Bartsch, Annett; Kroisleitner, Christine; Heim, Birgit (2016): Circumpolar Landscape Units, links to GeoTIFFs [dataset]. PANGAEA, https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.864508,

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Supplement to: Bartsch, A et al. (2016): An Assessment of Permafrost Long-term monitoring sites with circumpolar satellite derived datasets. Proceedings of the ESA Living Planet Symposium 2016. ESA SP-740, Prague, Czech Republic, 6 pp, hdl:10013/epic.48548.d001

Requirements for space based monitoring of permafrost features had been already defined within the IGOS Cryosphere Theme Report at the start of the IPY in 2007 (IGOS, 2007). The WMO Polar Space Task Group (PSTG, http://www.wmo.int/pages/prog/sat/pstg_en.php) identified the need to review the requirements for permafrost monitoring and to update these requirements in 2013.

Relevant surveys with focus on satellite data are already available from the ESA DUE Permafrost User requirements survey (2009), the United States National Research Council (2014) and the ESA – CliC – IPA – GTN –P workshop in February 2014. These reports have been reviewed and specific needs discussed within the community and a white paper submitted to the WMO PSTG. Acquisition requirements for monitoring of especially terrain changes (incl. rock glaciers and coastal erosion) and lakes (extent, ice properties etc.) with respect to current satellite missions have been specified.

About 50 locations ('cold spots') where permafrost (Arctic and Antarctic) in situ monitoring has been taking place for many years or where field stations are currently established have been identified. These sites have been proposed to the WMO Polar Space Task Group as focus areas for future monitoring by high resolution satellite data. The specifications of these sites including meta-data on site instrumentation have been published as supplement to the white paper (Bartsch et al. 2014, doi:10.1594/PANGAEA.847003).

The representativity of the 'cold spots' around the arctic has been in the following assessed based on a landscape units product which has been developed as part of the FP7 project PAGE21.

The ESA DUE Permafrost service has been utilized to produce a pan-arctic database (25km, 2000-2014) comprising Mean Annual Surface Temperature, Annual and summer Amplitude of Surface Temperature, Mean Summer (July-August) Surface Temperature. Surface status (frozen/unfrozen) related products have been also derived from the ESA DUE Permafrost service. This includes the length of unfrozen period, first unfrozen day and first frozen day. In addition, SAR (ENVISAT ASAR GM) statistics as well as topographic parameters have been considered. The circumpolar datasets have been assessed for their redundancy in information content. 12 distinct units could be derived. The landscape units reveal similarities between North Slope Alaska and the region from the Yamal Peninsula to the Yenisei estuary. Northern Canada is characterized by the same landscape units like western Siberia. North-eastern Canada shows similarities to the Laptev coast region.

This paper presents the result of this assessment and formulates recommendations for extensions of the in situ monitoring networks and categorizes the sites by satellite data requirements (specifically Sentinels) with respect to the landscape type and related processes.

This dataset provides landscape units for the pan-Arctic which have been derived for upscaling purposes as part of the PAGE21 work package 5.

Parameters relevant for geomorphological observations and carbon pools have been mostly selected from existing databases. The best dif-ferentiation of landscape units was obtained by using:

Topographic Wetness Index, SAR backscatter, Land Surface Temperature (July and August), unfrozen period length, the slope steeper than 3°, Mean annual Surface Temperature, day first frozen, day first unfrozen and Land surface temperature Amplitude (July and August).

This dataset comprises the landscape units as well as all input datasets (in case of applied post-processing of the original data source) in GeoTIFF format.