A Northern Hemisphere Volcanic Chemistry Record (1869–1984) and Climatic Implications Using a South Greenland Ice Core

The effect of volcanic emission of acidic aerosols on climate is well documented. The presence of acid droplets in the stratosphere can reduce transmissivity and hence decrease surface temperatures. Since the amount and chemical composition of erupted material has important effects on regional climate, knowledge of past volcanic events is of extreme importance. Detailed glaciochemical records provide the only milieu wherein the geochemistry of paleovolcanic events can be fully documented. We present a detailed sulfate and chloride record from an ice core drilled at site 20 D, 40 km SW of Dye 3 in southern Greenland. The record spans the time period 1869–1984 with chemical analyses of approximately eight samples per year. Time series decomposition and locally weighted scatter plot smoothing techniques were used to extract long term trends from the data so that individual volcanic eruptions could be documented. A number of events identified here have been unnoticed previously and a high percentage of the major chemical signatures documenting these events is associated with large decreases in temperature in the latitudinal zone 60–90 °N. Many authors have pointed out that the amount of volcanic acids such as HCl and H2SO4 injected into the atmosphere has a very important influence on global climate, yet this volcanic input has been difficult to quantify prior to ∼1960. Our data help to alleviate this problem. These individual events can be compared to available frost tree ring data from North America, further establishing a volcanism-climatic linkage.