Glaciers in China and Their Variations

This chapter summarizes recent glacier variations in China as investigated using remote-sensing methods. We find that glaciers in China have lost a tremendous amount of ice mass since the Little Ice Age maximum: area and ice volume have decreased by 26.7 and 24.5 % of the respective amounts of glaciers based on maps compiled during the late 1950s and 1980s. Chinese Glaciers have been in a general state of mass loss during recent decades as monitored by satellite remote-sensing methods over glaciers totaling one fifth of the glacier area in China. At present, the ability to monitor ice volume change and the surface velocity of glaciers by satellite is relatively new, but shows potential for glaciers having complex topographical conditions in the high mountains. This is an important research focus, in part because Chinese economic development is locally heavily impacted by changes in the glacier dynamical regime due to (1) glaciers’ role in supplying meltwater to most of the region and (2) potential for local glaciological hazards.