After the Arctic and Antarctica, the snow and glaciers of the Himalayas are the largest store of water on the planet. When the ice of this “Third Pole” melts each spring, it supplies the largest rivers in Asia—including the Ganges, Indus, Brahmaputra, Mekong, Yellow, and Yangtze rivers—with a surge of fresh water that is desperately needed to support the huge populations lining their banks.
This region, however, is warming rapidly—nearly twice as fast as the rest of the world. Though greenhouse gasses have traditionally been blamed for the melting ice of the Tibetan Plateau, new research suggests another factor may be equally significant and could be the key for preserving this vital resource.
A study co-authored by NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies and the Chinese Academy of Sciences has identified black carbon, the dark and dangerous component in the soot, as a key factor in warming in the Himalayas. “During the last 20 years,” explained Junji Cao, a researcher from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, “the black soot concentration has increased two- to three-fold relative to its concentration in 1975.”
Black carbon is produced by diesel engines, coal-fired power plants, industrial processes, and outdoor cooking stoves in India and China, and is pulled into the Himalayas by circulating air currents. The dark soot absorbs solar radiation, warming the air that crashes against the foothills of the Himalayas and propels it into higher elevations. This “heat pump” effect is thought to be the source of the region’s rapid warming.
– from treehugger.com