Debris is widely distributed in the ablation zones of mountain glaciers in the Tianshan Mountains. Supraglacial debris can accelerate or hamper glacier ablation, depending on its thickness. Thus, it plays an important role in the mass balance of debris‐covered glaciers. This paper proposes a novel method to estimate supraglacial debris thickness by using L‐band polarimetric synthetic aperture radar. A new model‐based target decomposition is used to extract the surface scattering, double bounce, and volume scattering components. The surface scatter model uses the extended Bragg scatter, which considers the depolarization effect for rough surfaces. The volume scatter model uses elliptical scatterers, which approximate the shape of the solids in the debris. The volume scattering power is related to the dielectric properties of the debris, the radar wavelength, the incidence angle, and the elliptical scatter shape. Once the target decomposition is performed, the debris thickness can be inverted from the volume scattering power and other known parameters. Through comparison with a large number of field measurements, the inversion is shown to be reasonable, and the accuracy is validated to be ±0.12 m. Based on the inversion map in the study area, the debris thicknesses of the Koxkar glacier and its neighboring glaciers are presented and analyzed.

In 2015, 193 United Nations (UN) member states unanimously adopted the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. The 17 sustainable development goals (SDGs) drafted consist of 169 targets with over 230 indicators to be achieved by the year 2030.

Glaciers and ice sheets are sensitive indicators of climate change. The changes of outlines and texture features on the glacier surface are useful indicators of glacier change monitoring. The sensitivity of synthetic aperture radar (SAR), which is independent of weather and solar illumination, provides an efficient approach for glacier monitoring and the development of high-resolution SAR makes it possible to study glaciers in more detail. In this article, the decision-tree classification method, the Canny operator, and the phase congruency method are applied and compared to extract glacier outlines and water-eroded stripes using X-band high-resolution SAR imagery of the Dongkemadi glacier area in the Qinghai–Tibet Plateau, collected by the TerraSAR satellites. The experimental results are presented to illustrate the accuracy and efficiency of the phase congruency method as compared to other methods used for the extraction of linear features (outline and stripes) on glaciers. The phase congruency method, which is independent of image illumination and magnification, is used for the first time in glacier outline and stripe extraction. It is shown that, when combined with high-resolution SAR imagery, this method has the potential to provide valuable support for glacier mapping and change monitoring in the future.