Glaciers

Abstract

A glacier is a thick mass of ice moving downhill under the pull of gravity. It is an accumulation of large quantities of ice, air, water, and sediments (rock debris) that flows with gravity due to its own massive mass. Glaciers make up the Cryosphere, the part of the earth that remains below the freezing point of water and covers about 10 % of the earth’s land surface (about 15 million km²; Hambrey 1994; French 1996; Ben and Evans 1998; Anderson 2004). On a global basis, glaciers cover one-tenth of the earth’s surface, and store 68.7 % of the world’s freshwater supply (Fig. 11.1). If all of the global supply of land ice locked up in glaciers were to melt, then sea level would rise ~70 m.