On the influence of mineral dust on glacial albedo at Nevado Huascarán (Cordillera Blanca, Peru)

Plain Language Summary - The melting of glaciers in the tropical Andes has many consequences for local mountain communities, including increased water scarcity conflicts and vulnerability to to deadly outburst floods. Many factors, including light absorbing particles (LAPs), contribute to the melting of glaciers. LAPs, such as mineral dust, are emitted from terrestrial sources by a variety of mechanisms (e.g., climate forcing, envrionmental change, forest degradation, urbanization, etc.) and then transported by wind and deposited onto glaciers, thereby causing the surfaces to darken. Surface darkening accelerates glacier melting because dark surfaces absorb more heat than brighter surfaces. However, very little is known about the presence of mineral dust in the tropical Andes. To improve our understanding of how mineral dust is impacting the loss of glaciers in this region, we investigate the dust records of two ice cores drilled from the region’s highest mountain (Nevado Huascarán, Peru). The dust trends preserved in the ice cores were used as inputs for the SNICAR radiative transfer model, which estimates surface darkening caused by LAPs. Our results show that mineral dust has only a small impact on surface darkening at the high elevation Huascarán sites, and that this impact is likely to remain minimal throughout the twenty-first century.

Recommended citation: Weber A. M., Beaudon, E., Sierra-Hernández, M. R., Davis, M., Kenny, D., Shutkin, T. Y., & Thompson, L. G. (2026). On the influence of mineral dust on glacial albedo at Nevado Huascarán (Cordillera Blanca, Peru) Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres. 131(7). DOI:10.1029/2025JD045574