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Assessing the Long-term Contribution of Landfast Ice to the Arctic Freshwater Budget

Assessing the Long-term Contribution of Landfast Ice to the Arctic Freshwater Budget. Yanling Yu and Harry Stern Polar Science Center, Applied Physics Laboratory University of Washington. Some Facts about Landfast Ice.

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Assessing the Long-term Contribution of Landfast Ice to the Arctic Freshwater Budget

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  1. Assessing the Long-term Contribution of Landfast Ice to the Arctic Freshwater Budget Yanling Yu and Harry Stern Polar Science Center, Applied Physics Laboratory University of Washington

  2. Some Facts about Landfast Ice • Accounts for ~15% of the total annual mean ice cover in the Arctic Basin; • Grows locally on the Arctic shelves and is primarily thermodynamically controlled; • Produces ~2x103 km3 of ice volume annually; • Shows a large interannual variability but is not well understood.

  3. Why do you care?

  4. Unique Role of Landfast Ice Because of its unique geolocation, landfast ice is directly involved with the coastal river runoff and the land-upper ocean interaction in terms of the freshwater cycle. RADARSAT image on 1 June 1997 Sea Ice barrier Mackenzie's spring discharge waters (http://www.ccrs.nrcan.gc.ca/ccrs/learn/tour/)

  5. Landfast Ice Freshwater Cycle As a shelf freshwater “reservoir”, landfast ice acts like a rechargeable battery, storing freshwater in winter and releasing it later in summer. Winter Summer Spring

  6. Landfast ice stores about the same amount of freshwater as the total annual terrestrial discharge from the four largest Arctic rivers. Annual Freshwater Storage (in cubic km)

  7. Goals of this project are: • examine the interannual fluctuation of landfast extent for the whole Arctic Basin; • investigate the spatial & temporal variations in ice growth and melt patterns; • analyze the long-term changes of ice volume in terms of freshwater storage and their responses to Arctic climate variations, such as Ta, Wind, and major river runoff. Integrate research with education An undergraduate student will be involved with the project through the university’s Summer Undergraduate Student Program

  8. What research plans?! Research Plans First Year 1-D thermodynamic sea ice model (http://www.crysys.uwaterlo.ca/science/) • Derive landfast ice extent/coverage from NIC weekly ice charts for the • period 1976-1994 (2001) • Compute daily landfast ice thickness, growth/melt, and ice volume for • seven coastal regions associated with the major Arctic drainage basins

  9. Research Plans Second Year Determine Long-Term changes of landfast iceCompare these changes with seasonal and interannual variations of river runoff, air temperatures, wind, and the AO index

  10. Possible Connections with Other Projects Coastal Environment River Runoff Landfast Ice Shelf Processes

  11. Data Gaps? • Updated river discharge data; • Coastal/shelf water observations, such as Ts, salinity, Oxygen isotope samples; • Landfast ice thickness observations; • Model simulations of shelf processes.

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