Climate Change in the Eastern Arctic

本研究的总体目标是提供以哈德逊湾、福克斯盆地和哈德逊海峡为重点的北极东部地区气候变化影响评估。这项工作结合了北极东部气候条件的基础科学、这些条件的建模以及在执行气候变化影响评估中的应用。海冰支配着北极东部的气候。该地区已经经历了有充分记录的气候变化，并将在未来几十年经历更剧烈的变化。根据这一总体目标提出的研究项目将发展：1)气候数据分析，使我们能够利用细微的气候指标来探测气候变率和变化，特别是适合于气候重建；2)利用聚类分析来评估海冰的空间分布及其潜在的冰动力的技术；3)从耦合气候模式中剔除的一系列海冰状况预估，并通过区域建模和利用当地收集的气候数据进行统计降尺度的增强；4)评估预估的气候变化对当地第一民族和因纽特人社区、区域生物群和自然地理（如永久冻土退化）的影响。

The overarching goal of this research is to provide a climate change impact assessment for the Eastern Arctic region focussing on Hudson Bay, Foxe Basin, and Hudson Strait. The work combines the basic science of climate conditions in the Eastern Arctic, the modelling of these conditions and the use of these in performing climate change impact assessments. Sea ice dominates the climate of the Eastern Arctic. This region has already experienced well documented climate change and will experience even more dramatic change over the next few decades. The proposed research projects stemming from this overarching goal will develop: 1) climate data analytics that will enable the detection of climate variability and change using nuanced climate metrics, especially suitable for climate reconstruction, 2) techniques to assess spatial distribution of sea ice and its underlying ice dynamics using cluster analysis, 3) a range of projections of sea ice conditions culled from coupled climate models and augmented by regional modelling and statistical downscaling using locally collected climate data, and 4) assessments of impacts of the projected climate change on local First Nations and Inuit communities, regional biota, and physical geography such as permafrost degradation. In the first project several novel techniques using nuanced changes in temperature which build on past NSERC funded work will be used to reconstruct sea ice conditions prior to the satellite reconnaissance era (pre-1970). This will enable a longer time series and the ability to tease out changes that are the result of cyclical behaviour in the climate system and those resulting from recent anthropogenically induced climate change. In the second project, sea ice dynamics within the major Eastern Arctic basins are examined by using cluster analysis on gridded sea ice data, a novel approach to understanding how sea ice develops, propagates and breaks up as part of the annual cycle. This will also help in understanding the regional variation of sea ice thickness. The third project updates pioneering work done in the Climate Lab that was published in 2005 that provided projections of sea ice change from a suite of coupled climate models. Aspects of the earlier work will be updated and then augmented using the results of regional climate models and projections generated using statistical downscaling. This will provide projections suitable for climate change impact assessments which is the focus of the fourth research project. Increasingly local communities are experiencing the effects of a changing climate impacting on food security, transportation safety, housing infrastructure and traditional livelihoods. These, and other impacts, will be assessed using a climate change impact assessment framework providing the necessary tools for adaptation strategies.