by the year 2100 CE.” Organising more drills on the Ice Sheet could help to narrow down the exact amount of melting and the minimum temperature increase needed for the ice dome to melt away entirely.
The ice dome, which measures some 500 metres in thickness and covers around 2,500 square kilometres, could thus potentially melt by the end of the century if the estimates regarding climate change are to become a reality. Globally, this could have an enormous impact, raising the sea levels by 73 centimetres. Copernicus, the European Union’s Earth observation programme, previously warned that every centimetre of sea level rise would expose some six million more people to coastal flooding.
