RESPONSE OF ICE COVER ON SHALLOW LAKES OF THE NORTH SLOPE OF ALASKA TO CONTEMPORARY CLIMATE CONDITIONS (1950-2011): NUMERICAL MODELING AND RADAR REMOTE SENSING DATA ANALYSIS

摘要

This paper presents results from the analysis of a 20- year time series of ERS-1/2 Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) data and a numerical lake ice modeling experiment to elucidate the response of ice cover (freezing to bed, thickness, and phenology) on shallow lakes of the Alaskan Arctic Coastal Plain (AACP) to climate conditions over the last six decades. ERS-1/2 data was used to map areas of shallow lakes that freeze to bed for the period 1991-2011. Available long-term meteorological data from Barrow, AK was used to run the Canadian Lake Ice Model (CLIMo) for the period 1950-2011. Output from CLIMo includes daily ice thickness as well as freeze-up and break-up dates. Results from a sub-region of the AACP, near Barrow, show a decline in the fraction of lakes that freeze to their bed in winter (5 to 20%), and in maximum ice thickness (10 cm) as determined from the analysis of SAR data and CLIMo, respectively.