Himalayan glaciers have lost 40 per cent area since Ice Age, minister tells Parliament

Vijay Mohan

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Chandigarh, February 9

In the last 400 to 700 years, the glaciers in the most parts of the Himalayan region have lost around 40 per cent of their area, shrinking from 28,000 square kilometers to around 19,600 square kilometers. This has significant implications for fresh water resources and its socio-economic impact.

Revealing this in Parliament today, the Ministry of Earth Science, while quoting a recent study by the University of Leeds, stated that Himalayan glaciers have lost ice ten times more quickly over the last few decades than on average since the last major glacier expansion.

In its study, the university’s research team had reconstructed the size and ice surfaces of 14,798 Himalayan glaciers as they were during the Little Ice Age, which was 400-700 years ago.

“Melting glaciers have significant impact on water resources of Himalayan rivers due to change in glacier basin hydrology, downstream water budget, impact on hydropower plants due to variation in discharge, flash flood and sedimentation,” the Minister of State for Science and Technology and Earth Sciences, Dr Jitendra Singh said in the Lok Sabha in response to a question by Member of Parliament Dushyant Singh.

“They also increase risk related to glacier hazards due to enhanced number and volume of glacier lakes, accelerated flash flood and glacial lake outburst floods, and impact agro practices in high Himalayan region, etc,” he added.

Glaciers are present in Jammu and Kashmir, Ladakh, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh. Glaciers in Tibet and Nepal, also have an impact onmany tributaries and rivers flowing into India.

Various Indian institutes, universities and organisations such as the Geological Survey of India, Wadia Institute of Himalayan Geology, National Centre for Polar and Ocean Research (NCPOR), National Institute of Hydrology (NIH), Space Application Centre (SAC) and Indian Institute of Science monitor Himalayan glaciers for various scientific studies, including glacier melting and have reported accelerated heterogeneous mass loss in the glaciers, the ministry said.

“The mean retreat rate of Hindu Kush Himalayan glaciers is 14.9 – 15.1 meters per annum (m/a), which varies from 12.7 – 13.2 m/a in the Indus, 15.5 -14.4 m/a in Ganga and 20.2 – 19.7 m/a in the Brahmaputra river basins,” the ministry’s statement said. “However, glaciers in the Karakoram region have shown comparatively minor length change, minus 1.37 – 22.8 m/a, indicating stable condition,” the statement added.

Mass balance studies conducted for Himalayan glaciers by various universities and other research organisations have also revealed that majority of the Himalayan glaciers are melting or retreating at varying rates, the ministry said.