FROZEN GROUND The News Bulletin of the International Permafrost Association Number 29, December 2005 INTERNATIONAL PERMAFROST ASSOCIATION The International Permafrost Association, founded in 1983, has as its objectives to foster the dissemination of knowledge concerning permafrost and to promote cooperation among persons and national or international organisations engaged in scientific investigation and engineering work on permafrost. Membership is through national Adhering Bodies and Associate Members. The IPA is governed by its officers and a Council consisting of representatives from 26 Adhering Bodies and Associates having interests in some aspect of theoretical, basic and applied frozen ground research, including permafrost, seasonal frost, artificial freezing and periglacial phenomena. Committees, Working Groups, and Task Forces organise and coordinate research activities and special projects. The IPA became an Affiliated Organisation of the International Union of Geological Sciences (IUGS) in July 1989. Beginning in 1996 the IPA and the International Geographical Union (IGU) developed an Agreement of Cooperation, thus making IPA an affiliate of the IGU. The Association’s primary responsibilities are convening International Permafrost Conferences, undertaking special projects such as preparing databases, maps, bibliographies, and glossaries, and coordinating international field programmes and networks. Conferences were held in West Lafayette, Indiana, U.S.A., 1963; in Yakutsk, Siberia, 1973; in Edmonton, Canada, 1978; in Fairbanks, Alaska, 1983; in Trondheim, Norway, 1988; in Beijing, China, 1993; in Yellowknife, Canada, 1998, and in Zurich, Switzerland, 2003. The Ninth conference will be in Fairbanks, Alaska, in 2008. Field excursions are an integral part of each Conference, and are organised by the host country. Executive Committee 2003-2008 Council Members Argentina President Professor Jerry Brown, USA Austria Belgium Vice Presidents Canada Professor Charles Harris, U.K. China Dr. Georgy Z. Perlshtein, Russia Denmark Members Finland Professor Hans-W. Hubberten, Germany France Mr. Don W. Hayley, Canada Germany Professor Zhu Yuanlin, China Iceland Italy International Secretariat Dr. Hanne H. Christiansen, Norway Japan Dr. Angélique Prick, Norway Kazakhstan Mongolia Standing Committees The Netherlands Data, Information and Communication New Zealand International Advisory Committee for ICOP Norway Working Groups Poland Antarctic Permafrost and Periglacial Environments Russia Coastal and Offshore Permafrost Spain Cryosol Sweden Glacier and Permafrost Hazards in High Mountains Switzerland Isotopes and Geochemistry of Permafrost United Kingdom Mapping and Modelling of Mountain Permafrost United States of America Periglacial Landforms, Processes, and Climate Permafrost and Climate Associate Members Permafrost Astrobiology Portugal Permafrost Engineering South Africa Cover: Offshore permafrost drilling at Cape Mamontov Klyk, Western Laptev Sea (Siberia). During the Russian-German Expedition COAST a transect consisting of five boreholes from the coast to the offshore (12 km off the coast) was drilled and cored from the sea ice. Photograph taken April 14, 2005 by Volker Rachold, Alfred Wegener Institute, Research Department Potsdam. See the Coastal and Offshore Permafrost Working Group report for more information. FROZEN GROUND THE NEWS BULLETIN OF THE INTERNATIONAL PERMAFROST ASSOCIATION NUMBER 29 • DECEMBER 2005 Frozen Ground, the News Bulletin of the Inter- EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE REPORT 2 national Permafrost Association, is published annually. GLOBAL AND REGIONAL ACTIVITIES The IPA is a non-governmental association of national organisations and associates representing THE INTERNATIONAL POLAR YEAR: STATUS OF 26 countries. The success of the bulletin depends upon the willingness of IPA participants to supply PLANNED PERMAFROST ACTIVITIES 3 information for publication. News items from any SECOND EUROPEAN CONFERENCE ON PERMAFROST 5 IPA participant or others are very welcome, as are interesting photographs. To submit news items REPORTS OF THE 16TH AND 17TH IPA COUNCIL 6 or photos please contact: EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE SUMMARIES 9 The IPA Secretariat The University Centre in Svalbard, UNIS P.O. Box 156 WORKING GROUPS AND STANDING COMMITTEE REPORTS 10 N-9171 Longyearbyen NORWAY NEWS FROM MEMBERS 18 Email: [email protected] Frozen Ground is also available as PDF file on IPA web site (http://www.geo.uio.no/IPA/). OTHER NEWS 42 This issue of Frozen Ground was compiled and edited by Angélique Prick. PLANNING CALENDAR 46 The IPA Secretariat is supported by The Research Council of Norway and The University Centre in Svalbard, UNIS. MEMBERS/NATIONAL CONTACTS/WORKING GROUPS 47 EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE REPORT A number of notably activities took place this past year. gions specialty and glaciological conferences (see calendar The Second European Conference on Permafrost was held for permafrost-related meetings). The IPA Council is con- in Potsdam and included meetings of the IPA Council sidering changing the frequency of its international con- and the Executive Committee. In addition to discussing ference from every five to four years with at least one offi- future changes to the Constitution, the Council approved cial regional conference during the interim period. The the new membership category of Associate Member. Por- method of electing the Executive Committee is also un- tugal has become the first Associate Member, and con- der consideration as is the rotation of its officers (see sum- gratulations to New Zealand for becoming a new Adher- maries of Council meetings). Coordination and collabo- ing Member. ration of activities with other international unions and Members of our international community participated societies are continuing, including those with IUGS, IGU, in conferences including: the International Conference on CliC, IPY and the recently formed IUGG Commission Periglacial Geomorphology; the Arctic Science Summit on Cryospheric Sciences. Week; the First CliC Conference; three conferences in As announced earlier the Research Council of Nor- Russia (the International Pushchino Conference, the Third way awarded a grant to UNIS that enabled the employ- Russian Conference on Geocryology; the International ment of a half-time position in the IPA Secretariat. Conference on Cryopedology); the Sixth International Angélique Prick occupies the position and is responsible Conference on Geomorphology (IAG); the Second Inter- for preparing Frozen Ground, among other duties. Hanne national Conference on Arctic Research Planning, the Fifth Christiansen continues her role of overall management of International Conference on Gas Hydrates; and the an- the Secretariat and is taking a lead in the IPA IPY perma- nual AGU and EGU meetings. frost education and outreach activities together with the Planning for the International Polar Year (2007-2008) University of the Arctic. The IUGS is supporting our ini- resulted in acceptance by the IPY Joint Committee of three tial efforts for planning the IPY and Planet Earth activi- coordinated permafrost projects : the Permafrost Observa- ties. tory Project, the Antarctic and sub-Antarctic Permafrost, Details of many of the above-mentioned activities are Periglacial and Soil Environments Project and the Arctic presented in the following pages. Circum-Polar Coastal Observatory Network. Representa- tives of many of these projects met in Copenhagen in November to develop plans for field activities, outreach, education and data management. Included were discus- sions of our new carbon project and participation in the International Year of Planet Earth. One IPY-IPA legacy will be to encourage the development of the next genera- tion of permafrost researchers. The Permafrost Young Researchers Network (PYRN) is in its early development stage and it plans to encourage communications and col- laborations among undergraduates and graduate students, post docs and other younger researchers and educators. Plans for the first Asian Conference on Permafrost in Lanzhou, China, in August 2006 are well advanced. We encourage multi-disciplinary participation in the confer- ence and field excursion. Although the abstract deadline is January 30, contact the organizers for the latest infor- The IPA Executive Committee at the EUCOP II mation and possible late participation (www.casnw.net/ Conference, Potsdam. permafrost/home.html). From left to right: Vice President Prof. Charles Harris, The coming year will be busy and critical to the future Secretariat Leader Dr. Hanne H. Christiansen, Member of the IPA. In addition to the conference in China, we Prof. Hans-W. Hubberten, President Dr. Jerry Brown, plan to participate in other international conferences in- Vice President Dr. Georgy Z. Perlshstein, Secretariat cluding the annual conference in Russia (Tyumen), the Officer Dr. Angélique Prick, Member Don W. Hayley. international soil congress, and the international cold re- Photograph provided by Hanne H. Christiansen. 2 Frozen Ground GLOBAL AND REGIONAL ACTIVITIES THE INTERNATIONAL POLAR YEAR: STATUS OF PLANNED PERMAFROST ACTIVITIES Jerry Brown and Hanne H. Christiansen, The IPA Secretariat at the University Centre in Svalbard, Longyearbyen, Norway ([email protected]) The International Polar Year (2007-2008) provides a will continue to be reported at existing CALM and other unique opportunity for scientists and engineers along with sites. Our IPY Legacy for the TSP project is to establish a younger researchers from around the world to increase