Samcot_annual_report

Annual Report 2016

SAMCoT

Low coast of Baydaratskaya Bay with ice-wedge. An MSU

student participating in the expedition is sampling the

frost grounds for further laboratory research.

Using remote sensing data MSU researchers have tracked the retreat of the coastline in Baydara in different occasions

from June 2013 to September 2016. The observed coastal cliff is shown amplified.

With support from SAMCoT/WP6, Moscow State

University (MSU) performed extensive fieldwork at

Baydaratskaya Bay in September 2016. The test site is

situated on the west coast of the Baydara Gulf of the

Kara Sea.

The fieldwork was conducted in order to:

Study the processes and mechanisms

behind coastline retreat

Investigate the properties of permafrost

in the area of interest

Examine the interaction between permafrost

and existing engineering structures

(e.g. cofferdam, pipelines)

Prepare for in-situ validation of some elements

of MSU’s thermal abrasion modelling

This year’s survey is the fifth fieldwork campaign in the

area. MSU researchers visited Baydaratskaya Bay site

for the first time in 2012, just at the start of the SAMCoT

Coastal Technology activities.

FIELDWORK AT BAYDARATSKAYA BAY

Currently there is no widely accepted approach for the

quantitative assessment of soil erosion resistance

and potential erosion rates for clay-rich or “cohesive”

soils. Permafrost soils are considered cohesive due to

both the high amount of fines and the presence of ice

adding cohesion. In order to improve our knowledge of

sediment transport in permafrost areas, a study on the

variation of the critical shear stress versus temperature

is needed. This part of the investigations will be carried

out by Julie Malenfant-Lepage, PhD candidate at Laval

University in Canada, who started collaborating with

SAMCoT in September 2016.

Malefant-Lepage will develop laboratory and field test

procedures using the cohesive strength meter to deter-

mine the critical shear stress of thawing sediments. In

particular, she intends to develop a method to assess

the maximum quantity of water that can be concentra-

ted in one channel in order to control the heat transfer

to permafrost as well as the erosion of soils. The use of

the erosion meter system will be an important asset for

Malefant-Lepage’s PhD.

EXPERIMENTAL WORK ON SEDIMENT TRANSPORT IN PERMAFROST AREA

Malefant-Lepage will work in close collaboration with

Bonoit Loranger, a PhD candidate financed by the

Norwegian Research Council through the project “Frost

Protection of Roads and Railways (FROST)”. FROST star-

ted in 2015 and is designed to tie together knowledge

from cold regions engineering, thermodynamics, geology

and mineralogy. It involves researchers from both

Norway and Canada. Loranger’s research focuses on

frost heave and on the frost susceptibility characteris-

tics of frozen soils and crushed rock materials used in

road construction. Elena Kuznetsova, a researcher at

NTNU and project manager on the FROST project, will

supervise the work of both candidates. Kuznetsova and

the PhD candidates will work on finding a connection

linking Loranger’s research on the segregation potential

of soils, which has numerous applications in the design

of cold region constructions, and Malefant-Lepage’s re-

sults on soil sensitivity to erosion. The results obtained

from the connection between both topics will eventually

be applied as an input to erosion/sedimentation models

developed by SAMCoT’s Coastal Technology team.

Over the years valuable full-scale data have been gath-

ered and made available to SAMCoT researchers. These

include mapping, measuring coastline retreat rate and

observing the underlying physical processes, time-lapse

photography of slope degradation processes, continuous

temperature measurements of the soil at two typical

coastal sites, etc. The compiled Baydaratskaya Bay site

data are currently being used by Depina to define a case

study for Arctic coastal erosion protection measures. In

addition, Mohammad Saud Afzal, a new SAMCoT postdoc

from 1st January 2017, will use the data. Saud aims to

develop an integrated system model and a roadmap to

assess coastal erosion in the Arctic.