Thermal state of permafrost in Russia

The results of the International Permafrost Association's International Polar Year Thermal State of Permafrost (TSP) project are presented based on field measurements from Russia during the IPY years (2007–09) and collected historical data. Most ground temperatures measured in existing and new boreholes show a substantial warming during the last 20 to 30 years. The magnitude of the warming varied with location, but was typically from 0.5°C to 2°C at the depth of zero annual amplitude. Thawing of Little Ice Age permafrost is ongoing at many locations. There are some indications that the late Holocene permafrost has begun to thaw at some undisturbed locations in northeastern Europe and northwest Siberia. Thawing of permafrost is most noticeable within the discontinuous permafrost domain. However, permafrost in Russia is also starting to thaw at some limited locations in the continuous permafrost zone. As a result, a northward displacement of the boundary between continuous and discontinuous permafrost zones was observed. This data set will serve as a baseline against which to measure changes of near‐surface permafrost temperatures and permafrost boundaries, to validate climate model scenarios, and for temperature reanalysis. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

[1]  V. Romanovsky,et al.  Report from the International Permafrost Association: state of permafrost in the first decade of the 21st century , 2008 .

[2]  A. Kholodov,et al.  Thermal State and Fate of Permafrost in Russia : First Results of IPY , 2008 .

[3]  S. Solomon.  The Physical Science Basis : Contribution of Working Group I to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change , 2007 .

[4]  H. L. Miller,et al.  Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis , 2007 .

[5]  T. Shiraiwa,et al.  The glaciological expedition to Mount Ichinsky, Kamchatka, Russia , 2007 .

[6]  Stefano Schiavon,et al.  Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis. , 2007 .

[7]  H. Christiansen,et al.  Report from the International Permafrost Association , 2006 .

[8]  A comparative study of geothermal and meteorological records of climate change in Kamchatka , 2006 .

[9]  M. Jorgenson,et al.  Response of boreal ecosystems to varying modes of permafrost degradation , 2005 .

[10]  N. Shiklomanov.  From Exploration to Systematic Investigation: Development of Geocryology in 19th- and Early—20th-Century Russia , 2005 .

[11]  Marco Caccianiga,et al.  Accelerated thawing of subarctic peatland permafrost over the last 50 years , 2004 .

[12]  S. Marchenko,et al.  The thermal environment of blocky materials in the mountains of Central Asia , 2004 .

[13]  T. Shiraiwa,et al.  Heat transfer in the seasonal active layer of Gorshkov Ice Cap on the summit of Ushkovsky Volcano, Kamchatka Peninsula , 2002 .

[14]  P. Konstantinov,et al.  Observations of surface dynamics with thermokarst initiation, Yukechi site, Central Yakutia , 2002 .

[15]  J. Houghton,et al.  Climate change 2001 : the scientific basis , 2001 .

[16]  T. Kameda,et al.  Characteristics of a crater glacier at Ushkovsky volcano, Kamchatka, Russia, as revealed by the physical properties of ice cores and borehole thermometry , 2001 .

[17]  M. Torre Jorgenson,et al.  Permafrost Degradation and Ecological Changes Associated with a WarmingClimate in Central Alaska , 2001 .

[18]  N. Oberman,et al.  Permafrost dynamics in the north-east of European Russia at the end of the 20th century , 2001 .

[19]  S. Harris,et al.  Thermal regimes beneath coarse blocky materials , 1998 .

[20]  A. Fedorov.  Effects of recent climate change on permafrost landscapes in central sakha 1 , 1996 .

[21]  N. Romanovskiy,et al.  Alpine permafrost temperature zonality, northern trans-Baikal region, U.S.S.R. , 1991 .

[22]  Screen Temperatures and 10m Temperatures , 1970 .