page_title: Puncak Jaya
section_title: Glaciers
hierarchical_section_title: Puncak Jaya / Glaciers
context_page_description: Puncak Jaya or Carstensz Pyramid is the highest summit of Mount Jayawijaya or Mount Carstensz in the Sudirman Range of the western central highlands of Papua Province, Indonesia. Other summits are East Carstensz Peak, Sumantri and Ngga Pulu. Other names include Nemangkawi in the Amungkal language, Carstensz Toppen and Gunung Soekarno.
  At 4,884 metres above sea level, Puncak Jaya is the highest mountain in Indonesia, on the island of New Guinea.
  It is also the highest point between the Himalayas and the Andes. Some sources claim Papua New Guinea's Mount Wilhelm, 4,509 m, as the highest mountain peak in Oceania, on account of Indonesia being part of Asia.
  The massive, open cut Grasberg mine is within 4 km west of here.
context_section_description: While Puncak Jaya's peak is free of ice, there are several glaciers on its slopes, including the Carstensz Glacier, West Northwall Firn, East Northwall Firn and the recently vanished Meren Glacier in the Meren Valley (meren is Dutch for "lakes").
  Being equatorial, there is little variation in the mean temperature during the year (around 0.5 °C [0.90 °F]) and the glaciers fluctuate on a seasonal basis only slightly. However, analysis of the extent of these rare equatorial glaciers from historical records show significant retreat since the 1850s, around the time of the Little Ice Age Maximum which primarily affected the Northern Hemisphere, indicating a regional warming of around 0.6 °C (1.1 °F) per century between 1850 and 1972.
  The glacier on Puncak Trikora in the Maoke Mountains disappeared completely some time between 1939 and 1962.  Since the 1970s, evidence from satellite imagery indicates the Puncak Jaya glaciers have been retreating rapidly. The Meren Glacier melted away sometime between 1994 and 2000.
  An expedition led by paleoclimatologist Lonnie Thompson in 2010 found that the glaciers are disappearing at a rate of seven metres (23 ft) thickness per year and in 2018 they were predicted to vanish in the 2020s.
caption: Puncak Jaya icecap 1936
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