Blowing snow contributions to the Arctic snow-on-sea ice budget using ICESat-2 observations

Abstract

Blowing snow modulates the evolution of snow over Arctic sea ice through redistribution and sublimation. Here, we present the first multi-year pan-Arctic observational estimates of blowing snow occurrence, properties, and associated fluxes based on NASA Ice, Cloud and land Elevation Satellite 2 (ICESat-2) satellite observations for five cold seasons (November through April 2018–2023). On average, ICESat-2 detects blowing snow 19 % of the time over sea ice, with localized frequencies reaching up to 35 % in the Central Arctic, where blowing snow heights (optical depths) reach 150 m (0.20). We find that blowing snow occurrence shows strong interannual variability related to large-scale climate variability, particularly the Arctic Oscillation (AO). During positive AO phases, blowing snow occurrence increases substantially, with up to a two-fold increase in the Central Arctic. Blowing snow occurrence, height, and optical depth all exhibit a strong dependence on wind speed, increasing by more than five-fold between 4 and 15 ms-1. ICESat-2 blowing snow sublimation estimates average 1.63 cm snow-water-equivalent (SWE) per cold season, thus removing 14 % of pan-Arctic snowfall. In the Central Arctic, the offset is 18 %–24 %. These values are consistent with simulations from the high-resolution SnowModel-LG (1.66 cm SWE) and a simpler, threshold-based model (2.07 cm SWE). Interannual variability in snowfall and sublimation can be 1–2 cm SWE, though not always in phase, resulting in snowfall removals that range from 9 % to 20 %. Critically, these findings provide satellite-based constraints on blowing snow processes over sea ice and underscore the importance of blowing snow sublimation in the Arctic snow budget.