Abstract
Glacier surface temperature (GST) is influenced by both the energy flux from the atmosphere above and the thermal dynamics at the ice–water–debris interfaces. However, previous studies on GST are inadequate in time series research and mountain glacier surface temperature retrieval. We evaluate the GST variability at Hailuogou glacier, a temperate glacier located in Southeastern Tibetan Plateau, from 1990 to 2018. We utilized a modified mono-window algorithm to calculate the GST using the Landsat 8 thermal infrared sensor (TIRS) band 10 data and Landsat 5 thematic mapper (TM) band 6 data. Three essential parameters, including the emissivity of ice and snow, atmospheric transmittance, and effective mean atmospheric temperature, were employed in the GST algorithm. The remotely-sensed temperatures were compared with two other single-channel algorithms to validate GST algorithm’s accuracy. Results from different algorithms showed a good agreement, with a mean difference of about 0.6 ℃. Our results showed that the GST of the Hailuogou glacier, both in the upper debris-free part and the lower debris-covered tongue, has experienced a slightly increasing trend at a rate of 0.054 ℃ a−1 during the past decades. Atmospheric warming, expanding debris cover in the lower part, and a darkening debris-free accumulation area are the main causes of the warming of the glacier surface.
Highlights
Land surface temperature (LST), which is called the skin temperature of the Earth’s surface [1], is an indispensable parameter in the physical, chemical, and biological processes at regional and global scales [2,3]
We analyzed the Glacier surface temperature (GST) spatial distribution patterns across Hailuogou glacier based on the image obtained by Landsat 8 on 10 November 2018
Looking at the entire glacier, the remote-sensing-retrieved temperature distribution shows that the surface temperature decreases with increasing elevation, while the mean temperature gradient is about −0.61 °C/100 m, which is slightly lower than the air temperature (−0.65 °C/100 m) (Figures 3a, 4, and Figure 5)
Summary
Land surface temperature (LST), which is called the skin temperature of the Earth’s surface [1], is an indispensable parameter in the physical, chemical, and biological processes at regional and global scales [2,3]. LST has been widely used in many fields of earth science due to its essential role in the mass balance and energy exchange between the atmosphere and land [4,5,6,7]. GST has, been used for glacier mass balance and runoff modelling and debris thickness estimations [13,14], highlighting the long-term dynamics of climatic conditions and changes of glacier surface properties
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