Comment on "Sensitivity of glaciation in the arid subtropical Andes to changes in temperature, precipitation, and solar radiation" by Vargo et al. (2018)

Abstract

Vargo et al. (2018) used idealized model experiments to test the sensitivity of glaciation to changes in temperature, precipitation and shortwave radiation in the Western Cordillera, the Altiplano and the Cordillera Oriental (Eastern Cordillera) in the arid subtropical Andes. We point out that the application to Cordillera Oriental does not consider precipitation at the appropriate spatial scale, because precipitation gradients are steep in the area. Using high-resolution datasets we found that precipitation in the Cordillera Oriental is significantly lower than that considered as input in the model, and similar to the value used for the Western Cordillera. Considering more realistic precipitation data for the Cordillera Oriental would produce similar results to those from the Western Cordillera. Adequate parametric and scale inputs reinforce the importance of Vargo et al. (2018) modeling in order to predict glacial sensitivity to climate changes.