Swiss glaciers are melting at an above-average rate this year. This is stated by the monitoring body GLAMOS, reports "Reuters", quoted by News.bg.
Earlier this year, glaciologists noted the abundant winter and spring snowpack in the Alps and expressed hope that this signaled a halt to years of severe decline or even a reversal of the losses.
But at average temperatures in August, a few degrees above freezing, even at station "Jungfraujoch" at a height of 3,571 meters, located above the Alech glacier, scientists measured record ice losses across the country this month.
GLAMOS reports that Swiss glaciers have lost 2.5% of their volume this year, which is above the average for the last decade.
"It is worrying for me that despite the perfect year we actually had for glaciers, with the snow-rich winter and the rather cool and rainy spring, it was still not enough," said GLAMOS director Matthias Huss.
" p>"If the trend we have seen this year continues, it will be a disaster for Swiss glaciers," he predicted.
It is noted that one of the factors that has accelerated the melting this year is dust from the Sahara. It gives the ice sheets a brown or pink tint, which inhibits their ability to reflect sunlight back into the atmosphere.
More than half of the glaciers in the Alps are in Switzerland, where temperatures are rising about twice the global average due to climate change.
Last week, the Swiss government gave approval to review segments of its border with Italy as melting ice ridges between the two countries change the shape of the watersheds that define the border.
If greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise, by 2100 the glaciers in the Alps are expected to lose more than 80% of their current mass.
Earlier this year, Europe's top human rights court ruled that Switzerland was not doing enough to stop the effects of climate change. The Swiss government denies this.