Close Window

The Changing Cold Regions Network: Observation, Diagnosis, and Prediction of Environmental Change in the Saskatchewan and Mackenzie River Basins, Canada

Chris M. DeBeer, Changing Cold Regions Network, chris.debeer@usask.ca
Merritt R. Turetsky, University of Guelph, mrt@uoguelph.ca (Presenter)
Howard Wheater, University of Saskatchewan, howard.wheater@usask.ca

The cold interior of Northwestern Canada has one of the world's most extreme and varied climates and, as with other regions across the Arctic, is experiencing rapid environmental change. The Changing Cold Regions Network (CCRN; www.ccrnetwork.ca) is a Canadian research network devoted to addressing key challenges and globally-important issues facing the Arctic by improving the understanding of past and ongoing changes in climate, land, vegetation, and water, and predicting their future integrated responses, with a geographic focus on the Saskatchewan and Mackenzie River Basins. The network is funded for 5 years (2013-18) by the Natural Science and Engineering Research Council of Canada, and combines the unique expertise of over 40 Canadian scientists representing 8 universities and 4 Federal government agencies, as well as 15 international researchers from the United States, China, Australia, the UK, France, and Germany.

CCRN has been integrating existing and new experimental data with modelling and remote sensing products to understand, diagnose and predict changing land, water and climate, and their interactions and feedbacks, for Northwestern Canada’s cold interior. It uses a network of world class Water, Ecosystem, Cryosphere and Climate (WECC) Observatories to study the detailed connections among changing climate, ecosystems and water in the permafrost regions of the Sub-arctic, the Boreal Forest, the Western Cordillera, and the Prairies. More detailed information can be found at http://ccrnetwork.ca/science/index.php.

The network is strongly linked to several key international organizations and projects. Under the auspices of the Global Energy and Water Exchanges (GEWEX) project of the World Climate Research Programme, CCRN constitutes a regional hydroclimate project (RHP)—currently the only active project in North America. CCRN is linked with NASA and the Arctic–Boreal Vulnerability Experiment as an Affiliated Project of the Science Team. In particular, surface observations from CCRN’s WECC Observatories contribute an important source of information to the ABoVE airborne campaign. CCRN also has strong collaborative links with the US National Center for Atmospheric Research regarding the development and application of high resolution weather and climate modelling over western North America.

It is expected that the knowledge and tools developed through this research will benefit not only Canada, but also many other countries in cold regions that face similar challenges in the face of such uncertainty. In particular CCRN, and its larger follow-on project, the Global Water Futures Programme (GWF; https://gwf.usask.ca/), welcome the opportunity for broader collaboration with the international arctic research community.

Associated Project(s): 

Poster Location ID: 44

Session Assigned: Permafrost and Hydrology

 


Close Window