Grant: Advancing Climate Change Science in Canada

In the Anthropocene, human-driven changes to carbon cycles alter global and local climates and hence allaspects of economy and human life. The subarctic is 1/6 of the Canadian land mass but a poorly studied areawhere human habitation is sparse and rates of resource extraction are increasing. The central and westernsubarctic is particularly vulnerable to climate change effects (temperature and precipitation) due to extensivepermafrost, large stores of carbon, and low annual precipitation. Carbon fluxes to the atmosphere from surfacewater bodies as greenhouse gases (carbon dioxide and methane) is a balance between carbon sources fromterrestrial systems including wetlands and lake/pond margins and carbon stored in sediments. This loss fromsurface water bodies is large and complicates our ability to quantify the effect of climate change and humanactivities on this large region. This proposal examines the landscape-scale carbon balance in three areas along atransect from south to north covering conditions of continuous, widespread discontinuous, and sporadicdiscontinuous permafrost. We use a combination of hydroclimatic information, chemical analysis, highlyspecialized isotopic techniques, remote sensing, and numerical modelling to improve our quantitativeunderstanding and forecasting of carbon dynamics, greenhouse gas production, carbon stores and the criticalcarbon balance between long-term storage in sediments (carbon sequestration) and release to the atmosphere(increasing greenhouse gases). We have formed a strong research team including Canadian and internationalresearch scientists from universities, territorial and federal governments, students, and Indigenouscommunities. Research outcomes will inform science-based management and policy decisions and delivery ofclimate change actions for Canada's north and Canada's obligations for international reporting on greenhousegas emissions.