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Thermal diffusivity of seasonal snow determined from temperature profiles Public Deposited

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https://ir.library.oregonstate.edu/concern/articles/4q77fs17f

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Abstract
  • Thermal diffusivity of snow is an important thermodynamic property associated with key hydrological phenomena such as snow melt and heat and water vapor exchange with the atmosphere. Direct determination of snow thermal diffusivity requires coupled point measurements of thermal conductivity and density, which are nonstationary due to snow metamorphism. Traditional methods for determining these two quantities are generally limited by temporal resolution. In this study we present a method to determine the thermal diffusivity of snow with high temporal resolution using snow temperature profile measurements. High resolution (between 2.5 and 10 cm at 1 minute) temperature measurements from the seasonal snow pack at Plaine-Morte glacier in Switzerland are used as initial conditions and Neumann (heat flux) boundary conditions to numerically solve the one-dimensional heat equation and iteratively optimize for thermal diffusivity. The implementation of Neumann boundary conditions and a t-test, ensuring statistical significance between solutions of varied thermal diffusivity, are important to help constrain thermal diffusivity such that spurious high and low values as seen with Dirichlet (temperature) boundary conditions are reduced. The results show that time resolved thermal diffusivity can be determined from easily implemented and inexpensive temperature measurements of seasonal snow with good agreement to density-based empirical parameterizations for thermal conductivity.
  • Keywords: thermal diffusivity, porous media, heat diffusion, snow temperature measurements, thermal conductivity
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  • Oldroyd, H. J., Higgins, C. W., Huwald, H., Selker, J. S., & Parlange, M. B. (2013). Thermal diffusivity of seasonal snow determined from temperature profiles. Advances in Water Resources, 55, 121-130. doi:10.1016/j.advwatres.2012.06.011
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  • 55
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  • This research was supported with partial funding from the Swiss National Science Foundation [200021_120238/1, 200020_125092/1], the NCCR Mobile Information Communication Systems (MICS) project and Competence Center Environment and Sustainability (CCES) of ETH Domain. We are also grateful for logistical support from the Crans-Montana ski resort, and for the field assistance from the many members of the Environmental Fluid Mechanics and Hydrology (EFLUM) laboratory at EPFL.
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