joshua king and chris derksen climate research division environment canada
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SnowSAR in Canada: An evaluation of basin scale dual-frequency (17.2 and 9.6 GHz) snow property retrieval in a tundra environment. Joshua King and Chris Derksen Climate Research Division Environment Canada Toronto, Ontario, Canada. - PowerPoint PPT PresentationTRANSCRIPT
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SnowSAR in Canada: An evaluation of basin scale dual-frequency (17.2 and 9.6 GHz) snow property retrieval in a tundra environment
Joshua King and Chris DerksenClimate Research DivisionEnvironment CanadaToronto, Ontario, Canada
Thanks to: Nick Rutter, Tom Watts and all participants in the field campaign
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Motivation
• Radar as an emerging technology for observation of snow properties
• ESA Earth Explorer CoReH2O
• Dual frequency 17.2 and 9.6 GHz (Ku- and X-band) synthetic aperture radar (SAR)
• Few studies have investigated seasonal/spatial Ku- and X-band radar response and no previous study in a tundra environments
Ku
VV
VH
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Research Gaps
1. Soil/Vegetation properties• Uncertainties related to variation
in soil and vegetation dielectrics
2. Snow grain properties• Unbiased measurements may
allow the role of large depth hoar to be evaluated
3. Scaling of observations• Are small scale variations in
snow and soil properties influential at the airborne and/or satellite level?
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SnowSAR in Canada• Airborne radar operating at the
proposed CoReH2O frequencies
• 17.2 and 9.6 GHz
• Dual-polarization (VV, VH)
• 2 x 2 m spatial resolution
• Three observation campaigns in Trail Valley Creek near Inuvik, NWT (December 2012 , March 2013, April 2013)
• Trench stratigraphy experiments
• Improved snow grain characterization (IRIS)
• Seasonal soil permittivity in multiple locations
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Study area and plan
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Flight data summary
December - 0/27March – 24/27April - 23/27
Incidence angles between 38 and 55 degrees
Local incidence angles between 26 and 62 degrees
Swath generally < 400 m
All 4 channels (Ku and X VV, VH) available with all completed flight lines
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Snow Measurement Campaign
Snow Pit (< 1 m)
Snow Trench (5 to 50 m)
Snow Transect (> 100 m)
Lidar (Basin scale)
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Sic Sic Creek Basin
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Sic Sic Creek - Snow Pit Locations
Upland Tundra
River Valley
Forest Transition
Pit Locations
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December
March
April
March
Sic Sic Creek - Seasonal
UplandPlateau
Valley
Foresttransition
Pit Locations
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Sic Sic Creek - Backscatter
UplandPlateau
Valley
Foresttransition
April 2013, 50 m, 45-50 deg elevation
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MEMLS Workflow – Pit
MEMLSActive
SurfaceRoughness
SnowPits
SSA to Pc
From IRIS2-Layer
Snowpack
SnowInput 1
Wegmüller & Mätzler (1999)
Mironov (2010)
MET TowerData
ObservedData
DerivedData
SimulatedData
M = 0.05Q = 0.1Sccho = 13
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Sic Sic Creek - MEMLS Active
• 10 m average of observed radar backscatter
• Small range of depth suggest grains may be an important in sic sic creek
• Can we compare single pits against radar pixels?
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Sic Sic Valley - 5 m Trench
• IR photography completed in 5 to 50 m trench excavations by Watts & Rutter• Stratigraphy extracted from stitched IR imagery to create 2D map
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Sic Sic Valley - 5 m Trench
• Topography produces a range of depth over short distances
• Also tends to drive DH fraction
• Distribution of grain properties built from snow pits within +-3 days
• Due to the nature of tundra snow, the slab distribution includes solid facets
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MEMLS Workflow – Distribution
MEMLSActive
TrenchExcavation
SurfaceRoughness
StratigraphyDistribution
SnowPits
GrainDistribution
2-LayerSnowpack
SnowInput 1 Snow
Input 2 SnowInput n
Wegmüller & Mätzler (1999
Mironov (2010)
MET TowerData
Field Data
DerivedData
SimulatedData
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Valley Trench – MEMLS Active
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Summary/Moving forward
• Relating backscatter to physical snow properties is a complex process
– Improved understanding of horizontal variation in grain properties and stratigraphy is needed
• Model advancement and inversion possible but requires community effort to assist in validation
– Physically based justification for tuning possible with known distributions
• Additional uncertainties including soil contribution must be resolved in the near future
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Snow texture
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Vegetation
• Backscatter appears influenced by local vegetation
• Methods needed to decompose contributions from vegetation and snow to develop retrieval
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Upland Tundra – Soil Permittivity
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Snow Measurement Campaign
Snow Pit (< 1 m)
Snow Trench (5 to 50 m)
• Manual Stratigraphy• Density (100 cc cutter)• Temperature Profile (4 cm)• IRIS SSA (5 cm)
• IR Stratigraphy• Multiple snow pits• IRIS SSA (5 cm)
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Snow pits in local context