Globally, melt from seasonal snowcovers and glaciers are estimated to provide essential freshwater flows for over one-sixth of the world’s population. This freshwater is a critical resource for local and downstream communities and ecosystems. Ongoing anthropogenic climate and land use change are dramatically impacting the cold-region processes driving these critical flows. Seasonal snowpacks influence many aspects of cold-regions meteorology and hydrology such as surface-atmosphere-energy exchanges, and frozen soil dynamics. Glaciers modify the local climate and provide essential water supply in late summer.  There are significant incentives to provide better estimates of these changing physical processes through improved observations, analysis, and modelling.

In this session, we invite contributions from the broader cryosphere community who are interested in observations, analysis, and/or modelling to share their experiences, insights, and advances in utilizing existing and next-generation tools. Contributions are particularly encouraged that explore the possibilities and strategies to overcome the significant challenges of the increasingly complex and large datasets now available from big data and advances in remote sensing from UAVs, satellite and airborne systems, and high-performance computing opportunities. Research spanning processes across all climate zones is encouraged to be a part of the discussion. 

Oral talks:

10:00 - 10:15: Quantifying the snowpack surface energy budget of a subarctic alpine catchment: Shar Ta Gà’ (Grizzly Creek), Yukon
Presenter(s): Eole Valence, PhD Student, McGill University, Jeffrey M. McKenzie (1), Bastien Charonnat (2), Michel Baraër (2), Kaiyuan Wang (1), Janie Masse-Dufresne (2), 1 Department of Earth and Planetary Science, McGill University, Montreal (Quebec), Canada, 2 Hc3 (Hydrology, Climate and Climate Change), École de

10:15 - 10:30: Snow Interception Processes and Prediction in a Windswept Subalpine Environment
Presenter(s): Alex Cebulski, PhD Student, University of Saskatchewan, John Pomeroy, Centre for Hydrology, University of Saskatchewan, Canmore, Alberta

10:30 - 10:45: Characterization of the turbulent fluxes and surface melt for two Canadian Rockies glaciers
Presenter(s): Caroline Aubry-Wake, , Physical Geography, Utrecht University and Coldwater Laboratory, U.Sask., D. Scott Munro, U. Toronto, Warren Helgason, University of Saskatchewan,  John W. Pomeroy, University of Saskatchewan

10:45 - 11:00: Assimilation of Satellite Albedo to Improve Simulations of Glacier Hydrology
Presenter(s): Andre Bertoncini, Ph.D. Candidate, University of Saskatchewan, John W. Pomeroy, Centre for Hydrology, University of Saskatchewan

11:00 - 11:15: Fractional Snow Cover Area Modelling in Mountainous Terrain
Presenter(s): David Casson, PhD Candidate, Centre for Hydrology, University of Saskatchewan, Canmore, Alberta, Canada, Martyn Clark, Centre for Hydrology, University of Saskatchewan, Canmore, Canada,Andrew W. Wood, Research Applications Laboratory, National Center for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, Colorado

11:15 - 11:30: A comparison of snowmelt timing estimates from Sentinel-1 Synthetic Aperture Radar observations and in-situ snow water equivalence records in British Columbia, Canada
Presenter(s): Sara Darychuk, PhD Candidate, University of Northern British Columbia, Joseph M. Shea - University of Northern British Columba