The largest glacier group on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau has been discovered in a county of southwest China's Tibet through satellite remote sensing, local authorities claim.

A group of 42 glaciers were found in Bomi County with an average altitude of 4,200 meters above sea level in the southeast of the region.

It would be the biggest glacier group on the Qinghai-Tibet plateau, said Zhaxi Norbu, director of the county's publicity department.

The total area of the glaciers has yet been counted.

The 90-square-km Kaqin glacier is located in Yi'ong Town, with two major peaks of 5,990 meters and 5,964 meters above sea level.

But the tongue of the Kaqin glacier had shrunk by 10 kilometers since a decade ago due to global warming, Norbu said.

The total area of the glaciers on the Qinghai-Tibet plateau is estimated at about 50,000 square kilometers, mainly distributed in the Kunlun and Himalayas ranges.

Over the past century, the area of the glaciers has shrunk by around 30 percent. Experts say the glacier area will shrink by a further 45 percent if the temperature rises by 2.1 to four degrees Centigrade at the end of the century.

(China Daily September 25, 2007)