Scientists Heat Arctic Permafrost in Effort to Better Understand Thawing Processes
28.06.2010 - Atmosphere & Space, Land & Geology, Arctic
In an effort to better understand the implications of global warming on the various layers of the Arctic permafrost, a group of scientists from the US Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) will be conducting a large-scale, long-term ecosystem experiment. Because of the large areas covered by permafrost in the Arctic, research on the effects of global warming on the frozen layers is crucial.
The team of scientists, along with a team of architects, engineers and biologists from ORNL and other national laboratories, design, simulate and field-test large-scale manipulative experiments that warm a test area to evaluate ecosystem response to projected climate conditions. These manipulative experiments, the scientists believe, will help them to gain better insight into the processes of warming and their consequences. By heating multiple plots of land about 20 metres in diameter, ORNL researchers hope to eventually have replicated plots with treatments that include heating in combination with elevated carbon dioxide.
