A submarine ridge no deeper than 600 feet (180 meters) connects the island physically with North America<\/a>. Structurally, Greenland is an extension of the Canadian Shield<\/a>, the rough plateau of the Canadian North that is made up of hard Precambrian<\/a> rocks.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Britannica Quiz<\/p>\n Islands and Archipelagos<\/p>\n <\/a> <\/p>\n Greenland\u2019s major physical feature is its massive ice sheet<\/a>, which is second only to Antarctica<\/a>\u2019s in size. The Greenland Ice Sheet<\/a> has an average thickness of 5,000 feet (1,500 meters), reaches a maximum thickness of about 10,000 feet (3,000 meters), and covers more than 700,000 square miles (1,800,000 square km)\u2014more than four-fifths of Greenland\u2019s total land area. Layers of snow falling on its barren, windswept surface become compressed into ice layers, which constantly move outward to the peripheral<\/a> glaciers<\/a>; the Jakobshavn Glacier, often moving 100 feet (30 meters) a day, is among the world\u2019s fastest glaciers. The remaining ice-free land area occupies the country\u2019s coastal areas and consists largely of highlands; mountain chains parallel the island\u2019s east and west coasts, rising to 12,139 feet (3,700 meters) at Gunnbj\u00f8rn Mountain<\/a> in the southeast. These highlands notwithstanding, most parts of the rock floor underlying the Greenland Ice Sheet are in fact at or slightly beneath current sea levels.<\/p>\n Long, deep fjords reach far into both the east and west coasts of Greenland in complex systems, offering magnificent, if desolate, scenery. Along many parts of the coast, the ice sheet fronts directly on the sea, with large chunks breaking off the glaciers and sliding into the water as icebergs<\/a>.<\/p>\n \n Trusted knowledge for those who want to know more.\n <\/p>\n SUBSCRIBE<\/a><\/p>\n The climate<\/a> of Greenland is Arctic<\/a>, modified only by the slight influence of the Gulf Stream<\/a> in the southwest. Rapid weather changes, from sunshine to impenetrable blizzards, are common and result from the eastward progression of low-pressure air masses over a permanent layer of cold air above the island\u2019s icy interior. Average winter (January) temperatures range from the low 20s F (about \u22127 \u00b0C) in the south to approximately \u221230 \u00b0F (about \u221234 \u00b0C) in the north. Summer temperatures along the southwestern coast average in the mid-40s F (about 7 \u00b0C) during July, while the average in the far north is closer to 40 \u00b0F (about 4 \u00b0C). Greenland experiences about two months of midnight sun<\/a> during the summer. Average annual precipitation decreases from more than 75 inches (1,900 mm) in the south to about 2 inches (50 mm) in the north. Large areas of the island can be classified as Arctic deserts because of their limited precipitation.<\/p>\n In the late 20th and early 21st centuries, scientists posited<\/a> that global warming<\/a> was profoundly affecting not only Greenland\u2019s climate but also its physical geography. A number of scientists noted that Greenland\u2019s vast ice sheet was shrinking at a highly increased rate. In 2012, for example, satellites<\/a> revealed that at midyear 97 percent of the ice sheet showed some signs of melting, whereas in most years the melt affected only about half of the ice sheet. Researchers were uncertain, however, if the abrupt ice loss represented a long-term trend, but in 2016, as global warming pushed the planet toward the hottest January, February, March, April, and May in its history (according to NASA<\/a>), Greenland also experienced a series of record early spikes in the melting of its ice sheets. <\/p>\n The country\u2019s plant life is characterized<\/a> mainly as tundra<\/a> vegetation and consists of such plants as sedge and cotton grass. Plantlike lichens<\/a> also are common. The limited ice-free areas are almost totally devoid of trees, although some dwarfed birch, willow, and alder scrub do manage to survive in sheltered valleys in the south. Several species of land mammals\u2014including polar bears, musk oxen<\/a>, reindeer<\/a>, Arctic foxes, snow hares, ermines, and lemmings\u2014can be found on the island. Seals and whales are found in the surrounding waters and were formerly the chief source of nourishment for the Greenlanders. Cod, salmon, flounder, and halibut are important saltwater fish<\/a>, and the island\u2019s rivers contain salmon and Arctic char.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Land More than three times the size of the U.S. state of Texas, Greenland extends about 1,660 miles…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":88786,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5],"tags":[478,2831,2830,2829,57],"class_list":["post-88785","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-greenland","tag-article","tag-britannica","tag-encyclopeadia","tag-encyclopedia","tag-greenland"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@dk\/116613985517207424","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/88785","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=88785"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/88785\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/88786"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=88785"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=88785"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=88785"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Island,](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/islet-reef-New-Caledonia.jpg\")
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