Université de Fribourg

The firn meltwater retention model intercomparison project (retmip) : evaluation of nine firn models at four weather station sites on the greenland ice sheet

Vandecrux, Baptiste ; Mottram, Ruth ; Langen, Peter L. ; Fausto, Robert S. ; Olesen, Martin ; Stevens, C. Max ; Verjans, Vincent ; Leeson, Amber ; Ligtenberg, Stefan ; Munneke, Peter Kuipers ; Marchenko, Sergey ; Pelt, Ward van ; Meyer, Colin R. ; Simonsen, Sebastian B. ; Heilig, Achim ; Samimi, Samira ; Marshall, Shawn ; Machguth, Horst ; MacFerrin, Michael ; Niwano, Masashi ; Miller, Olivia ; Voss, Clifford I. ; Box, Jason E.

In: The Cryosphere, 2020, vol. 14, no. 11, p. 3785-3810

Perennial snow, or firn, covers 80 % of the Greenland ice sheet and has the capacity to retain surface meltwater, influencing the ice sheet mass balance and contribution to sea-level rise. Multilayer firn models are traditionally used to simulate firn processes and estimate meltwater retention. We present, intercompare and evaluate outputs from nine firn models at four sites that represent...

Université de Fribourg

Firn data compilation reveals widespread decrease of firn air content in western Greenland

Vandecrux, Baptiste ; MacFerrin, Michael ; Machguth, Horst ; Colgan, William T. ; As, Dirk van ; Heilig, Achim ; Stevens, C. Max ; Charalampidis, Charalampos ; Fausto, Robert S. ; Morris, Elizabeth M. ; Mosley-Thompson, Ellen ; Koenig, Lora ; Montgomery, Lynn N. ; Miège, Clément ; Simonsen, Sebastian B. ; Ingeman-Nielsen, Thomas ; Box, Jason E.

In: The Cryosphere, 2019, vol. 13, no. 3, p. 845–859

The perennial snow, or firn, on the Greenland ice sheet each summer stores part of the meltwater formed at the surface, buffering the ice sheet’s contribution to sea level. We gathered observations of firn air content, indicative of the space available in the firn to retain meltwater, and find that this air content remained stable in cold regions of the firn over the last 65 years but...