Permafrost degradation and associated ground settlement estimation under 2 °C global warming

Abstract

Global warming of 2 °C above preindustrial levels has been considered to be the threshold that should not be exceeded by the global mean temperature to avoid dangerous interference with the climate system. However, this global mean target has different implications for different regions owing to the globally nonuniform climate change characteristics. Permafrost is sensitive to climate change; moreover, it is widely distributed in high-latitude and high-altitude regions where the greatest warming is predicted. Permafrost is expected to be severely affected by even the 2 °C global warming, which, in turn, affects other systems such as water resources, ecosystems, and infrastructures. Using air and soil temperature data from ten coupled model intercomparison project phase five models combined with observations of frozen ground, we investigated the permafrost thaw and associated ground settlement under 2 °C global warming. Results show that the climate models produced an ensemble mean permafrost area of 14.01 × 106 km2, which compares reasonably with the area of 13.89 × 106 km2 (north of 45°N) in the observations. The models predict that the soil temperature at 6 m depth will increase by 2.34–2.67 °C on area average relative to 1990–2000, and the increase intensifies with increasing latitude. The active layer thickness will also increase by 0.42–0.45 m, but dissimilar to soil temperature, the increase weakens with increasing latitude due to the distinctly cooler permafrost at higher latitudes. The permafrost extent will obviously retreat north and decrease by 24–26% and the ground settlement owing to permafrost thaw is estimated at 3.8–15 cm on area average. Possible uncertainties in this study may be mostly attributed to the less accurate ground ice content data and coarse horizontal resolution of the models.