Antara, Denpasar – The Meteorology, Climatology, and Geophysics Agency (BMKG) discovered that the glacier's thickness atop Puncak Jaya, Papua, decreased by about four meters, or 66 percent, in December 2023 compared to the same period in 2022, based on their latest monitoring.
"This is likely related to the El Nino conditions in 2022-2023," said Donaldi Permana, the Coordinator of the Research and Development Division of Climatology at the BMKG, during a virtual seminar on sustainable climate in commemoration of World Meteorological Day in Denpasar, Bali, on Thursday.
According to him, BMKG has been monitoring the glaciers on Puncak Jaya from 2009 to 2023. These glaciers are some of the few remaining tropical glaciers in the world and are found at high elevations due to the mountain's altitude, which reaches over 4,800 meters (15,700 feet) above sea level.
From 2016 to 2022, he said, the average reduction in ice area reached about 0.07 square kilometers per year, with the estimated total glacier area in April 2022 reaching 0.23 square kilometers.
In the 2022 monitoring, BMKG estimated that the remaining ice thickness in December 2022 reached six meters. However, one year later, in December 2023, the latest data showed that the ice thickness was thinning further, with a reduction of up to four meters or leaving a thickness of only two meters.
He mentioned that climate change due to global warming has played a significant role in gradually thinning the only permanent snow cover in tropical Indonesia.
According to BMKG, in 1850, the coverage of permanent ice in Puncak Jaya, Papua, reached about 19 square kilometers, and then gradually decreased to an estimated 0.34 square kilometers in May 2022.
In addition to the thinning glaciers on Puncak Jaya, he mentioned that several mountains in tropical regions have also experienced ice melting, including Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, Quelccaya in Peru, and Naimona'nyi in the Himalayas, Tibet.
He explained that global climate change in the period 2023 was the hottest year with the global average temperature over the past 10 years, from 2014 to 2023, reaching 1.20 plus or minus 0.12 degrees Celsius.
Donaldi emphasized the importance of reducing carbon dioxide emissions, including mitigation and adaptation measures.
"If carbon dioxide is not mitigated or reduced immediately, it will remain in the atmosphere for quite a long time, about 100 years from now, with a concentration of 33 percent," he said.
Several mitigation and adaptation measures need to be taken, including tree planting, reducing and recycling plastic, transitioning to green energy, saving electricity, conserving fuel, and reducing the use of private vehicles.
Source: https://jakartaglobe.id/news/el-nino-thins-the-only-glacier-in-indonesia-bmk