Hourly surface meltwater routing for a Greenlandic supraglacial catchment across hillslopes and through a dense topological channel network

Abstract

Recent work has identified complex perennial supraglacial stream and river networks in areas of the Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS) ablation zone. Current surface mass balance (SMB) models appear to overestimate meltwater runoff in these networks compared to in-channel measurements of supraglacial discharge. Here, we constrain SMB models using the hillslope river routing model (HRR), a spatially explicit flow routing model used in terrestrial hydrology, in a 63 km