Geneva, October 1
Glaciers in Switzerland, home to the largest number of glaciers in the Alps, lost 5.5% of their ice volume this year, marking the second-largest percentage decline on record amid heat waves and low winter snowfall, experts said.
“Alpine glaciers have no chance of surviving in the long term under such conditions,” the GLAMOS Swiss glacier monitoring service and the Swiss Academy of Sciences said in a statement released Thursday.
The decline has accelerated in recent years. Over the past five years alone, Switzerland has lost nearly one-fifth of its total glacier ice volume, according to the experts.
The findings add to growing concerns over the impact of global warming on Europe, which is the world’s fastest-warming continent.
“The warming that we are experiencing now can be attributed 100% to anthropogenic climate change. It’s as simple as that,” said Matthias Huss, head of GLAMOS. “Without human emissions or fossil fuels we wouldn’t have any warming at the moment.”
Ice loss continues to accelerate
Switzerland recorded its largest glacier retreat in 2022, when summer heat and low winter snowfall combined with an unusual layer of reddish dust from the Sahara. The dust darkened the glaciers, causing them to absorb more heat.
Huss said winter snow cover was important for two reasons.
“On the one hand, it protects the bare ice from melting. The longer you have snow, the longer you avoid the loss of old ice,” Huss said in an interview at the Federal Polytechnic Institute ETHZ, where he is a professor of glaciology.
“On the other hand, the snow is important also for generating new food for the glacier. The more snow you have, the higher the potential to keep some of the snow at high elevation and to form new ice,” he added.
The accelerated melting in the Alps is part of a wider global trend. Experts say global warming also contributed to destabilising a Himalayan slope that collapsed in August, triggering catastrophic flooding in Nepal.
Satellites have also documented significant glacier shrinkage in Greenland and Antarctica over the past half-century.
Percentage loss rises as glaciers shrink
In absolute terms, the amount of ice lost in Switzerland this year was lower than in 2003. However, the percentage decline was greater because Switzerland’s glaciers now contain roughly one-third of the ice volume they had 23 years ago.
In 2003, glaciers lost 3.5% of their total ice volume.
The accelerated melting has significant consequences for Switzerland. The loss of 2.2 trillion litres (581 billion gallons) of water between July and September is equivalent to about four times the country’s annual water consumption.
Switzerland, with a population of around 9.1 million, generates more than half of its electricity from hydropower.
The effects of glacier loss extend beyond Switzerland. The country is considered Europe’s water tower and supplies water to some of the continent’s major rivers, including the Danube, Po, Rhine and Rhone.
Experts said the “extreme melting” recorded this year resulted in an average reduction of between 2.5 and 4 metres (about 8 to 13 feet) in glacier thickness. Some glacier tongues lost as much as 10 metres (33 feet).
Expert teams have been assessing runoff and crevasses formed by water flowing through the glaciers. In some areas, they have used red dye in streams to track water flows.
The Allalin, Clariden, Rhone and Aletsch glaciers were among those that experienced their largest melt on record this year. Aletsch is the largest glacier in the Alps.
