Northern Climate ExChange puts Yukon climate studies at the public's fingertips

 Whitehorse – People interested in climate change and climate science in Yukon can now find the last eight years of research on the subject in one easy-to-access document.

The Northern Climate ExChange (NCE) released the “Compendium of Yukon Climate Change Science” this week. It can be found at http://www.taiga.net/nce/mainstreaming/index.html.

The report, produced as part of the Northern Climate ExChange’s mainstreaming program, includes over 175 studies divided into ten general themes. There are studies on everything from fish to forestry, from pollution to the breeding cycles of red squirrels at Kluane Lake. (they’re giving birth an average of 18 days earlier, largely as a result of climate change in the area). (see backgrounder, below)

“The north is already experiencing the impacts of climate change,” says Lia Johnson, the Climate Change Information Analyst for the NCE. “There’s a lot of research being done here at the Yukon Research Centre, and by outside universities and researchers. It’s great to have all the relevant research on the Yukon in one place.

“There are really two audiences for the compendium,” says Johnson. “There’s the full compendium, detailing all of the studies for governments, organizations and researchers to access. Then there’s a summary of 20 of the studies, which give a broad overview of the state of knowledge for Yukon climate change. That’s more for the public.”

The compendium was compiled by Aletta Leitch, a student working at the NCE last summer. The compendium is available in a PDF format, which allows the material to be downloaded onto an individual’s computer. The information is searchable through a standard keyword search.

“It’s a living document,” says Johnson. “We’ve included material right up to the present day, and we’ll continue to add to it as new research is published.”

The Northern Climate ExChange is one of six key programs that operate under the Yukon Research Centre (YRC) at Yukon College.

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Background

Some studies of note included in the compendium:

• It was determined that Yukon glaciers experienced a surface area decrease of 22% in a fifty-year period from 1956-1958 to 2006-2008. This period of melting was accompanied by increasing summer and winter temperatures, as well as decreasing winter precipitation.

• Melt of the Yukon-Alaska glaciers has contributed approximately 9% of the sea-level rise in the past 50 years.

• A modeled annual air temperature increase of 5 degrees Celsius predicted that essentially all of the permafrost would disappear from Wolf Creek and just over 10% would be left at Ruby Range. The stated results are relevant to the long term, and for the short term, results should be considered as only addressing the few metres of permafrost closest to the surface.

• Research revealed an increase in white spruce density on north-facing slopes and treeline advance on south-facing slopes, both related to warm temperatures throughout the 20th century. The difference between slopes is due to the distribution of permafrost.

• During the period 1948-2005, the Yukon experienced an annual average warming of 2.2°C and a winter warming of 4.5°C, the greatest rate of temperature increase in northern Canada.