The impact of our warming world on Earth’s ice

9 February 2017

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The impact of our warming world on Earth’s ice

Top international scholars will gather at Victoria University of Wellington next week to discuss the connections between Earth’s frozen waters and the global climate system.

The International Symposium on The Cryosphere in a Changing Climate is the first gathering of its kind to bring together three leading organisations in the field of cryospheric research—the International Glaciological Society, the International Association of Cryospheric Sciences/International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics and the World Climate Research Programme Climate & Cryosphere Project.

The five-day symposium will look at a number of aspects of the cryosphere (frozen parts of the Earth), including glaciers and ice sheets, ice cores, sea ice, snow and sea-level change.

Victoria University Associate Professor and conference organiser, Andrew Mackintosh says the event will bring some of the world’s leading ice and climate scientists to Wellington. “It will also provide us with an opportunity to showcase the world-leading cryospheric research being carried out by Victoria’s Antarctic Research Centre”.

Plenary speakers include Professor Dorthe Dahl Jensen from the University of Copenhagen on ice cores, Professor Ben Marzeion from the University of Bremen talking about glacier mass loss and Professor Eric Rignot from University of California, Irvine discussing the Antarctic ice sheet. Professor Rignot will also deliver Victoria University’s annual S.T. Lee Lecture on Tuesday 14 February, which is open to the public.

Professor Rob DeConto from University of Massachusetts will discuss the future fate of the polar ice sheets and implications for global coastlines. Professor DeConto won the 2016 Tinker-Muse Prize for Science and Policy in Antarctica—a leading global award for Antarctic science.

Michael White, senior editor at prestigious international journal Nature will give the final talk of the symposium. The talk, which is open to the local science community, will explore the publishing climate science papers in Nature.

Visit the symposium webpage for more information including the programme of speakers.

The symposium is being hosted by Victoria University, and co-sponsored by the National Institute for Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA), Antarctica New Zealand, GNS Science and the University of Otago.

What: The International Symposium on The Cryosphere in a Changing Climate

When: 13-17 February 2017

Where: Rutherford House, 23 Lambton Quay, Wellington

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