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Extracting a Climate Signal from 169 Glacier Records

Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve, Pacific Coast of Alaska, USA. NASA photo. Extracting a Climate Signal from 169 Glacier Records
Science Vol. 308, No. 5722, pp. 675-677, 29 April 2005.

J. Oerlemans

Institute for Marine and Atmospheric Research
Utrecht University
Princetonplein 5, 3584 CC Utrecht, Netherlands.

ABSTRACT:
I constructed a temperature history for different parts of the world from 169 glacier length records. Using a first-order theory of glacier dynamics, I related changes in glacier length to changes in temperature. The derived temperature histories are fully independent of proxy and instrumental data used in earlier reconstructions. Moderate global warming started in the middle of the 19th century. The reconstructed warming in the first half of the 20th century 0.5 kelvin. This warming was notably coherent over the globe. The warming signals from glaciers at low and high elevations appear to be very similar.


Download data from the WDC Paleo archive:
Glacier Length based Global Temperature Reconstruction



Fig. 3a.
Temperature reconstruction for various regions. The black curve shows an estimated global mean value, obtained by giving weights of 0.5 to the Southern Hemisphere (SH), 0.1 to Northwest America, 0.15 to the Atlantic sector, 0.1 to the Alps, and 0.15 to Asia.
Fig. 3a. Temperature reconstruction for various regions.
To read or view the full study, please visit the Science website.
It was published in Science, Vol. 308, No. 5722, pp. 675-677, 29 April 2005.
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