West China glaciers shrink 18%

2014-12-19 20:00:22 

A research institute released the second catalogue of China's glaciers in Beijing on Saturday, indicating the glaciers in western China have shrunk by 18 percent.

The Cold and Arid Regions Environmental and Engineering Research Institute under the Chinese Academy of Sciences surveyed China's glaciers by using remote sensing images from 2006 - 2010 for the program "Research on China's Glaciers Resources and Changes" which is set up and sponsored by the Ministry of Science and Technology in 2006, Xinhua News Agency reported.

Changes and movement of glaciers are the most direct indication for climate changes. China made its first glacier catalogue from 1978 -2002, using aerial shots and aerial relief maps from the 1950s - 1980s as the major data. During this period, 46,377 glaciers were compiled in the catalogue, covering 59,425 square kilometers and an ice volume of 5,600 cubic kilometers.

In recent decades, changes in the global climate have caused glaciers around the world to shrink. Glaciers in western China have changed profoundly. The Ministry of Science and Technology sponsored program systematically updated the report to account for the current situation in the second compilation.

The new statistics show that there are 48,571 glaciers, covering an area of 51,840 square kilometers and an ice volume of 4,494 cubic kilometers. Compared with the statistics from the first catalogue, the Chinese Academy of Sciences found that since the late 1950s, glaciers in western China have continued to shrink, by 18 percent so far, which means they are shrinking by an average of 243.7 square kilometers per year.

The glaciers around the Altai Mountains and Gangdise Mountains are the worst off, shrinking by 37.2 percent and 32.7 percent respectively. The glaciers at the Himalayas, Tanggula Mountains, Tianshan Mountains, the Pamirs, Hengduan Mountains, Nyainqentanglha Mountain Range and Qilian Mountains are shrinking slightly more slowly, by 21 percent to 27.2 percent. The Karakorum Mountains, Altun Mountains, Qiangtang Plateau and Kunlun Mountains have witnessed the smallest decreases, with glaciers there shrinking by 8.4 percent to 11.3 percent.

The respective annual shrinkage rates also show that glaciers in the south of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, the east of the Gangdise Mountains, and south and west of the Himalayas are shrinking more quickly, by 2.2 percent per year. The Qiangtang Plateau is the area with the smallest shrinkage, roughly 0.2 percent per year.

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