Shock state in the Dolomites: glaciers disappear alarming quickly!

Shock state in the Dolomites: glaciers disappear alarming quickly!

Marmolata, Italien - The glaciers in the Dolomites are in front of that. A current study published in the journal The Cryosphere and was carried out by the University of Ca ’Foscari in Venice in cooperation with the Institute for Polar Studies of the Italian Research Council shows alarm results. Since the 1980s, the total area of ​​the last twelve glaciers in the Dolomites has dropped by 56 %, from over 4 square kilometers to almost 2 square kilometers. The decline has been particularly strong since 2010, when a third of the glacier area was lost. These developments are caused significantly by the increase in temperatures as a result of climate change, reports the Kleine Zeitung .

Andrea Securo, the study manager, warns that the Dolomite glaciers will have completely disappeared within a few decades. The ice loss on the glacier on the north side of the marmolata, the highest mountain of the Dolomites with 3,343 meters high, is particularly dramatic. The Fradusta glacier now has only a tenth of its earlier area, which illustrates the dramatic effects of climate change.

glacier as fresh water memory

The importance of the glaciers goes beyond their aesthetic and tourist attraction. Another study by the European Space Organization (ESA) and the Friedrich Alexander University Erlangen-Nuremberg shows that Glacier is crucial freshwater storage. These water reserves are critical of drinking water, irrigation and hydropower. This study, which was published in the research magazine Nature , emphasizes that Glacier has losing an average of 273 billion tons per year since 2000. This corresponds to a volume that is five and a half times as large as Lake Constance.

The loss of glacier ice has increased by 36 % in the past ten years. The annual ice acceptance of 231 billion tons per year (2000-2011) fell to 314 billion tons per year (2012-2023). In the past two decades, the glaciers have lost around 5 % of their total volume.

global and regional perspectives

The ice loss varies regionally. For example, the glaciers in Central Europe have suffered a loss of 39 % since 2000, while the antarctic and subantarctic islands lost only 2 % of mass. In addition, glaciers have lost a total of 18 % more mass than the Greenland ice shield and more than twice as much as the Antarctic ice shield. Between 2000 and 2023, the melted glacier ice loss of 6542 billion tons led to a global sea level increase of 18 mm, which makes the glaciers the second largest cause of the increase after octagonal warming.

These alarming developments clearly show how closely climate change is associated with the fate of the glaciers. Persistent research efforts are necessary in order to better understand the exact course and the effects of these changes and to develop suitable measures. The Friedrich-alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg has made a significant contribution here by contributing data and analyzes of glaciers in different regions.