Author(s): S. J. Prinsenberg
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Keywords: No Keywords
Abstract: Since heat conduction through snow is slower than through ice, the depth and density of the snow cover is important in determining ice growth rates. Depths and densities (water content) vary along the Canadian East and Arctic coasts, and causes snow parameters used in ice growth models to vary from location to location and to vary in time at anyone location. The spatial and temporal variations in snow and ice thermal parameters are determined by fitting climatic ice and snow thickness data to results of a Freezing-Degree Day model. As expected the drier snow in the high Arctic conducts heat slower than the wetter snow at lower latitudes. When the snow effect on ice growth is parameterized using the station's ice thicknesses, the empirical constants of Freezing Degree-Days models can be related to thermal properties of snow and ice and shown to vary in latitude. With variable constants, ice growth is predicted more accurately than with a non-variable constants.
Year: 1992