Improvement of the Fairbanks Atmospheric Carbon Monoxide Transport Model -- A Program for Calibration, Verification and Implementation

Completion Report Prepared for the Research Section, Alaska Department of Transportation and Public FacilitiesIn the early 70s, state, local and federal officials in Fairbanks, Alaska, became concerned with the rising incidence of high carbon monoxide episodes. Because of that concern, the Alaska Department of Highways (forerunner of the Department of Transportation and Public Facilities) and the Fairbanks North Star Borough requested that the Institute of Water Resources undertake a study to develop a computer model capability for understanding the transport of carbon monoxide and other pollutants within the Fairbanks airshed. The work was completed in June of 1976. Two publications (Carlson and Fox, 1976; Norton and Carlson, 1976) describe the initial development, documentation and implementation of the computer model. The model, ACOSP (Atmospheric Carbon monOxide Simulation Program), describes the two-dimensional behavior of pollutants in the atmosphere via solution of the convection-diffusion equation using the finite element method of numerical analysis

Develop Guidelines for Pavement Preservation Treatments and for Building a Pavement Preservation Program Platform for Alaska

INE/AUTC 12.0

Alaska-Canada Rail Link Economic Benefits

Construction of the 1,740 km Alaska-Canada Rail Link (ACRL) between Fort Nelson, BC and Delta Junction, Alaska to join the North American rail system to the Alaska Railroad will result in tremendous economic benefits for Canada and the US. The ACRL will provide valuable additional east-west rail capacity and tidewater access to the Pacific, hugely benefitting not only the Yukon and Eastern Alaska regions, into which it will introduce rail transport for the first time, but throughout both countries. The economic benefits of ACRL construction are consistent with Canadian government’s desire to promote Northern development and comparable in significance to those of Canadian Pacific Railway in the 1880’s and the St. Lawrence Seaway in the 1950’s. Construction of the ACRL alone will bring unprecedented economic stimulus to the region in terms of job creation, wages and income tax revenue over multiple years. Table 7-1 below summarizes the benefits from ACRL construction for the Yukon, BC and Canada as a whole. However, these estimates are conservative as they exclude benefits associated with pre-construction activities, railway operation post-construction, sales taxes and corporate taxes as well as all such benefits that will accrue to Alaska and the US

Social-ecological soundscapes: examining aircraft-harvester-caribou conflict in Arctic Alaska

Thesis (M.S.) University of Alaska Fairbanks, 2017As human development expands across the Arctic, it is crucial to carefully assess the impacts to remote natural ecosystems and to indigenous communities that rely on wild resources for nutritional and cultural wellbeing. Because indigenous communities and wildlife populations are interdependent, assessing how human activities impact traditional harvest practices can advance our understanding of the human dimensions of wildlife management. Indigenous communities across Arctic Alaska have expressed concern over the last four decades that low-flying aircraft interfere with their traditional harvest practices. For example, communities often have testified that aircraft disturb caribou (Rangifer tarandus) and thereby reduce harvest opportunities. Despite this longstanding concern, little research exists on the extent of aircraft activity in Arctic Alaska and on how aircraft affect the behavior and perceptions of harvesters. Therefore, the overarching goal of my research was to highlight the importance of aircraft-harvester conflict in Arctic Alaska and begin to address the issue using a scientific and community-driven approach. In Chapter 1, I demonstrated that conflict between aircraft and indigenous harvesters in Arctic Alaska is a widespread, understudied, and complex issue. By conducting a meta-analysis of the available literature, I quantified the deficiency of scientific knowledge about the impacts of aircraft on rural communities and traditional harvest practices in the Arctic. My results indicated that no peer-reviewed literature has addressed the conflict between low-flying aircraft and traditional harvesters in Arctic Alaska. I speculated that the scale over which aircraft, rural communities, and wildlife interact limits scientists' ability to determine causal relationships and therefore detracts from their interest in researching the human dimension of this social-ecological system. Innovative research approaches like soundscape ecology could begin to quantify interactions and provide baseline data that may foster mitigation discourses among stakeholders. In Chapter 2, I employed a soundscape-ecology approach to address concerns about aircraft activity expressed by the Alaska Native community of Nuiqsut. Nuiqsut faces the greatest volume of aircraft activity of any community in Arctic Alaska because of its proximity to intensive oil and gas activity. However, information on when and where these aircraft are flying is unavailable to residents, managers, and researchers. I worked closely with Nuiqsut residents to deploy acoustic monitoring systems along important caribou harvest corridors during the peak of caribou harvest, from early June through late August 2016. This method successfully captured aircraft sound and the community embraced my science for addressing local priorities. I found aircraft activity levels near Nuiqsut and surrounding oil developments (12 daily events) to be approximately six times greater than in areas over 30 km from the village (two daily events). Aircraft sound disturbance was 26 times lower in undeveloped areas (Noise Free Interval =13 hrs) than near human development (NFI = 0.5 hrs). My study provided baseline data on aircraft activity and noise levels. My research could be used by stakeholders and managers to develop conflict avoidance agreements and minimize interference with traditional harvest practices. Soundscape methods could be adapted to rural regions across Alaska that may be experiencing conflict with aircraft or other sources of noise that disrupt human-wildlife interactions. By quantifying aircraft activity using a soundscape approach, I demonstrated a novel application of an emerging field in ecology and provided the first scientific data on one dimension of a larger social-ecological system. Future soundscape studies should be integrated with research on both harvester and caribou behaviors to understand how the components within this system are interacting over space and time. Understanding the long-term impacts to traditional harvest practices will require integrated, cross-disciplinary efforts that collaborate with communities and other relevant stakeholders. Finally, my research will likely spark efforts to monitor and mitigate aircraft impacts to wildlife populations and traditional harvest practices across Alaska, helping to inform a decision-making process currently hindered by an absence of objective data

A Town Meeting on Energy : Prepared for Interior Alaskans

On March 26, 1977, an all-day Town Meeting on Energy was held at the Hutchison Career Development Center on Geist Road in Fairbanks, Alaska. This event was sponsored by the Alaska Humanities Forum in cooperation with the Fairbanks North Star Borough School District; the Institute of Water Resources at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks; and the Fairbanks Town and Village Association. This publication reports the activities during and the information resulting from this town meeting.Published through a grant from the Alaska Humanities Forum under the auspicies of the National Endowment for the Humanities

Special Issue: Food Sustainability, the Food System, and Alaskans

[Geography] -- The Alaska Food Policy Council: Everyone knows that food is important, but our dependence upon Outside for the stuff of life has finally begun to seem, well, just a little discomfiting to Alaska's policymakers. Once again, Alaskans are searching for a way to feed themselves. / Deirdre Helfferich -- Supermarkets in Fairbanks: Food must be affordable as well as accessible for a community to achieve food security. How well does Fairbanks, Alaska's second-largest city, stack up in this regard? / Alison Meadow -- [High-Latitude Agriculture] -- Homegrown Alaska: Farmer Profiles Open the Eyes of the Interior to the Scope of Local Agriculture: The scope of food grown by Interior farmers is staggering, and the breadth and variety of the farmers' characters is equally impressive. From Bethel to North Pole to Manley Hot Springs, there's more growing here than most people realize. / Nancy Tarnai -- Assessing Food security in Fairbanks, Alaska: There's a lot of farmers in the Interior, but finding out what they grow, what they need, and where they sell their agricultural products can by tricky. This senior thesis project answers several questions about agriculture in the Tanana Valley and points the way to determining how best to improve food security in the Fairbanks area. /Charles Caster -- Recovering from an aberration: The Future of Alaska's Livestock: Livestock is an integral part of agriculture, and this is true in Alaska as anywhere else: animals are raised for meat, milk, fiber, transportation, labor, and companionship. Or is there a difference in the Last Frontier? / Deirdre Helfferich -- Greenhouse: a place to grow: When the forty-year-old Agricultural and Forestry Experiment Station greenhouse on the West Ridge of the UAF campus was dismantled, it was only a matter of months before a brand-new teaching and research greenhouse was constructed. / Nancy Tarnai and Deirdre Helfferich -- ARS shuts the door on Alaska research: Agriculture Secretary Thomas Vilsack approved the closure of twelve Agricultural Research Service stations, including the ARS in Alaska, and despite a plea from US Senator Mark Begich. When the Sub-Arctic Research Unit and its gene bank close, the door will shut on a long history of research that won't be easily picked up by anyone else. / Nancy Tarnai -- [Events, People, & Places] Food -- Food Day begins with a bang: The first national Food Day celebration was inaugurated in 2011, and UAF was right there with an Iron Chef Surf vs. Turf Cookoff Challenge, Food Jeopardy, films, displays, and a delicious free all-local buffet. / Nancy Tarnai -- Buzz Klebesadel: An Alaskan author, scientist, and agricultural leader has passed on. -- [Natural Resources] -- Fisheries and food security in Alaska: Any discussion of food security in Alaska is incomplete without at least some attention to the current and potential role of fisheries. For thousands of years, coastal and living marine resources have provided a keystone for the cultural, economic, and environmental health and wellbeing of Alaska's people and communities. / Philip A. Loring and Hannah L. Harrison -- Seed libraries: Seed-Sharing on a Community Level: While many people are familiar with the concept of a seed bank, not so many are acquainted with the idea of a seed library. Now this new kind of lending institution has come to Alaska. / Deirdre Helfferich -- A guide to bumblebees of the Interior: A Taxonomic Key and Notes on BOMBUS Species: Bumblebees are important pollinators, and can even be more efficient than honeybees at crop pollination. Their tongues are longer, they can buzz pollinate, and there are lots of them in Alaska. With the recent die-offs of honeybees due to Colony Collapse Disorder, scientists are looking at native bees and other pollinators. / Rehanon Pampell, Alberto Pantoga, Derek S. Sikes, Patricia Holloway, and Charles Knight

Estimating the Application Rate of Liquid Chloride Products Based on Residual Salt Concentration on Pavement

This technical report summarizes the results of laboratory testing on asphalt and concrete pavement. A known quantity of salt brine was applied as an anti-icer, followed by snow application, traffic simulation, and mechanical snow removal via simulated plowing. Using a sample from this plowed snow, researchers measured the chloride concentration to determine the amount of salt brine (as chloride) that remained on the pavement surface. Under the investigated scenarios, the asphalt samples showed higher concentrations of chloride in the plowed-off snow, and therefore lower concentrations of chlorides remaining on the pavement surface. In comparison, the concrete samples had much lower chloride concentrations in the plowed-off snow, and much higher chloride concentrations remaining on the pavement surface. An interesting pattern revealed by the testing was the variation in the percentage of residual chloride on the pavement surface with changes in temperature. When pavement type was not considered, more residual chloride was present at warmer temperatures and less residual chloride was present at colder temperatures. This observation warrants additional testing to determine if the pattern is in fact a statistically valid trend. The findings from the study will help winter maintenance agencies reduce salt usage while meeting the defined Level of Service. In addition, findings will contribute to environmentally sustainable policies and reduce the level of salt usage (from snow- and ice-control products) introduced into the environment

New 2012 Precipitation Frequency Estimation Analysis for Alaska: Musings on Data Used and the Final Product

INE/AUTC 13.1

LOW-COST REMOTE WEATHER INFORMATION SYSTEM PHASE I AND PHASE 2

Remote Weather Information Systems (RWIS) are an important part of deciding maintenance activities and scheduling. However, the cost of RWIS limits the number of systems that can be deployed. Because of the lack of power and the high power budget of commonly used systems, some locations are not suitable for RWIS even though the information would be of great value. This project focuses on the development of a low-cost, low-power RWIS that is suitable for remote locations and allows for a higher density of RWIS. The system produced under this study uses less than 10 watts of power and costs less than $10,000 for the basic system. The system has performed well in Fairbanks, Alaska, over two winters. In addition, the system has been fully integrated into the Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities RWIS network.WeatherCloud Inc

Geophysical Applications for Arctic/Subarctic Transportation Planning

This report describes a series of geophysical surveys conducted in conjunction with geotechnical investigations carried out by the Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities. The purpose of the study was to evaluate the value of and potential uses for data collected via geophysical techniques with respect to ongoing investigations related to linear infrastructure. One or more techniques, including direct-current resistivity, capacitive-coupled resistivity, and ground-penetrating radar, were evaluated at sites in continuous and discontinuous permafrost zones. Results revealed that resistivity techniques adequately differentiate between frozen and unfrozen ground, and in some instances, were able to identify individual ice wedges in a frozen heterogeneous matrix. Capacitive-coupled resistivity was found to be extremely promising due to its relative mobility as compared with direct-current resistivity. Ground-penetrating radar was shown to be useful for evaluating the factors leading to subsidence in an existing road. Taken as a whole, the study results indicate that supplemental geophysical surveys may add to the quality of a geotechnical investigation by helping to optimize the placement of boreholes. Moreover, such surveys may reduce the overall investigation costs by reducing the number of boreholes required to characterize the subsurface