Residents, engineers and scientists discuss permafrost thaw

Arctic scientists, engineers and residents are all affected by permafrost thaw, but the lens through which they look at it is different. For scientists, it’s about understanding the process of thawing, while for engineers, it is about finding innovative infrastructure solutions. And for people living in the Arctic, it means adjusting their daily lives to the ground that is sinking.

The Permafrost and Infrastructure Symposium this month brought together more than 50 participants – North Slope residents and planners, as well as national and international scientists, engineers, program managers and policymakers, creating a space for them to exchange their perspectives on the effects of thawing permafrost in the Arctic.

“Because we have different backgrounds, different history, we have different opinions,” said Vladimir Romanovsky, one of the co-chairs of the symposium, emeritus professor of geophysics and former director of the University of Alaska Fairbanks Geophysical Institute Permafrost Laboratory.

While scientists often think they understand a problem, Romanovsky said, they might not know what local communities are worried about or how to practically implement their ideas. In turn, for engineers, it is important to look at the local specific problems and various adaptation technologies and strategies.

The symposium took place from July 28 to Aug. 5, in several locations: in Utqiagvik, along the Dalton Highway and in Point Lay and Wainwright. The extended geography allowed participants to observe various permafrost environments and the range of issues the thaw causes to transportation, as well as urban and village infrastructures in the rapidly warming Arctic.

“In Alaska, it may have been the first time that this interesting practical symposium was organized,” Romanovsky said.

When permafrost thaws, everything is affected: from roads to housing, from pipelines to food, from storm frequency to erosion threat. The widespread environmental changes are only expected to continue to affect circumpolar communities, which adds urgency to collaboration between engineers, permafrost scientists and Arctic residents.

In Point Lay, permafrost thaw is apparent in how the houses look. Pilings move, house structures sink and water and sewer systems often break, said co-chair of the event Billy Connor, who directs the Arctic Infrastructure Development Center at UAF’s Institute of Northern Engineering.

In Wainwright and Utqiagvik, shoreline erosion is one of the biggest issues caused by permafrost thaw, he said.

In all communities where the symposium took place, traditional hunting trails are not where they used to be because barrier islands move during increasing storms, and the sea walls protecting the communities need improvements, Connor said.

During the Utqiagvik conference at the Barrow Arctic Research Center, experts from Utqiaġvik and Point Lay shared observations of how permafrost thaw affects food and water security when saltwater intrudes into ice cellars. They also spoke about adaptation and mitigation efforts such as using various permafrost foundations, utility infrastructures and sea walls.

To see the permafrost issues firsthand, the symposium participants had a chance to go on excursions around Utqiagvik, as well as on day trips to either Point Lay or Wainwright.

Another excursion offered during the event was along the Dalton highway. During the drive, participants stopped to look at the 2012 landslide near the Yukon River Bridge that accelerated permafrost thaw, extensive erosion of the tundra along the Quintillion Fiber Optic trench and permafrost degradation caused by the 2015 Sagavanirktok River flood.

“During visiting villages and then of the Dalton Highway, there was lots of discussions and questions,” Romanovsky said. “Usually, it’s much easier to discuss outside of the presentations.”

Funding for the symposium came from the National Science Foundation, the U.S. Department of Transportation and UIC Science.

The grants were given to several research projects at the UAF, “which joined together to enhance information sharing between projects and reduce the demands of outreach and engagement (sometimes referred to as ‘research fatigue’) on local communities, said another event organizer Jana Peirce, who coordinates the Navigating the New Arctic science team researching ice-rich permafrost systems and adaptation in Prudhoe Bay and Point Lay.

To consolidate the knowledge exchange and the outcomes of various discussions, the symposium organizers are working on a roadmap document that will include a summary of insights from the event and recommendations from local and regional residents and planners to address the permafrost-related challenges.

The organizers plan to have a report at the end of January and present key findings to local policymakers and at national and international Arctic science and policy forums, such as Arctic Science Summit Week in Edinburgh, UK.

But the outcomes from the symposium have been taking place already.

After listening to the presentations about the symposium during their regular meeting in August, the North Slope Borough Assembly approved the project to put soil into a soil pond depression in Point Lay — an experiment to determine whether this method could be effective for filling under the Point Lay houses to stabilize the structure, said Dmitry Nicolsky, UAF Research Assistant Professor who is leading the project.

In the second half of September, the team from the Geophysical Institute plans to travel to the community to conduct the experiment with the help of the residents. They will install temperature sensors underneath the depression to monitor how the ground is behaving after they fill it with soil, Nicolsky said.

The method has been recommended to local planners since 2015, “but having it in front of the assembly members made the difference,” Peirce said.

“The urgency is increasing as thaw settlement has continued, and the houses have become more and more on shaky foundations,” she said.