Abstract
We investigated changes in the temperature regime of post-fire and post-technogenic cryogenic soils of Central Siberia using remote sensing data and results of numerical simulation. We have selected the time series of satellite data for two variants of plots with disturbed vegetation and on-ground cover: natural ecosystems of post-fire plots and post-technogenic plots with reclamation as well as dumps without reclamation. Surface thermal anomalies and temperature in soil horizons were evaluated from remote data and numerical simulation and compared with summarized experimental data. We estimated the influence of soil profile disturbances on the temperature anomalies forming on the surface and in soil horizons based on the results of heat transfer modeling in the soil profile. According to remote sensing data, within 20 years, the thermal insulation properties of the vegetation cover restore in the post-fire areas, and the relative temperature anomaly reaches the level of background values. In post-technogenic plots, conditions are more “contrast” comparing to the background, and the process of the thermal regime restoration takes a longer time (>60 years). Forming “neo-technogenic ecosystems” are distinct in special thermal regimes of soils that differ from the background ones both in reclamated and in non-reclamated plots. An assumption was made of the changes in the moisture content regime as the main factor causing the long-term existence of thermal anomalies in the upper soil horizons of disturbed plots. In addition, we discussed the formation of transition zones (“ecotones”) along the periphery of the disturbed plots due to horizontal heat transfer.
Highlights
IntroductionDynamics, and rate of soil processes are subjects of physical characteristics of soils (temperature and moisture content)
Regimes of soil functioning, dynamics, and rate of soil processes are subjects of physical characteristics of soils
We considered the following variants: (i) basic set of conditions, (ii) no change in the moisture content for the horizon O(F+H), (iii) equal moisture content in the upper soil horizons, and (iv) moisture content similar to var. 3 with greater change in albedo
Summary
Dynamics, and rate of soil processes are subjects of physical characteristics of soils (temperature and moisture content). Central Siberia is an important subject of these studies due to that 50% of forest ecosystems (about 3 mln km of 6 mln km of forested area) is in the permafrost zone [8]. Changes in thermal regimes of soil reveal themselves in the root-inhabited soil layer (active layer of soil). Possible changes in the state of permafrost soils are a significant factor affecting eco-systems [7,9,10,11,12,13] and even on global climate [14,15,16]. The heat exchange in the soil profile is a subject of the temperature gradient, thermal radiation balance, turbulent heat exchange in air, and evaporation and soil moisture
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