Snow dune growth increases polar heat fluxes
Falling snow often accumulates in dunes. These bedforms are found on up to 14 % of the surface of Earth, and appear occasionally on other planets. They have been associated with increased heat fluxes and rapid sea ice melting (Petrich et al., 2012; Popović et al., 2018). Their formation, however, is...
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ftcopernicus:oai:publications.copernicus.org:tcd96214 2023-05-15T18:17:41+02:00 Snow dune growth increases polar heat fluxes Kochanski, Kelly Tucker, Gregory Anderson, Robert 2021-07-22 application/pdf https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-2021-205 https://tc.copernicus.org/preprints/tc-2021-205/ eng eng doi:10.5194/tc-2021-205 https://tc.copernicus.org/preprints/tc-2021-205/ eISSN: 1994-0424 Text 2021 ftcopernicus https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-2021-205 2021-07-26T16:22:27Z Falling snow often accumulates in dunes. These bedforms are found on up to 14 % of the surface of Earth, and appear occasionally on other planets. They have been associated with increased heat fluxes and rapid sea ice melting (Petrich et al., 2012; Popović et al., 2018). Their formation, however, is poorly understood (Filhol and Sturm, 2015; Kochanski et al., 2019a; Sharma et al., 2019). Here, we use field observations to show that dune growth is controlled by snowfall rate and wind speed. We then use numerical experiments to generate simulated dune topographies under varied wind and snowfall conditions, and use those to quantify conductive and radiative heat fluxes through snow. Our results show that dune growth leads to decreased snow cover, more variable snow depth, and significant increases in surface energy fluxes. We provide quantitative results that will allow modelers to account for the impact of snow bedforms in snow, sea ice, and climate simulations. In addition, this work offers a starting point for process-based studies of one of the most widespread bedforms on Earth. Text Sea ice Copernicus Publications: E-Journals Sturm ENVELOPE(162.967,162.967,-71.050,-71.050) |
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Open Polar |
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Copernicus Publications: E-Journals |
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ftcopernicus |
language |
English |
description |
Falling snow often accumulates in dunes. These bedforms are found on up to 14 % of the surface of Earth, and appear occasionally on other planets. They have been associated with increased heat fluxes and rapid sea ice melting (Petrich et al., 2012; Popović et al., 2018). Their formation, however, is poorly understood (Filhol and Sturm, 2015; Kochanski et al., 2019a; Sharma et al., 2019). Here, we use field observations to show that dune growth is controlled by snowfall rate and wind speed. We then use numerical experiments to generate simulated dune topographies under varied wind and snowfall conditions, and use those to quantify conductive and radiative heat fluxes through snow. Our results show that dune growth leads to decreased snow cover, more variable snow depth, and significant increases in surface energy fluxes. We provide quantitative results that will allow modelers to account for the impact of snow bedforms in snow, sea ice, and climate simulations. In addition, this work offers a starting point for process-based studies of one of the most widespread bedforms on Earth. |
format |
Text |
author |
Kochanski, Kelly Tucker, Gregory Anderson, Robert |
spellingShingle |
Kochanski, Kelly Tucker, Gregory Anderson, Robert Snow dune growth increases polar heat fluxes |
author_facet |
Kochanski, Kelly Tucker, Gregory Anderson, Robert |
author_sort |
Kochanski, Kelly |
title |
Snow dune growth increases polar heat fluxes |
title_short |
Snow dune growth increases polar heat fluxes |
title_full |
Snow dune growth increases polar heat fluxes |
title_fullStr |
Snow dune growth increases polar heat fluxes |
title_full_unstemmed |
Snow dune growth increases polar heat fluxes |
title_sort |
snow dune growth increases polar heat fluxes |
publishDate |
2021 |
url |
https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-2021-205 https://tc.copernicus.org/preprints/tc-2021-205/ |
long_lat |
ENVELOPE(162.967,162.967,-71.050,-71.050) |
geographic |
Sturm |
geographic_facet |
Sturm |
genre |
Sea ice |
genre_facet |
Sea ice |
op_source |
eISSN: 1994-0424 |
op_relation |
doi:10.5194/tc-2021-205 https://tc.copernicus.org/preprints/tc-2021-205/ |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-2021-205 |
_version_ |
1766192472407408640 |