Earth’s Cryosphere, 2017, Vol. XXI, No. 6, p. 56-64

AUFEIS AREAS IN RIVER VALLEYS: ENGINEERING DEVELOPMENT PROBLEMS

V.R. Alekseev

Melnikov Permafrost Institute, SB RAS, 36, Merzlotnaya str., Yakutsk, 677010, Russia; Snow@irk.ru

Groundwater-fed icing deposits (aufeis or taryns) in northern Eurasia, Canada and Alaska form giant fields covering tens of square kilometers. Every year Siberia develops about 60,000 large ice clusters with a total area of 45,000 km2 (0.66 % of the permafrost zone), or 35 times as large as the area of all glaciers in the Asian part of Russia. Especially hazardous phenomena of winter flooding, formation of aufeis and ground ice, heaving, thermokarst, thermal erosion, etc. in river valleys pose engineering problems to development of the terrain. The aufeis hazard creates serious difficulties in construction, laying pipelines, production from placer mineral deposits, etc. Three basic principles of terrain development have been formulated proceeding from the conditions and patterns of aufeis formation, with reference to available experience in aufeis hazard mitigation. It is proposed to set up special test sites for further field and experimental studies of aufeis.

Aufeis, icing, aufeis mitigation, permafrost, ground ice, periglacial phenomena, permafrost zone