Yorkshire Philosophical Society

Event Information

Relative sea-level changes and the history of the Greenland Ice Sheet
Dr Sarah Woodroffe, Associate Professor, Department of Geography, University of Durham

We can use relative sea-level data from lake basins around Greenland to better understand how the ice sheet responded to climate changes during the past few thousand years. Coastal saltmarshes in SW and SE Greenland also contain records of recent sea-level changes (past few decades to hundreds of years) that can help us understand how the Greenland Ice Sheet has responded to more recent climate changes. In this talk I will describe how we can use sea-level data from Greenland to reconstruct past ice sheet change and reflect on how by using precise reconstructions from saltmarshes, together with modelling data we are now improving our understanding of 20th century ice sheet changes around Greenland.

Partnership Lecture with the Royal Geographical Society and PLACE

Image: Jakobshaven Isbrae, the fastest flowing ice stream in Greenland.