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Title: Modeling the role of preferential snow accumulation in through talik development and hillslope groundwater flow in a transitional permafrost landscape

Journal Article · · Environmental Research Letters
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Through taliks – thawed zones extending through the entire permafrost layer – represent a critical type of heterogeneity that affects water redistribution and heat transport, especially in sloping landscapes. The formation of through taliks as part of the transition from continuous to discontinuous permafrost creates new hydrologic pathways connecting the active layer to sub-permafrost regions, with significant hydrological and biogeochemical consequences. At hilly field sites in the southern Seward Peninsula, AK, patches of deep snow in tall shrubs are associated with higher winter ground temperatures and an anomalously deep active layer. To better understand the thermal-hydrologic controls and consequences of through taliks, we used the coupled surface/subsurface permafrost hydrology model ATS (Advanced Terrestrial Simulator) to model through taliks associated with preferentially distributing snow. Scenarios were developed based on an intensively studied hillslope transect on the southern Seward Peninsula, which predominately has taller shrubs midslope and tundra in upslope and downslope areas. The model was forced with detrended meteorological data with snow preferentially distributed at the midslope of the domain to investigate the potential role of vegetation-induced snow trapping in controlling through talik development under conditions typical of the current-day Seward Peninsula. We simulated thermal hydrology and talik development for five permafrost conditions ranging in thickness from 17m to 45m. For the three thinnest permafrost configurations, a through talik developed, which allowed water from the seasonally thawed layer into sub-permafrost waters, increasing sub-permafrost groundwater flow. These numerical experiments suggest that in the transition from continuous to discontinuous permafrost, through taliks may appear at locations that preferential trap snow and that the appearance of those through taliks may drive significant changes in permafrost hydrology.

Research Organization:
Oak Ridge National Lab. (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States); Los Alamos National Lab. (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE Office of Science (SC), Biological and Environmental Research (BER); USDOE Laboratory Directed Research and Development (LDRD) Program
Grant/Contract Number:
AC05-00OR22725; 89233218CNA000001
OSTI ID:
1477801
Alternate ID(s):
OSTI ID: 1474578; OSTI ID: 1483502
Report Number(s):
LA-UR-17-31045
Journal Information:
Environmental Research Letters, Journal Name: Environmental Research Letters Vol. 13 Journal Issue: 10; ISSN 1748-9326
Publisher:
IOP PublishingCopyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United Kingdom
Language:
English
Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 56 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

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Cited By (10)

Coupled cryo-hydrogeological modelling of permafrost dynamics near Umiujaq (Nunavik, Canada) journal February 2020
Soil Physical, Hydraulic, and Thermal Properties in Interior Alaska, USA: Implications for Hydrologic Response to Thawing Permafrost Conditions journal May 2019
The Role of Permafrost in Eurasian Land‐Atmosphere Interactions journal November 2019
Feedbacks Between Surface Deformation and Permafrost Degradation in Ice Wedge Polygons, Arctic Coastal Plain, Alaska journal March 2020
Shrub tundra ecohydrology: rainfall interception is a major component of the water balance journal May 2019
Thermal Disturbances in Permafrost Due to Open Pit Mining and Tailings Impoundment journal December 2019
Sensitivity of active-layer freezing process to snow cover in Arctic Alaska journal January 2019
A distributed temperature profiling method for assessing spatial variability in ground temperatures in a discontinuous permafrost region of Alaska journal January 2019
Soil moisture and hydrology projections of the permafrost region – a model intercomparison journal January 2020
Estimation of subsurface porosities and thermal conductivities of polygonal tundra by coupled inversion of electrical resistivity, temperature, and moisture content data journal January 2020

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Related Subjects

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES
Computer Science
Earth Sciences
open talik
hydrology
permafrost
modeling
ATS