Long-term records of glacier evolution and associated proglacial lakes on the Tibetan Plateau (1976‒2020)

Figures & data

Figure 1. The locations of the seven typical glaciers on the Tibetan Plateau that were selected for this study.

Table 1. Details of the remote sensing data used (data source: http://glovis.usgs.gov/). The relevant satellite sensors are Landsat-2 MSS, Landsat-5 TM, Landsat-7 ETM, and Landsat-8 OLI.

Glacier name (Glacier type)	Dates	Satellite	Path	Row	Resolution (m)	Weather system (Geographical zone)
Chemayong drong Glacier (Subcontinental glacier)	1976-11-16	Landsat 2	154	39	60.0	Indian summer monsoon (Himalaya Mountains, Head water of Yarlung Zangbo, Brahmaputra area)
	2001-07-01, 2004-11-07, 2005-10-25, 2006-10-11, 2007-09-20, 2008-11-09, 2009-09-25, 2010-10-14, 2011-10-01, 1990-01-08	Landsat 5	144	39	28.5
	2000-12-29, 2002-06-10, 2003-11-04, 2006-10-11, 2012-11-28	Landsat 7	144	39	30.0
	2013-11-23, 2014-06-03, 2015-09-10, 2016-12-17, 2017-10-24, 2018-11-21, 2019-10-23, 2020-10-09	Landsat 8	144	39	30.0
Shenmo Glacier, Shene Glacier, Zeng Glacier (Subcontinental glaciers)	1976-12-17	Landsat 2	148	40	60	Indian summer monsoon (Himalaya Mountains, Southern Tibet)
	1989-11-27, 1999-12-09, 2005-11-23	Landsat 5	138	40	30
	2010-11-13	Landsat 7	138	40	30
	2018-10-26, 2020-10-15	Landsat 8	138	40	30
Purokhangri Glacier (Continental glacier)	1976-12-19	Landsat 2	150	37	60	Westerlies (Northern Tibet)
	1996-12-14, 1999-08-17	Landsat 5	140	36	30
	2004-09-15, 2010-12-05	Landsat 5	140	36	30
	2015-09-14, 2020-10-13	Landsat 8	140	36	30
Mikdui Glacier (Debris-covered glacier)	1989-12-17, 1999-11-11, 2009-11-22, 2010-12-27	Landsat 5	134	40	60	Indian summer monsoon (Eastern, Southern Tibet)
	2000-12-07, 2001-11-24, 2002-12-13, 2003-11-14, 2004-12-18, 2005-11-03, 2006-12-24, 2007-11-25, 2008-11-11, 2011-11-20, 2012-12-24	Landsat 7	134	40	30
	2013-11-17, 2014-12-22, 2015-12-25, 2016-11-09, 2017-11-12, 2020-12-22	Landsat 8	134	40	30
Changyong Glacier (Subcontinental glacier)	1976-12-17	Landsat 2	148	40	60	Indian summer monsoon (Yarlung Zangbo, Brahmaputra)
	1989-11-27, 1999-12-09	Landsat 5	138	40	30
	2005-11-23, 2010-11-13	Landsat 5	138	40	30
	2018-10-26, 2020-10-15	Landsat 8	138	40	30

Figure 2. Flowchart showing details of the method used to produce the glacier and proglacial lake dataset.

Figure 3. Images showing the boundary of the Chema Yongdrong Glacier terminus: (a) 7-5-4 band combination showing the glacier border, (b) enlarged vector image of the glacier terminus, and (c) enlarged near-infrared image of the glacier terminus.

Figure 4. Enlarged view of the fragmented Purok Khangri Glacier: (a) northern and (b) western part (band combination: 7-5-4).

Table 2. Details of the glacier attributes in the dataset.

ID	Field name	Data type	Field description
1	FID	Short Int	Identification
2	Shape	Text	Geometric type
3	Glc_Name	Text	Name of glacier
4	Glc_Long	Double	Longitude of glacier
5	Glc_Lati	Double	Latitude of glacier
6	Prm_Image	Text	Main image of glacier boundary
7	Altit_ave	Double	Average altitude of glacier
8	Mtn_Name	Text	Mountain range
9	Pref_Name	Text	Administrative region
10	Compiler	Text	Interpreter
11	Shape_Area	Double	Glacier area
12	Shape_Per	Double	Glacier perimeter

Figure 5. The size of the relative error in the areas of individual glaciers(a) and proglacial lakes(b).

Table 3. Changes in glacier and proglacial lake areas (GA: glacier area, PLA: proglacial lake area; + means glacier/proglacial lake increase, – means glacier/proglacial lake decrease).

Name of glacier	Period	GA (km^2)	GA change (km^2)	GA change rate (%)	PLA (km^2)	PLA change (km^2)	PLA change rate (%)
Chema Yongdrong	1976	22.98 ± 0.11	/	/	0.7 ± 2.83	/	/
	1990	22.55 ± 0.03	–0.43	3.04	0.71 ± 0.54	+0.14	20
	2000	22.26 ± 0.03	–0.29	0.09	0.81 ± 0.59	–0.03	3.57
	2010	21.67 ± 0.03	–0.59	2.65	1.09 ± 0.44	+0.28	34.56
	2020	21.02 ± 0.01	–0.65	2.9	1.21 ± 0.10	+0.12	11.01
	1976–2020	21.73 ±0.03	–1.96	8.52	1.05±0.46	+0.51	72.85
Purok Khangri	1976	435.5 ± 0.012	/	/	/	/	/
	1996	418.98 ± 0.003	–16.52	3.79	/	/	/
	2004	395.36 ± 0	–23.62	5.64	/	/	/
	2010	401.97 ± 0.003	+6.61	1.67	/	/	/
	2020	384.74 ± 0.004	–17.23	4.29	/	/	/
	1976–2020	404.92 ± 0.004	–50.76	11.66	/	/	/
Changyong	1989	6.5 ± 0.13	/	/	/	/	/
	1999	6.48 ± 0.13	–0.02	0.31	/	/	/
	2010	6.4 ± 0.13	–0.08	1.23	/	/	/
	2020	6.22 ± 0.003	–0.18	2.81	/	/	/
	1989–2020	6.38 ± 0.09	–0.28	4.31	/	/	/
Mikdui	1989	29.93 ± 0.07	/	/	/	/	/
	1999	29.09 ± 0.02	–0.84	2.81	/	/	/
	2010	29.22 ± 0.02	0.13	0.45	/	/	/
	2020	28.51 ± 0.01	–0.71	2.43	/	/	/
	1989–2020	29.39 ± 0.02	–1.42	4.74	/	/	/
Shene	1976	38.69 ± 0.07	/	/	5.06 ± 0.65
	1989	38.23 ± 0.02	–0.46	1.19	5.35 ± 0.16	+0.29	5.73
	1999	38.09 ± 0.02	–0.14	0.37	5.37 ± 0.17	+0.02	0.37
	2010	37.32 ± 0.02	–0.77	2.02	5.42 ± 0.14	+0.05	0.93
	2020	35.71 ± 0.01	–1.61	4.31	5.57 ± 0.14	+0.15	2.77
	1976–2020	37.53 ± 0.02	–2.98	7.70	5.38±0.22	+0.51	10.08
Shenmo	1976	33.05 ± 0.10	/	/	0.6 ± 2.73	/	//
	1989	32.71 ± 0.02	–0.34	1.03	1.06 ± 0.45	+0.46	76.67
	1999	32.34 ± 0.02	–0.37	1.13	1.26 ± 0.38	+0.20	18.87
	2010	31.72 ± 0.03	–0.62	1.92	1.58 ± 0.30	+0.32	25.04
	2020	30.88 ± 0.01	–0.84	2.65	1.96 ± 0.25	+0.38	24.05
	1976–2020	32.01 ± 0.03	–2.17	6.57	1.39±0.67	+1.36	226.67
Zeng	1976-11-16	87.12 ± 0.02	/	/	1.04 ± 1.72		/
	1989-11-27	85.59 ± 0.01	–1.53	1.76	0.93 ± 0.53	–0.11	10.58
	1999-12-09	85.41 ± 0.01	–0.18	0.21	0.95 ± 0.49	+0.02	2.15
	2010-11-13	85.18 ± 0.01	–0.23	0.27	0.74 ± 0.62	–0.21	22.11
	2020-10-15	84.19 ± 0.00	–0.99	1.16	0.79 ± 0.61	+0.05	6.76
	1976–2020	85.33 ± 0.01	–2.93	3.36	0.88±0.73	–0.25	24.04

Figure 6. Maps showing details of changes in the Purok Khangri Glacier (Areas where notable changes have occurred are circled.) the band combination for (a) is 4-3-2. (The glacier appears white in this image because no Landsat MSS band 5 in 1976 image). The band combination for (b), (c), and (d) is 5-4-3; and the band combination for (e) and (f) is 7-5-4.

Figure 7. Maps showing changes in the boundaries of seven typical glaciers: (a) Chema Yongdrong Glacier and proglacial lake, (b) Purok Khangri Glacier, (c) Mikdui Glacier, (d) Shene, Shenmo and Zeng glaciers and their proglacial lakes, and (e) Changyong Glacier, the yellow lines mark the 1976 boundaries and the red lines the 2020 boundaries; in parts (c) and (e), the yellow lines mark the 1989 boundaries and the red lines for the 2020 boundaries. (f) shows the distribution of these glaciers.

Data availability statement

The data that support the findings of this study are openly available in http://doi.org/10.57760/sciencedb.j00076.00131.