Chinese scientists discover thickening ground ice in parts of warming Tibet

The Tibetan Plateau, home to the world’s largest expanse of alpine permafrost, is warming at about twice the global average but, counter-intuitively,researchers have found that ice in parts of the Tibet autonomous region is actually thickening.

A team from Peking University found that shallow ground ice has unexpectedly increased over the past 20 years, affecting more than a third of the plateau’s permafrost, a phenomenon driven largely by natural climate factors.

The authors noted that the...