Local summer insolation and greenhouse gas forcing drove warming and glacier retreat in New Zealand during the Holocene

Dowling, Lisa; Eaves, Shaun; Norton, Kevin; Mackintosh, Andrew; Anderson, Brian; Hidy, Alan; Lorrey, Andrew; Vargo, Lauren; Ryan, Matthew; Tims, Stephen

doi:10.1016/j.quascirev.2021.107068

Local summer insolation and greenhouse gas forcing drove warming and glacier retreat in New Zealand during the Holocene

Journal Article · Mon Jul 19 00:00:00 EDT 2021 · Quaternary Science Reviews

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.quascirev.2021.107068· OSTI ID:1825368

^[1]; Eaves, Shaun ^[1]; Norton, Kevin ^[1]; Mackintosh, Andrew ^[2]; Anderson, Brian ^[1]; ^[3]; Lorrey, Andrew ^[4]; ^[1]; ^[1]; ^[5]

Victoria Univ. of Wellington (New Zealand)
Monash Univ., Melbourne, VIC (Australia)
Lawrence Livermore National Lab. (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States)
National Inst. of Water and Atmospheric Research (New Zealand)
Australian National Univ., Canberra (Australia)

Geological climate archives from the Holocene Epoch provide baseline information concerning natural climate variability. Temperate mountain glacier extent is sensitive to summer air temperature, thus geological records of past glacier length changes are a useful proxy for this climatic variable. Here we present a new cosmogenic ¹⁰Be chronology of glacier length changes at Dart Glacier in the Southern Alps, New Zealand. Prominent moraines deposited 321 ± 44 yr ago (n = 11) and 7.8 ± 0.3 ka (n = 5) show glaciers during the Little Ice Age were less extensive than during the early Holocene. This pattern of net Holocene glacier retreat is consistent with emerging data from other catchments in New Zealand and across the southern mid-latitudes. Using the physical framework of a transient global climate model simulation, we suggest that cool summers in the early Holocene were promoted by the local summer insolation minimum, together with low atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations, causing an early Holocene austral glacial maximum. An insolation-driven reduction in seasonality at southern mid-latitudes may reconcile differences between early Holocene temperature reconstructions where climate proxies have different seasonal sensitivities. Furthermore, we suggest that rising greenhouse gas concentrations after 7 ka caused regional-scale glacier retreat and appear to be the dominant driver of multi-millennial summer temperature trends in the southern mid-latitudes during the present interglacial.

View Accepted Manuscript (DOE)

Research Organization:: Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States)

Sponsoring Organization:: USDOE National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA)

Grant/Contract Number:: AC52-07NA27344

OSTI ID:: 1825368

Report Number(s):: LLNL-JRNL--815423; 1024612

Journal Information:: Quaternary Science Reviews, Journal Name: Quaternary Science Reviews Journal Issue: na Vol. 266; ISSN 0277-3791

Publisher:: ElsevierCopyright Statement

Country of Publication:: United States

Language:: English

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Related Subjects

58 GEOSCIENCES
Cosmogenic surface exposure dating
Geomorphology
Glacial
Glaciation
Holocene
Little Ice Age
Moraine chronology
New Zealand
Paleoclimate modeling
Southern Hemisphere
Southern Ocean

Local summer insolation and greenhouse gas forcing drove warming and glacier retreat in New Zealand during the Holocene

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