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Soil Temperature

Alaska

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Soil Temperature: Alaska

Daily soil temperatures have been collected at various depths from the mid 1980s at sites in Alaska as shown in the figure below. Sites were chosen to represent different permafrost regions, for their length of record, and ongoing availability of the data. We also sought to avoid sites with undue human influence such as oil field construction. For each site, we show a general profile of the site and a plot of daily air temperatures and soil temperatures at a level deep enough to remove the diurnal temperature cycle. Finally, we plot normalized monthly soil temperature (mean monthly temp. minus the long-term mean soil temp. for the period of record divided by the long-term monthly standard deviation). This removes the annual cycle, shows the overall trend, and better allows comparison between sites. The sites are

• Franklin Bluffs on the north slope of the Brooks Range
• Hogan Hill in the south.

Base map from the Circum-Arctic Map of Permafrost and Ground-Ice Conditions

Franklin Bluffs

Franklin Bluffs Mean Annual Soil Temperature Profiles Location: 69.67° N, 148.72° W on the north slope of the Brooks Range in the Continuous (>90%) permafrost zone. Date Range: 27 October 1986 - 18 June 2003 Depths measured: 0 m, 0.21 m, 0.26 m, 0.36 m, 0.46 m, 0.56 m, 0.76 m, 0.81 m, 0.86 m Notes: There may be some problems with the thermistors at depth, but the problems are inconsistent and seem to correct themselves. In the summers of 1999 and 2000, the maximum temperatures for the 0.86 meter level exceeded the maximum temperatures at shallower depths. This may be due to a faulty thermistor, but the anomaly is less than one degree Celsius. Data at 0.86 m are missing for 23 Jan. - 27 Jun. 1996 Data Reference: Osterkamp, T. 1999, updated 2003. Daily air and active layer temperatures from permafrost observatories in Alaska, 1986-2003. Boulder, CO: National Snow and Ice Data Center. Digital media. Access Data

Franklin Bluffs Daily Air and Soil Temperatures
27 Oct. 1986 - 18 Jun. 2003

Franklin Bluffs Normalized Monthly 0.86 m Soil Temperature
Oct. 1986 - Jun. 2003

Hogan Hill

Hogan Hill Mean Annual Soil Temperature Profiles Location: 62.62° N, 145.44° W in southern Alaska along the trans-Alaska pipeline on the border between continuous (>90%) and discontinuous (50-90%) permafrost zones. Date Range: 18 October 1986 - 3 October 2001 Depths measured: 0.03 m, 0.28 m, 0.38 m, 0.49 m, 0.58 m, 0.69 m, 0.88 m. Notes: When the borehole was drilled, the 0.88 and 0.69 m thermistors were in permafrost, but the permafrost appears to have thawed a couple years later. Like at Franklin Bluffs, deeper soil temperatures some times exceed shallower temperatures, but because the permafrost thawed this may be explained by naturally occurring factors (such as ground water incursion) instead of faulty thermistors. The 0.88 m thermistor does seem to have stopped working in August 2000, so 0.69 m temperatures are shown in the time series plots. Data Reference: Osterkamp, T. 1999, updated 2003. Daily air and active layer temperatures from permafrost observatories in Alaska, 1986-2003. Boulder, CO: National Snow and Ice Data Center. Digital media. Access Data

Hogan Hill Daily Air and Soil Temperatures
27 Oct. 1986 - 18 Jun. 2003

Hogan Hill Normalized Monthly 0.69 m Soil Temperature
Oct. 1986 - Jun. 2003

Last updated 29 June 2006 - FF