Försämrad korrelation mellan storleken av Kebnekaises sydtoppsglaciär och andra klimatindikatorer
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) recognizes glaciers as the best land-indicator of climate change. A variety of studies have concluded, using both modeling and field studies, that above all climate parameters precipitation, particularly winter precipitation, and summer temperature controls the change in glacier mass balance. With global warming almost all glaciers on Earth are losing mass. In this study, the summit-glacier constituting Kebnekaise's south summit (called the Southern-summit henceforth), Sweden's highest point, is studied to see how it is affected by winter precipitation and summer temperature during the period 1968?2013. Whether the Southern-summit reacts on climate fluctuations, during the period 1968?2012, in the same way as the two adjacent glaciers Storglaciären and Rabots glacier is also studied. The Southern-summit with its maximum height at 2120 m a.s.l. in 1968 shrinks at an average rate of 0.35 m/yr. The Southern-summit is according to measurements in 2013, 2100 m a.s.l., only 3 m higher than Sweden's second highest point, the Kebnekaise north summit. With the general decrease of the Southern-summit's height, it can take up to 10 years before it is permanently not Sweden's highest point, but only a couple of years until, at least temporarily, it becomes Sweden's second highest point, it should be noted that is a simplification. Regression analyzes indicate that there is a weaker correlation between the height of the Southern-summit and the other climate indicators during the period 1984?2013 than during the period 1968?1983. Because of the lack of research on summit-glaciers, it is difficult to determine why the correlation between the various factors is better in the earlier period, however, some possible theories might be: (1) Meteorological data must be viewed as a system and not as two individual parameters. (2) Because of the Southern-summit's size it is more sensitive to climate change than the surrounding glaciers. (3) The Southern-summit has undergone two greater reductions in height of 10 m during two short periods and may have reached some kind of minimum value where ablation and accumulation patterns are not as expected.