Earth System Dynamics
Earth System Dynamics
ESD
Articles | Volume 17, issue 3
Articles | Volume 17, issue 3
https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-17-769-2026
© Author(s) 2026. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-17-769-2026
© Author(s) 2026. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Articles | Volume 17, issue 3
Research article
 | Highlight paper
 | 
19 Jun 2026
Research article | Highlight paper |  | 19 Jun 2026

Chaotic fluctuations in Greenland ice streams limit predictability of ice sheet collapse

Kolja Kypke, Marisa Montoya, Alexander Robinson, Jorge Alvarez-Solas, Jan Swierczek-Jereczek, and Peter Ditlevsen

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Latest update: 19 Jun 2026
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Editorial statement
This article provides a concrete example of how chaotic fluctuations in Greenland ice streams limit numerical predictability of ice sheet collapse. The paper identifies a limit to the horizon of predictability and attributes it to the physical structure of the ice sheet. For a fixed warming magnitude and an ensemble of warming rates and initial conditions, the timing of the collapse can differ by tens or hundreds of thousands of years.
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This model study sets out to investigate how the collapse of the Greenland ice sheet to a virtually ice-free state due to increasing temperatures depends on the rate of this increase. We find oscillations in ice volume on millennial timescales that impact the time it takes before the ice sheet collapses, concluding that there is a mode of deterministic chaos internal to the ice sheet dynamics.
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