The Correlation of Glacier Mass Balance and Sar Backscatter on Svartisen, Norway

Mass-balance measurements describe the difference between accumulation and ablation and therefore the annual climate response of a glacier. Such measurements are the standard observation of glacier ‘health’ and when coupled with frontal, area or volume observations can describe the dynamic response of a glacier to climate over longer time scales. Mass balance measurements are made in situ and are logistically intensive. Satellite-based techniques have yet to replace traditional measurements although the subject has received a great deal of attention. Here we report on the testing of a proxy algorithm that was developed for Svalbard glaciers and uses Synthetic Aperture Radar imagery. Applied to the complex topography of two icecaps the method failed to correlate glacier facies area with mass balance observations. Our experiment shows more novel approaches are needed to find functional glacier monitoring solutions.