News

Asian glaciers bucking trend of climate change ice melt

02.05.2012

Bucking the global trend, glaciers in the Karakoram region, north of the Himalaya, have been shown to be growing, gaining as much water from precipitation as they were losing from melting, bucking the global trend. The new study of the Karakoram used French satellite measurements to predict changes in the glaciers’ mass balance (the difference between precipitation gains and losses to melting). The results show that the Karakorum glaciers are currently making no contribution to rising sea levels. Many use the science behind the anomaly in the Himalaya as evidence that climate change is not occurring. However, the overwhelming evidence at the poles far outweighs the contribution from the Asian glaciers: globally, the world’s glaciers are shrinking.

Photo (c) Guilhelm Vellut / Flickr