Regions: Inuvialuit Settlement Region
Tags: physical sciences, active layer, permafrost, climate change, environmental change
| Principal Investigator: | Nixon, Mark (15) |
| Licence Number: | 13025 |
| Organization: | Natural Resources Canada - Gelogical Survey |
| Licensed Year(s): |
2008
2007
2006
2005
2004
2003
2002
2001
2000
1999
1998
1997
1996
1995
1994
1993
1992
1991
1990
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| Issued: | Mar 28, 1999 |
| Project Team: | Fred Wright |
Objective(s): One feature of permafrost that has responded significantly to past climate change is thickness of the active layer. The active layer, overlaying permafrost is earth material that thaws from the surface and refreezes each year. It forms the interface between permafrost and the atmosphere and biosphere including many human activities. Active layer thickness influences vegetation and soil conditions, thereby influencing hunting, gathering, forestry and agriculture. Thickness, texture, and moisture content of the active layer affects foundation conditions for transportation and construction. Changes in the active layer and thaw penetration can contribute to slope instability with impacts on transportation facilities and other structures. It is important to understand how the active layer varies locally and regionally and how it will respond to environmental change.
Project Description: This season we may visit areas between Tsighetchic and the coast in March and will survey from Fort Simpson to the Arctic coast in July. Inuvik Research Centre may take late season measurements as part of a cooperative program. Travel will be by road, small boat on the river and helicopter from Inuvik. Access to the sites is always on foot. This is the ninth annual survey of a network of thaw depth measuring devices (thaw tubes) and temperature data loggers along a transect extending from Fort Simpson to Tuktoyaktuk. The tubes consist of small diameter (2.5 cm or 1") water filler pipes anchored at 4 meter (12') depth and protruding about 20 cm (1') above the surface that record the maximum annual thaw depth at a site. Temperature dataloggers are installed in small screens above ground and buried just below the surface. Up to five 10 meter ground temperature cables will be installed this season in the upper valley to supplement the above instrumentation. A series of annual readings over a number of years will tell us if there is a change in thaw depth at that site and its relation to temperature conditions.
