The glacier loss has increased considerably over the past decade. Since 2000 by five percent of the total volume. That is on average around 273 billion tonnes of ice per year. In the Alps and Pyrenees this was also much larger than in the Antarctic and Subantarctic area.
With the exception of the continental ice surfaces in Greenland and the Antarctica, the glaciers of the world extended over about 705,200 square kilometers. But the ice masses around the world are shrinking more and more.
Glaciers have lost about five percent of their total volume since 2000, so the latest findings of 35 teams from the research initiative “Glacier Mass Balance Intercartison exercise (Glambie)”*.
This quantity is comparable to the volume of five and a half times volume of Lake Constance. As research director Michael Zemp from the University of Zurich (UZH) explained, the world’s population could be provided with three liters of water every day for 30 years.
However, there is also an accelerated increase in the second half of the research period – from 231 billion tonnes per year in the first half of the research period (2000 to 2011) to 314 billion tons in the second half. From 2012 to 2023, the loss was 36 percent higher than from 2000 to 2011.
Strong regional differences
Although in less exposed regions such as the Antarctic and Subantarctic Islands the mass loss is 1.5 percent, a decrease of approximately 39 percent of their glacier mass was registered for the European Alps and Pyrenees. Because of their low height, they are mainly influenced by the raised temperatures.
Sea level increase
The global melting glaciers have since 2000 an increase in sea level raised by 18 millimeters. After heating the oceans, the melting of the glaciers would be the second strongest driver of sea level, even well before the mass loss of Greenland and the Antarctic ice shield.
Saving huge amounts of fresh water
Huge amounts of fresh water are stored in the glaciers of our earth. With decreasing glacier ice cream, a precious freshwater supply is also lost successively.
*The Glambie research is intended to assess global glacier loss and regional differences. It is based on a detailed analysis of multi-year data from a total of 450 sources, including direct field measurement data, as well as radar, laser and gravimetry data of numerous satellite missions. The combination of the data from these different sources created an annual range of glacier mass changes from 2000 to 2023.
Source: Krone
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