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Abstract The heat transfer between the warm oceanic water and the floating portion of the Antarctic ice sheet (the ice shelves) occurs in a dynamic environment with year‐to‐year changes in the distribution of icebergs and fast‐ice (the “icescape”). Dramatic events such as the collapse of glacier tongues are apparent in satellite images but oceanographic observations are insufficient to capture the synoptic impact of such events on the supply of oceanic heat to ice shelves. This study uses a 3D numerical model and semi‐idealized experiments to examine whether the current high melting rates of ice shelves in the Amundsen Sea could be mitigated by certain icescape configurations. Specifically, the experiments quantify the impacts on oceanic heat supply of presence/absence of the Thwaites Glacier Tongue, Bear Ridge Iceberg Chain, tabular iceberg B22, and fast‐ice cover seaward of Pine Island Ice Shelf (PIS). The experiments reveal that future changes in the coastal icescape are unlikely to reverse the high ice shelf melting rates of the Amundsen Sea, and that icescape changes between 2011 and 2022 actually enhanced them slightly. Ice shelves such as Crosson and Thwaites are found to have multiple viable sources of oceanic heat whose relative importance may shift following icescape reconfigurations but the overall heat supply remains high. Similarly, the formation of a fast‐ice cover seaward of PIS slows down the cavity circulation (by 7%) but does not reduce its heat supply.
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Numerical experiments examining the response of onshore oceanic heat supply to yearly changes in the Amundsen Sea icescape (Antarctica)
Satellite images from Antarctica reveal important changes in the coastal icescape (fast-ice, icebergs and ice shelves) but these yearly changes and their impacts on the coastal circulation and ice shelf basal melt rates are not represented in the Earth System Models used to project future sea level rise. The impacts of these yearly icescape changes are thus investigated using a high-resolution regional ocean-ice shelves-sea ice coupled model of the Amundsen Sea (Antarctica). A set of nine semi-idealized experiments were designed to highlight the impacts of (a) the collapse of the Thwaites Glacier Tongue, (b) the disappearance of the Bear Ridge Iceberg Chain and tabular iceberg B22, and (c) presence/absence of a fast-ice cover between Thwaites and Pine Island ice shelves, in both cold and warm background hydrological conditions. The dataset features the results of the nine experiments and reveals changes in sea ice concentrations, coastal oceanic circulation and oceanic heat supply to the ice shelf cavities, ice shelf basal melt rates, hydrological conditions, and fluxes of heat/freshwater at the sea surface. These model results are archived in self-documented NetCDF files with the appropriate metadata for each variable. The dataset includes a 'readme file' providing an overview of the archive as well as additional information regarding the model results.
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- Award ID(s):
- 1941292
- PAR ID:
- 10532661
- Publisher / Repository:
- SEANOE
- Date Published:
- Edition / Version:
- 1.0
- Subject(s) / Keyword(s):
- Antarctica Amundsen Sea Ice shelves Oceanography FOS: Earth and related environmental sciences Cryosphere Modeling ROMS
- Format(s):
- Medium: X Other: NetCDF
- Location:
- (East Bound Longitude:-90.0; North Bound Latitude:-68.0; South Bound Latitude:-76.0; West Bound Longitude:-140.0)
- Right(s):
- Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial Share Alike 4.0 International
- Institution:
- Virginia Institute of Marine Science (VIMS)
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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