COUNTRY IPPA REPORTS Reports from the Adhering Bodies of the International Permafrost Association 2015 ISSN– 1 – 2221-3775 Table of Content 1 Argentina, South American Partners and Mexiko _______________________________________ 3 2 Austria _____________________________________________________________________ 5 3 Canada ____________________________________________________________________ 10 4 China _____________________________________________________________________ 17 5 Denmark __________________________________________________________________ 19 6 Finland ____________________________________________________________________ 20 7 France ___________________________________________________________________ 21 8 Germany _________________________________________________________________ 24 9 Iceland ___________________________________________________________________ 30 10 Italy _____________________________________________________________________ 31 11 Japan ___________________________________________________________________ 34 12 Kyrgyzstan _______________________________________________________________ 35 13 Mongolia ________________________________________________________________ 37 14 New Zealand _____________________________________________________________ 38 15 Norway _________________________________________________________________ 39 16 Poland __________________________________________________________________ 42 17 Portugal _________________________________________________________________ 44 18 Romania ________________________________________________________________ 45 19 Russia __________________________________________________________________ 47 20 South Korea _____________________________________________________________ 57 21 Spain ___________________________________________________________________ 60 22 Sweden _________________________________________________________________ 64 23 Switzerland ______________________________________________________________ 68 24 The Netherlands __________________________________________________________ 71 25 United Kingdom ___________________________________________________________ 72 26 United States of America ____________________________________________________ 74 – 2 – Figure 1. Lizoite rock glacier in Salta, Argentina (M. 1 Argentina, South Martini) American Partners and During 2015 Dr. Mateo Martini and co-workers from Mexiko CICTERRA (Universidad Nacional de Córdoba) con- tinued with the dynamic and thermal monitoring of In March 2015 an excursion to the Morenas Colora- the Varas rock glacier (initiated in 2010) and obtained das rock glacier in the Andes of Mendoza was made the first results for the Lizoite rock glacier (initiated in with the participation of 16 Students from the Univer- 2014), both located in the Cordillera Oriental of NW sity of Bonn (Germany) under the direction of Dario Argentina (22-23˚S). Trombotto and Prof. Lothar Schrott (Bonn). On behalf of the XIX Argentine Congress of Geolo- gy, held in Córdoba in 2014, and with the support of the Subcommittee of Cryospheric Sciences of the Argentine Republic (SAC) and the Argentine and South American Permafrost Association (AASP), a new special publication Lilloana (San Miguel de Tucumán) was edited by Trombotto and Ahumada. The chapters include periglacial and glacial topics like rock glaciers of the Tropical Andes of Argentina (Ana Lía Ahumada); ice studies of grain size evoluti- on throughout the depth of a glacier (Carlos Di Prin- zio, Córdoba); surface fluctuations of glaciers in the Nevado Cololo, Bolivia (Ana Maria Sanches, Centro Polar e Climático, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil), among others. Carla Tapia Baldis (PhD student, Universidad Na- cional de San Juan) concluded with the periglacial and glacial geomorphology cartography at “Valle de los Glaciares de Escombros”, Rio Blanco basin (Central Andes, 31°50’S). First results concerning cryogenic altitudinal belts were already published. Figure 2. Active layer detachment at 4100 m asl in A regional approach about climatic parameters that the province of San Juan, Argentina (Tapia Baldis) control present permafrost distribution between 31°- 32°S was made. Historic climatic series from spatial During 2015 Noelia Sileo (Ciudad Autónoma de gridded data are used to elaborate regional maps of Buenos Aires) continued the water, ice and snow temperature, solar radiation and precipitation trends, sampling in the Vallecitos river basin. New sampling validated with local meteorological stations registers. points have been added to complete the whole basin Landforms identified as probable active-layer de- monitoring program, to characterize different water tachments, among other mass movement deposits, origins and the hydrogeochemical composition of a were recognized and characterized using remote typical cryogenic environment. The electric conduc- sensory imagery and digital elevation models. tivity analysis in temporal series has revealed a cha- racteristic behavior between the different sampling sites, depending mainly on their spatial and altitudi- nal distribution. The first isotopic results show that water samples in lower areas are enriched compa- red to those from higher zones indicating a depen- dence on values of δ18O y δ2H with altitude. Xavier Bodin (Laboratoire EDYTEM, CNRS / Univer- sité de Savoie, Le Bourget-du-Lac, France) presen- ted first conclusions of terrestrial photogrammetry for studying rock glacier dynamics and their interannual surface changes in the Andes at the meeting “Geo- morphometry for Geosciences”, Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań. At the same congress and to- – 3 – gether with Lucas Ruiz (Mendoza) Bodin analysed rock glaciers with the help of high resolution Pléia- des images. Bodin has a collaboration project with the Research Group of Mendoza about Geocryology studying the rock glacier of “Quebrada del Medio” also called Hans Stepanek. Throughout 2015, PhD Student Cristian Daniel Vil- larroel (CONICET-UNSJ) started with field measu- rements of hydrological and hydrogeological pro- cesses in the upper section of the river Santa Cruz basin. This area has lots of active and inactive rock glaciers, protalus lobes and few covered glaciers. We have obtained the first results on the hydrologi- cal behavior of different streams. It has also estab- lished the geometry of the groundwater basins. Geo- logist Ana Forte, of the same Universidad Nacional de San Juan, is mapping periglacial geomorphology with permafrost distribution in the Cordón de la Ra- mada of San Juan. A collaboration work was initiated with the Universi- dad Nacional Autónoma of México, UNAM (Dr. Hugo Delgado Granados, Mexico City). Dario Trombotto is mentor in the PhD work of Víctor Hugo Soto Molina about permafrost at the Citlaltépetl volcano. Figure 3. Volcán Citlaltépetl, México (Víctor Hugo In 2015 Dario Trombotto was appointed member of Soto Molina) the Climate and Cryosphere (CliC), Project Scientific Steering Group (SSG) by the Joint Scientific Commit- tee (JSC) for the World Climate Research Program Report prepared by Dario Trombotto Liaudat, Geo- (WCRP) at the 35th session in Geneva, Switzerland. cryology, Mendoza (dtrombot@mendoza-conicet. gob.ar), – 4 – ted of a presentation-and-discussion part (held in the 2 Austria Trautenfels Castle) and an excursion part (leading The year 2015 was another busy year for the Austri- to the Hochreichart area, Seckauer Tauern Range). an permafrost community with national and interna- The excursion focused on present and past permaf- tional meetings and project activities. Similar to our rost distribution and hydrogeological issues related national reports of the previous years, this report con- to paleo-permafrost landforms. The workshop was sists of two parts. The first part reports about gene- jointly organized by the Department of Geography ral permafrost activities and events which happened and Regional Science, University of Graz (represen- this year in the country. The second part discusses ted by A. Kellerer-Pirklbauer), the Institute of Earth permafrost and periglacial research activities carried Sciences, University of Graz (G. Winkler), and the out by the different research groups in Austria. Universalmuseum Joanneum, Trautenfels and Graz (K. Krenn, I. Fritz). Part 1: General permafrost activities in Aus- tria The General Assembly 2015 of the European Geos- ciences Union (EGU) took place in Vienna during the period 12 to 17 April 2015. Almost 12.000 scientists from more than one hundred countries participa- ted in this event (http://www.egu2015.eu). Permaf- rost-related research was presented and discussed in 22 different sessions. Within the framework of a new nationwide project entitled permAT - Long-term monitoring of permaf- rost and periglacial processes and its role for natural Figure 1. The organising committee of the per- hazard prevention: Possible strategies for Austria a mAT-permafrost workshop held in Graz on 26-27 Fe- workshop was held in Graz on 26-27 February 2015. bruary 2015 consisting of (from left to right) Andreas The aim of this workshop was to discuss possible Kellerer-Pirklbauer, Christoph Gitschthaler (both strategies, which allow the establishment of a long- University of Graz), Annett Bartsch (Central Institute term funded, maintained and efficiently working per- for Meteorology and Geodynamics), Stefan Ropac mafrost and periglacial monitoring network in Austria and Matthias Themessl (both Climate Change Cent- thereby considering also national hazard aspects re Austria(CCCA). Photograph provided