Inventory and Spatial Distribution of Glacial Lakes in Arunachal Pradesh, Eastern Himalaya, India
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Inventory and Spatial Distribution of Glacial Lakes in Arunachal Pradesh, Eastern Himalaya, India Suraj Mal1,*, Atul Kumar2, Rakesh Bhambri3, Udo Schickhoff4 and R. B. Singh5 1
Department of Geography, Shaheed Bhagat Singh College, University of Delhi, Delhi - 110 017, India. Center for Study of Regional Development, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi - 110 067, India. 3 Centre for Glaciology, Wadia Institute of Himalayan Geology, Dehradun - 248 001, India. 4 CEN Center for Earth System Research and Sustainability, Institute of Geography, University of Hamburg, Germany. 5 Department of Geography, Delhi School of Economics, University of Delhi, Delhi - 110 017, India *E-mail: [email protected] 2
ABSTRACT The present study generates a glacial lake inventory of Arunachal Pradesh, Eastern Himalaya, India using Landsat 8 Operational Land Imager (OLI) images (2016-2018). The study reveals that there are in total 1532 (> 0.001 km2) glacial lakes, covering an area of 93.7 km2. Glacier erosion lakes are the most dominant type with 1268 glacial lakes (82.8%) and an area of 76.8 km2 (~82%). About 50% of the lakes are located in the four districts of eastern Arunachal Pradesh, while ~16% in the three districts of central and ~33% in the four districts of western Arunachal Pradesh. The western Arunachal Pradesh has mixed patterns of glacial lakes types, whereas the erosion lakes dominate the eastern and central Arunachal Pradesh. The current inventory can serve as a baseline database for understanding glacial lake-related flood hazard studies in Arunachal Pradesh. INTRODUCTION Glacial lakes are water bodies with adequate volume (Raj and Kumar, 2016), formed by glacial activities, as influenced by climate fluctuations in high mountains and continental ice sheets (Allen et al., 2019; Bhambri et al., 2018, 2015). The glacial erosion of valley floors and slopes, transportation of eroded material, and its deposition, as well as the accelerated glacier recession, lead to the origin and evolution of various types of glacial lakes (Hewitt, 1982; Price et al., 2013; Scheffers and Kelletat, 2016; Yao et al., 2018). Glacial lakes, being dynamic water bodies, regularly change in terms of area, shape, and water volume in response to the climate change-induced glacier and snow and local topographic changes (Bolch et al., 2019; Ives et al., 2010; Nie et al., 2013; Raj and Kumar, 2016; Zhang et al., 2015). These lakes are not only an essential part of the mountain hydrosphere and regional hydrology but also act as an indicator of climate change in glaciated regions of the world (Bhambri et al., 2018, 2015; Bolch et al., 2019; Krause et al., 2019). More detailed information on the evolutionary process of glacial lakes leads to an improved scientific understanding of the mountain cryosphere responses to climate change, in particular in the regions where field-based meteorological observations are scanty, such as the Himalayas (Aggarwal et al., 2017; Nie et al., 2017, 2013; Raj and Kumar, 2016). Several studies suggest that glacial lakes a
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