Approaches to Monitoring the Sub-Arctic

Presented on behalf of the research teams iAOOS-Norway, POLEWARD and MEOP:

During the International Polar Year it has become increasingly obvious that we need to prepare for a new era in the Arctic. Commercial activities will become ever more attractive as the sea ice cover retreats, and we scientists are not currently able to provide answers to all of the new questions that arise concerning the impacts that climate change will have on our ability to operate safely and sustainably in the Arctic.

To understand and minimize the impacts of future Arctic development we need research, and we need continual monitoring. The International Polar Year occurred during a period that has seen a large retreat of sea ice, and this retreat is therefore, luckily, well documented. A sustained observing system for the future needs to be smaller and cheaper than the investments made by the international research community during the IPY, but many IPY projects have contributed important knowledge for developing such a system—we now know that most of the technical challenges that will be encountered can be solved.

Here we present an overview of the ocean monitoring conducted by the Norwegian IPY projects iAOOS-Norway, POLEWARD and MEOP. A large variety of techniques have been used, including oceanographic cruise, animal-borne platforms, autonomous gliders, helicopter surveys, surface drifters and current meter arrays. Our research topics of specific focus ranged from ocean dynamics (structure and forcing of the main ocean currents), and hydrography (freshwater and heat content), to biology (contrasting Arctic with Atlantic regimes), sea ice parameterizations (thickness, albedo, snow) and data assimilation (remote sensing and in situ data).

The near-real-time monitoring of the Arctic Ocean that has been possible during the IPY has allowed us more insights and shorter response time in our research than would otherwise have been possible. We consider real-time data acquisition of the ocean interior to be a necessary component of a sustained Arctic Observing System.