The Yukon River Basin Assessment and Integrated ClimateEffects Monitoring Network

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The Yukon River Basin Assessment and Integrated
Climate-Effects Monitoring Network
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The Yukon Basin holds large stores of carbon

• Boreal Forest Ecosystems
• 25 - 30 of Global Soil Pool
• 30 Global Vegetation Pool

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Permafrost Temperature
Romanovsky, 1999
1978
2002
(courtesy of B. Riordan)
Globally and locally significant rapid change
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Will thawing permafrost greatly accelerate CO2
flux?

• Landscape is Heterogeneous, Controlled by Soil
  Drainage
• Permafrost Landscape Highly Elastic in C
  exchange

Wetter,warmer
Harden et al, GCB Dec. 2000
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River export of carbon is changing with
permafrost thawing (Striegl et al, 2005)

• Coastal Ocean Issues
• The largest coastal C sinks are considered to be
  the high-productivity waters of the Bering Sea
  shelf where nutrient and sediment inputs from
  coastal rivers are large and variable
• (OCCC Strategic Plan Doney et al,
  2004).

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The Yukon River Basin Assessment and Integrated
Climate-Effects Monitoring Network

• OBJECTIVE To use a multi-agency collaboration to
  compute whole-system hydrologic, carbon, and
  energy budgets for a common frame of reference (a
  watershed), and to assess how changes in those
  balances affect human activity and ecological
  function.

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Assessment Science Questions

• How will increases in temperature affect the
  hydrology of the Yukon River Basin?
• Will carbon feedbacks to the atmosphere from
  thawing permafrost potentially enhance global
  climate warming?
• How will warming affect the abundance, quality,
  and distribution of subsistence resources?
• What strategies are needed to mitigate or adapt
  to the likely effects of warming in northern
  latitudes?

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Multi-component Multi scale Observations For a
Common Frame of Reference
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Models that link terrestrial and aquatic systems
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The Yukon Watershed is entirely above 60o North
Latitude
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• Significant federal lands in the Yukon Basin
• 5 National Parks/ NRAs (Vital Signs)
• 8 Wildlife Refuges
• 3 Large military land holdings (CRREL)

Clow, 2006
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Proposed Data Collection- USGS/Canada
(YRITWC)
Flux Tower
Fixed river stations and research watersheds
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Integrated Regional Assessment of Effects of
Climate in the Yukon River Basin
Air
Forest
Soil
NOAA, USGS, UAF, FLUXNET
FIA, USGS, LTER, BLM, UA, NRCAN
FIA/FHM- USGS, NPS, NRCS, Research Surveys
Biology
FWS, NPS, UA, USGS
USGS, UAF, UAA, CRREL, YRITWC, NOAA, Alaska DEC
Water
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MODIS Satellite, 10 August, 2005
Brooks Range
Seward Peninsula
Fairbanks
Alaska Range
Anchorage
The Yukon River Basin A rapidly changing
landscape
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Scope of a Socio-Economic Assessment
Scientific data extent, magnitude, probability
of MULTIPLE natural hazards
Vulnerability physical, environmental, social,
economic (property)
Risk reduction Strategies land use, mitigation,
emergency response
Acceptable community risk
Natural hazard risk analysis
Natural hazards risk reduction decision-making
Shapiro, written comm.
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METHANE FLUX
Thermo-karst wetlands emitted 13 times more CH4
to the atmosphere than the permafrost plateau
sites on an annual basis.
1.0
Thermokarst wetlands
Thermokarst edges
0.8
Permafrost plateau
0.6
mmol CH4 m-2 hr-1
0.4
0.2
0.0
-0.2
3/20
4/9
4/29
5/19
6/8
6/28
7/18
8/7
8/27
9/16
Wickland, 2006
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Multi-tier Monitoring DesignScale-appropriate
monitoring linked through common indicators

• Tier One Intensive Research Areas
• Relatively small number of specific sites
  representing important processes
• Tier Two Gradient-based surveys
• Mapping of condition using sites representative
  of a specific condition class and indicator
  coverages.
• Tier Three Extensive Inventories and Surveys
• Statistical representation of the population
• Tier Four Remote Sensing and Mapping
• Wall-to-wall coverage

Increasing temporal resolution
Increasing spatial resolution
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FOREST SERVICE INVENTORY SAMPLE PLAN (12-15
years)
Tanana River 5 yrs
Draft, Van Hees, 2005
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Expectations for the talk

• Conceptual description
• Relevance to IPY goals
• Partnerships
• Related work within DOI

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Addresses all IPY Research Themes

• Present Environmental Status
• Past and Present Changes
• Global and Regional Multi-scale Linkages
• New Frontiers of Understanding
• Establishing a Northern Vantage Point
• Human Dimension Sustainability