365 Days of Climate Awareness 62 - Greenland

Greenland is an independent territory part of the Danish realm, and is the world's largest non-continental island, being part of the North American tectonic plate. Greenland is largely arctic, being almost entirely above 60 degrees north latitude, and more than 75% of that above the 66.5 degree Arctic Circle. 81% of Greenland is covered by an ice sheet with an average thickness of 2 km and a volume of 2.85M km³ (680,000 mi³), enough to raise global sea level by 7.2 m if it were to melt. Since the 90's the ice sheet has been losing mass annually.     

                       

Map of Greenland.

Species indigenous to the island and surrounding ocean include nearly 300 species of fish and dozens of species of birds. Most land mammals such as dogs and goats were introduced by settlers, but a number of species including musk oxen, arctic hares, foxes and wolves, polar bears and reindeer are native. Vegetation is sparse.

Gravimetric map of Greenland's bedrock with the ice cap removed. (Very likely the central sea would become dry land after the earth crust rebounds from the removal of the ice.)

The accelerated melting of the ice sheet in recent years has led to fears of two events: increased sea level rise, and interference in North Atlantic surface currents. Models have predicted that a rise in global temperature of 2°C from 1900 would cause the entire sheet to melt. But the steady influx of cold, fresh meltwater from Greenland is thought to pose a threat to the North Atlantic Current.

The hypothesis holds that the surface layer of cold water flowing south and east would possibly block or divert the northward current, diminishing or ending the evaporative, convective events east of Greenland which are central to Europe's habitable climate and to the North Atlantic current system. This is an area of active and growing investigation.

Regions of summer melting.

Tomorrow: the Arctic Ocean.

Be well!