My talk will attempt to capture the imperfect state of the art in high-resolution ice sheet modelling, aiming to expose the core performance-limiting issues. The essential equations for modeling ice flow in a changing climate will be presented, assuming no prior knowledge of the problem. These geophysical/climate problems are of both free-boundary and algebraic-equation-constrained character. Current-technology models usually solve non-linear Stokes equations, or approximations thereof, at every explicit time-step. Scale analysis shows why this current design paradigm is expensive, but building significantly faster high-resolution ice sheet models requires new techniques. I'll survey some recently-arrived tools, some near-term improvements, and sketch some new ideas.
