SES-03. Identifying the Drivers of Solid Earth Deformation in Southwest Greenland

Abstract
The degradation of the Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS) is transferring thousands of gigatons of mass from the land to the global oceans. This contemporary transfer of mass results in elastic deformation of the Earth’s crust, as material is transferred from the ice sheet towards the continental margin. In historically glaciated regions, such as the GrIS, Antarctica and Iceland, this elastic deformation signal is convolved with longer-term subsidence and rebound occurring in response to historical fluctuations in the mass and configuration of the global ice sheets. Separating out the short and long term components of surface deformation is vital for improving future sea level rise predictions, yet remains challenging. We use differential interferometric synthetic aperture radar (DInSAR) timeseries to provide high resolution maps of surface deformation in the Søndre Strømfjord region of west Greenland. This region is home to a complex network of surface sources and sinks that result in spatiotemporally variable surface subsidence and uplift. We use geodetic and remote sensing timeseries data to isolate mass transfer from ice, fluvial and sediment loads to separate out the different drivers of present day surface deformation within the region and provide an updated assessment of the rates of long term deformation using GNSS site records.