Spatial and Temporal Variability in Freshwater Inflow to the Arctic Ocean

The Arctic terrestrial hydrologic cycle, through its influence on the Arctic Ocean, is an important aspect of high-latitude Earth systems research. Given recent evidence of significant change in the Arctic environment, monitoring of the terrestrial Arctic hydrology has become increasingly important to establish baseline contemporary conditions upon which future changes can be measured. A key component in a systemic monitoring of Arctic hydrology is land-surface models which can accurately capture the temporal and spatial variability of the water cycle from readily available input drivers such as air temperature and precipitation. In this study we make use of a hydrological model that incorporates spatially explicit fields of vegetation type and rooting depth, soil properties, and routing of river water to the ocean. The hydrological model is a daily model which contains a snowpack routine, a two layer soil component for root zone and deep soil, and active layer thaw based on an air temperature degree day approach. Fields of daily precipitation and air temperature drive the model. We make use of data from over 650 Arctic discharge sites (in Russia, Canada, and the USA) in combination with the simulated discharge time series across the terrestrial Arctic drainage system (figure). By combining simulated discharges with observed data, we explore spatial and temporal variations in the Arctic freshwater budget.