'They are going to disappear': Western Canada glaciers face bleak future
Climate change is having a tremendous impact on Western Canada glaciers, which experienced their second-worst year of ice loss on record in 2025, according to a B.C. researcher and professor
With global warming leading to rapid Arctic sea ice melting, the effects of a changing climate are also hitting glaciers particularly hard, especially those in Western Canada.
In 2025, an estimated 30 gigatonnes of ice from Western Canada glaciers were lost, according to Brian Menounos, a researcher and professor at the University of Northern British Columbia (UNBC).
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It was enough of a drop to make it the second-worst year on record for glacier loss in Canada's West, Menounos told CBC recently.
The amount of glacial loss in Western Canada last year continues the alarming trend of accelerated ice decline worldwide as a result of global warming.
Bugaboo Glacier in B.C. (Getty Images/Alex Ratson/1223308286-170667a)
"We have to understand that it's not a question of if the glaciers are going to disappear, they are going to disappear," said Menounos, in the interview with CBC. "What we're finding is that these glaciers are disappearing much faster than previously projected."
2021-24 sees doubling of mass loss
Menounos, who has been working with a group of international researchers to monitor global, glacial health, attributed the decline "in large part" to rising greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuel use.
If 2025's massive ice loss wasn't enough for Western Canada glaciers, a peer-reviewed study that Menounos was involved with--published in June last year-- pinpointed to another significant decline from 2021-24.
During that period, glaciers in Western Canada and the conterminous United States, as well as Switzerland, respectively, experienced a doubling in mass loss compared to the 2010–2020 period, according to the analysis.
A black and white image of the front edge of the Athabasca Glacier in the Columbia Ice Fields in Jasper National Park. (Getty Images/Zeb Andrews/2239457560-170667a)
Since 2020, the total ice volume has declined by 12 per cent in Western Canada and the U.S., and 13 per cent in Switzerland.
"Unfortunately, in the last four years, we've seen yet another doubling of how much water we're losing from our glaciers annually," said Menounos, in an interview with CBC Radio West.
The authors of the study cited numerous factors for the mass loss, including low winter snow accumulation, early-season heat waves, and prolonged periods of warm, dry conditions.
Glaciers are 'essential' to mountain landscape, tourism
In the four-year period, the glaciers in Canada's West and the conterminous U.S. lost approximately 22.2 gigatonnes of ice per year, while Switzerland glaciers dropped 1.5 gigatonnes yearly.
"Glaciers are essential parts of the mountain landscape, with strong cultural and tourism value. They provide cool, plentiful water to many headwater streams during late summer and years of drought," the authors said in the study.
Athabasca Glacier, part of the Columbia Icefield in Jasper National Park. (Getty Images/Yiming Chen/1604818084-170667a)
According to the UNBC, the amount of water melted from the glaciers would be sufficient enough to submerge the metropolitan area of Toronto under 35 metres of water each year.
“Even against the backdrop of rapid glacier loss since the start of this century, what we’re witnessing now is unprecedented,” said Menounos, in a UNBC news release. “The melt rates over the [past] four years far exceed anything we’ve observed in the past six decades, posing serious implications for freshwater availability, increased geohazard risks, and the loss of cultural and tourism values tied to mountain landscapes.”
Researchers found that significant, transient snow lines, and impurity loading due to wildfires in the Western Canada-U.S., or Saharan dust in Switzerland, darkened glaciers.
As a result, the glaciers experienced an increased mass loss through "greater, absorbed shortwave radiation available for melt."
Part of the interior walls of the Blackcomb Glacier at the Whistler Blackcomb ski resort in B.C. during the winter. (Onfokus/Getty Images/1432712743-170667a)
"This ice-albedo feedback will lead to continued high rates of thinning, unless recently, exposed dark ice and firn at high elevations is buried by seasonal snowfall. Physical models that simulate impurity deposition and movement through firn and ice are needed to improve future projections of glacier mass change," the study said.
Glacier ice-loss rates have accelerated in past decades
And, from 2000–2023, a different examination published in February 2025 found the ice loss of Earth's glaciers accounted for about 20 per cent of observed sea level rise. The research indicated that 42 per cent of the decline took place in heavily glacierized regions such as Alaska and the Canadian Arctic.
Meanwhile, several studies published in 2025, 2022, 2021 and 2018, as well as a 2023 World Meteorological Organization report, mentioned the glacier decline rates in the Western Canada-U.S. and Switzerland have sped up, derived from on-site and geodetic observations.
"Even under moderate emission scenarios, glaciers in both regions are projected to mostly disappear by the end of the century, with only some of the largest glaciers and icefields existing beyond 2100," stated in the June 25, 2025 study Menounos worked on.
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Thumbnail courtesy of Getty Images/Yiming Chen/1604818084-170667a.
With files from CBC News.
