Active subglacial lakes in the Canadian Arctic identified by multi-annual ice elevation changes

Zheng, Whyjay; Van Wychen, Wesley; Li, Tian; Yamanokuchi, Tsutomu

doi:10.5194/tc-20-1699-2026

Articles | Volume 20, issue 3

https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-20-1699-2026

© Author(s) 2026. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-20-1699-2026

© Author(s) 2026. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 20, issue 3

Research article

|

23 Mar 2026

Research article |

| 23 Mar 2026

Active subglacial lakes in the Canadian Arctic identified by multi-annual ice elevation changes

Whyjay Zheng, Wesley Van Wychen, Tian Li, and Tsutomu Yamanokuchi

Supplement

https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-20-1699-2026-supplement

Data sets

ArcticDEM - Strips, Version 4.1 C. Porter et al. https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/C98DVS

ATLAS/ICESat-2 L3A Land Ice Height, Version 6 B. Smith https://doi.org/10.5067/ATLAS/ATL06.006

Randolph Glacier Inventory - A Dataset of Global Glacier Outlines, Version 7.0 RGI 7.0 Consortium https://doi.org/10.5067/f6jmovy5navz

15-m ArcticDEM-derived Elevation Change Rate of Glaciers in The Arctic W. Zheng et al. https://doi.org/10.30238/TPIDR.DB_ECRG/Dataset

Model code and software

Cryosphere And Remote Sensing Toolkit (CARST) v2.0.0a1 W. Zheng et al. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.4592619

whyjz/ac-subglacial-lakes: v1.0 W. Zheng https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.19097467

Short summary

We identify lakes beneath the glaciers in the Canadian Arctic using satellite measurements over a decade, increasing the number of known subglacial lakes in this area from 2 to 37. These lakes are recharged by billions of cubic meters of water, and the draining of these lakes can lower the ice elevation by more than 100 m. We find three types of subglacial lakes, two of which are primarily located in the Canadian Arctic. When glaciers lose their ice quickly, these lakes become active.