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The field sites have been selected to cover a wide range of environmental conditions and to offer the best available platforms for the validation of large scale models, the development of permafrost monitoring capabilities, the study of permafrost processes, and for overlap with existing monitoring programs. Site selection was also driven by the necessity to focus on the smaller number of field sites that are able to provide a comprehensive range of monitoring parameters for the validation of Global Climate Models (GCMs) across the Arctic permafrost areas.
While many sites in the Arctic are equipped to record active layer, and some upper permafrost layer, temperatures or gas fluxes, only a small number of these have the longer observation records that will enable the PAGE21 project to derive the maximum benefit from earlier programs and to include temporal variability in Arctic ecosystems in a consistent way.

The sites selected for PAGE21 fulfil the latter conditions and are often embedded in existing monitoring networks such as the Circumpolar Arctic Layer Monitoring (CALM) program, the Circumarctic Network of Terrestrial Field Bases (SCANNET, through the EU-funded INTERACT application), or the upcoming Sustaining Arctic Observing Networks (SAON), taking advantage of funded initiatives to conduct permafrost monitoring at these sites. The PAGE21 project sites are, for instance, supported through other initiatives such as DEFROST (Nordic Centre of Excellence, in the Cryosphere Programme of the Nordic Council of Ministers), and the ESA DUE Permafrost project. PAGE21 is unique in that it does upgrade these sites to cover most aspects of monitoring relevant to permafrost and it connects them systematically to model outputs.

The PAGE21 sites span the whole spectrum of conditions observed in the Arctic, starting with the sporadic permafrost zone in the sub-Arctic (Abisko) and extending to the continuously cold permafrost zone (Kytalyk). The sites also cover different geographical zones of the Arctic, with sites on each of the three landmasses (North America, Greenland and Europe/ Russia) surrounding the Arctic Ocean, and include maritime as well as continental locations.
 

                   Kytalyk           Samoylov            Abisko            Svalbard            Zackenberg

Vorkuta/ Seida     Nadym     Spasskaya Pad     Cherskii     North Slope     Herschel Island     Daring Lake



 

1020172smallThe Chokurdakh scientific tundra station is situated in the Kytalyk wildlife reserve, located on the left bank of the Elon (Berelekh) River in North-Eastern Yakutia, Republic of Sakha in Yakutia in the Russian Federation. The field site is approximately 25 kilometer north of the Chokurdakh settlement and around 480 kilometer north of the Arctic Circle.

The research area consists of three different morphological units: the river floodplain, the river terrace with tundra vegetation and the high plateaus (1030 metres) underlain by continuous permafrost, with permafrost thickness over 300 metres.

The Kytalyk is a preservation area of white crane (sterkh, Grus leucogeranus) and most common human activities include fishing and reindeer breeding. An average temperature of the warmest month, which is July, in the area is 9.5 degrees Celsius and that of the coldest month, which is January, is -34.6 degrees Celsius.
 


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Within PAGE21, following research will be conducted in Kytalyk:

  • CO2, CH4 fluxes using eddy covariance with two eddy covariance towers
  • N2O using flux chambers
  • Ecosystem exchange of latent heat, water vapor
  • Soil temperature and soil heat balance
  • Hydrology: precipitation, snow cover, water table and runoff
  • Detailed flux measurements on thaw ponds
  • Monitoring of active layer thickness
  • Monitoring of permafrost thaw activity along a thaw lake bank

  

 
 
Site GPS: N 70° 49' 28'', E 147° 29' 23

For more information on the Chokurdakh scientific tundra station in Kytalyk, please contact
 
Dr. Trofim MAXIMOV, Chief of Biogeochemical Cycles of Permafrost Ecosystems Lab.
Tel: +7 4112 33 58 97,
mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or visit the website: http://ibpc.ysn.ru/ (In Russian)
 

Field Trips

Summer 2012 a research team form the Stockholm University ans the Vienna Technical University stayed in Kytalyk and Spasskaya Pad for a summer research season. You can read from the trip in English in here.
 
 A group from VU Amsterdamm started the 2013 season with a short stay in April -May. You can read about it in here.
 
During the summer of 2013, researchers from VU University in Amsterdam departed for their season in the field of Kytalyk. Click here to read their stories.
 
The new station. Photo by Martin Proksch smallThe Russian-German Research Station Samoylov is located on Samoylov Island in the Lena River Delta, Northeast Siberia (72º 22'N, 126º28'E), approximately 120 km south of the Arctic Ocean. 

The research emphasis is on understanding ecosystem-atmosphere interactions on various spatial and temporal scales. The main objectives are to study the community structure and dynamics of microbial populations involved in the methane cycle as well as the processes controlling the exchange fluxes of methane, carbon dioxide, and energy on scales ranging from the micro-site to the ecosystem- and meso-scale. The ultimate goal is the assessment and prediction of environmental changes in the Lena River Delta region.

Other important long-term studies focus on river hydrology, geomorphology, hydrobiology (e.g. zooplankton dynamics), and paleo-environmental reconstruction.

Die-StationThe station was originally built as a logistics base for the Lena Delta Reserve and has been the base or starting point for numerous AWI expeditions since 1998. In 2005, AWI and the Lena Delta Reserve completed a four-room extension to the station, which now offers accommodation for at least 7 people in three double rooms and one single room. Additional accommodation is in tents.

Mean temperature in Samoylov in  January is -31.0°C and in July +8.9°C. The Russian-German Research Station Samoylov can be reached by helicopter from Tiksi (connected by air service to Moscow, Yakutsk, and St. Petersburg) in about 45 minutes and by river boat from Tiksi in about 12 hours.


For more information, please contact: Dr. Julia Boike at the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research (AWI), Research Unit Potsdam , Telegrafenberg A43, 14473 Potsdam
Phone: +49 331 288 2119
Fax: +49 331 288 2137
Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.">This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.



Field Trips:
 
  • Fall 2013
  • Benjamin Runkle from University of Hamburg described his work through YR blog which is available here.
 
 
Abisko station small MJohansson

 
The Abisko Research station is located at the shore of Lake Torneträsk in Northern Sweden (68º 21' N, 18º 49' E) approximately 200 Kilometer north of the Arctic Circle. At the site can be found a wide range of ecosystems from pine forest at low altitude in East to alpine tundra in the west. Main human activities in the area include reindeer husbandry, fishing, hunting tourism and research. 

The emphasis of staff research is on plant ecology, geomorphology and meteorology. The main objectives of the ecological projects are to study the dynamics of plant populations, to identify the controlling factors at species latitudinal and altitudinal limits, to understand ecosystem structure and function and to predict impacts of global environmental change. The meteorological projects deal with recent climate changes in the region, and also with local variations of Online Poker the microclimate in sub-alpine and alpine ecosystems. The geomorphology research focuses on the mass wasting of mountains and sediment transport.
 

Parameters relevant for PAGE21

      • Meteorology with records from 1913 to present
      • Permafrost deep borehole
      • CO2 monitoring
      • CH4 monitoring
      • N2O monitoring
      • Energy exchange
      • Soil Carbon inventory
      • Spectral monitoring


For more information on Abisko field site, please contact Site manager: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it., Abisko Scientific Research Station, S- 981 07 Abisko, Sweden
Phone: +46 980 401 79 Fax: +46 980 401 71 or visit the Abisko station website

Field Trips

A research team form the Lund University stayed in Abisko during summer 2012. You can read their blog in here.

 

 At the end of summer, PAGE21 young researcher Elin Högstöm from Vienna University of Technology traveled to Abisko and told about her work through the blog which is available here.