Environmental Science and Engineering Seminar

The Greenland Ice Sheet is currently the dominant source of barystatic sea level rise, and its rate of mass loss is accelerating. This acceleration is driven primarily by increasing meltwater generation and runoff, rather than calving fluxes. Regional climate models equipped with specialized snow modules for polar ice sheets are used to quantify mass loss and attribute it to specific processes. However, as the multi-meter-thick firn layer covering approximately 90% of the ice sheet continues to evolve under increasingly warmer and melt-prone conditions, ice sheet assessments and projections increasingly depend on the fidelity of model physics governing meltwater processes in firn. This talk presents a general evaluation of meltwater infiltration processes, comparing model representations against extensive field observations and experiments, and discusses the implications for the future evolution of the firn layer and its role in modulating runoff.