Application of a polythermal ice sheet model to the Antarctic Ice Sheet: Steady-state solution and response to Milankovic cycles

I. HANSEN, R. GREVE and K. HUTTER

Abstract

Several computations with the authors' three-dimensional polythermal ice sheet model SICOPOLIS are performed for the Antarctic Ice Sheet. The distinctive feature of this model is the detailed consideration of the basal temperate ice layer, in which the water content and its impact on the ice viscosity are computed; its transition surface to the cold ice region is treated by accounting for the continuum-mechanical jump conditions that hold on this interface. The presented simulations cover two types of scenarios, namely (i) a steady-state simulation under present climate conditions, and (ii) sinusoidal Milankovic-period forcing with the three Milankovic periods of 20, 40 and 100 thousand years, respectively.

Proceedings of the 5th International Symposium on Thermal Engineering and Sciences for Cold Regions (ed. Y. Lee and W. Hallett), pp. 89-96 (1996).

 
Last modified: 2008-09-05