NAIROBI - How much East Africa’s tropical glaciers have shrunk since the 20th century, according to a new study.

Roughly half of the glacier area has been lost in the last two decades, the study found. Due to their proximity to the equator, glaciers atop Mount Kenya, Mount Kilimanjaro, and DR Congo’s Rwenzori Mountains are particularly exposed to global warming.

More recent studies have focused on Kilimanjaro and Mount Kenya but the Rwenzori Range has not been considered for nearly two decades, which introduces an uncertainty about the remaining glacierization in East Africa.

The glaciers could disappear by the 2050s, according to researchers. Declining cloud cover atop the mountains — an indicator of climate change — was responsible for the rapid speed at which the glaciers are melting, the study noted.

the present study provides insights into the most recent glacier extents of all three mountain regions using a manual, multitemporal analysis of high-resolution satellite images for the years 2021/2022. The glacierization in East Africa is estimated to be 1.36 km2, with a glacier area of 0.98 km2 on Kilimanjaro, 0.069 km2 on Mount Kenya and 0.38 km2 in the Rwenzori Range. The uncertainty is determined to be within 12.5%.

Compared to previous estimations, the overall area has declined by more than a half of its early 21st century extent.

Being mainly controlled by high-altitude hygric seasonality, these glaciers are particularly valuable indicators of tropical climate variability and climate change.

For the full text of the study, visit: https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/2752-5295/ad1fd7