EAPSI: Investigating the Alaskan Black Carbon Deposition During the Last Millennium from the Mt. Hunter Ice Core

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Black carbon (also known as soot) significantly alters the energy balance across the earth system, resulting in higher air temperatures and lower ice reflectivity, both of which have impacts on glacier melt rates and, therefore, global sea level. Ice cores provide one of the best available records of how atmospheric black carbon concentrations changed prior to the recent instrumental period (after ~1950 AD), allowing one to evaluate the impact of black carbon emissions on climate and glacier mass balance in the past. This project will develop the first millennial-length ice core black carbon record from Alaska in order to determine sources of pollution to Alaska and to model the effects of soot on Alaskan glacier melt rates. This data will be analyzed under the guidance of Dr. Ross Edwards, one of the world's leading experts in black carbon analysis at the Curtin University in Perth, Australia. This study will melt and analyze a 208 meter ice core collected during the summer of 2013 from the summit plateau of Mt. Hunter, Alaska. Analysis will be conducted on an SP2 black carbon analyzer, a state-of-the-art instrument capable to providing the highest quality record of black carbon concentration variation. The proposed research will result in a time series of Alaskan black carbon concentration spanning the last 1,000 years. This novel record will help to establish the sources of black carbon to Alaska and to constrain the impact of black carbon deposition on the mass balance of Alaskan glaciers over the last millennium. This NSF EAPSI award is funded in collaboration with the Australian Academy of Science.