Soil moisture redistribution and its effect on inter-annual active layer temperature and thickness variations in a dry loess terrace in Adventdalen, Svalbard

Schuh, Carina; Frampton, Andrew; Christiansen, Hanne Hvidtfeldt

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-11-635-2017

Articles | Volume 11, issue 1

https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-11-635-2017

© Author(s) 2017. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.

Special issue:

Changing Permafrost in the Arctic and its Global Effects in...

https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-11-635-2017

© Author(s) 2017. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.

Articles | Volume 11, issue 1

Research article

|

28 Feb 2017

Research article |

| 28 Feb 2017

Soil moisture redistribution and its effect on inter-annual active layer temperature and thickness variations in a dry loess terrace in Adventdalen, Svalbard

Carina Schuh, Andrew Frampton, and Hanne Hvidtfeldt Christiansen

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Final revised paper (published on 28 Feb 2017)
Supplement to the final revised paper
Preprint (discussion started on 10 Aug 2016)
Supplement to the preprint

Interactive discussion

Status: closed

AC: Author comment | RC: Referee comment | SC: Short comment | EC: Editor comment

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RC1: 'Review of Soil moisture redistribution and its effect on inter-annual active layer temperature and thickness variations in a dry loess terrace in Adventdalen, Svalbard', Anonymous Referee #1, 10 Sep 2016
- AC1: 'Response letter to Anonymous Referee 1.', Andrew Frampton, 16 Nov 2016
RC2: 'Review', Anonymous Referee #2, 18 Sep 2016
- AC2: 'Response letter to Anonymous Referee 2.', Andrew Frampton, 16 Nov 2016

Peer-review completion

AR: Author's response | RR: Referee report | ED: Editor decision

AR by Andrew Frampton on behalf of the Authors (25 Nov 2016) Author's response Manuscript

ED: Referee Nomination & Report Request started (30 Nov 2016) by Julia Boike

RR by Anonymous Referee #2 (18 Dec 2016)

Suggestions for revision or reasons for rejection

Review of revised version of manuscript tc-2016-173
„Soil moisture resdistribution and its effect on inter-annual active layer temperature and thickness variations in a dry loess terrace in Adventdalen, Svalbard“ by C. Schuh et al.

General comments:
I have already reviewed the first version of the manuscript. The authors have adequately addressed all of my comments in the revised version, hence I can now recommend the manuscript for publication. I am looking forward to seeing the paper published in The Cryosphere. Please find below a few final minor and technical comments.

Specific comments:

Throughout the paper, figures and tables: please check spelling of “van Genuchten” and write either small or capital “van”.

P 1, L 14: please correct “… is considered…”

P 1, L 17: “… and are subject to…”

P 2, L 3: “… and has implications for…”

P 2, L 9: I suggest to write “… so that the distribution and movement of moisture … is essential…”

P 2, L 24: Here I suggest to write “…, which turned out to be mainly air temperature and solar radiation…”

P 3, L 28: citation Cable et al.: remove citation if not accepted yet

P 3, L 38: I think these should be mean monthly GST (?)

P 5, L 13: Sentence does not make sense: Richards’ equation is the unsaturated version of Darcy’s equation, hence “with the unsaturated version of Darcy’s equation” should be deleted (if this corresponds with the ATS model equations). Correct spelling: Richards’

P 6, L 36: better: “… and no-flow boundaries were assigned…”

P 6, L 38: remove reference to Sect 2 and add explanation here for better readability

P 7, L 36: replace “greatest” by highest”

P 9, L11, 19 and 20: replace “greater” and “greatest” by “stronger” and “strongest”

P 12, L 8: replace “greatest” by “deepest”

P 12, L34-40: This is a very general statement. The soil moisture retention properties may become important as soon as the total water content in the profile changes over time. I suggest to restrict this statement to the particular situation where the total amount of water in the profile remains constant.

P14, L 4: replace “greater” by “larger” and “stronger”

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RR by Anonymous Referee #1 (20 Dec 2016)

ED: Publish subject to minor revisions (Editor review) (22 Dec 2016) by Julia Boike

AR by Andrew Frampton on behalf of the Authors (05 Jan 2017) Author's response Manuscript

ED: Publish subject to technical corrections (18 Jan 2017) by Julia Boike

AR by Andrew Frampton on behalf of the Authors (23 Jan 2017) Author's response Manuscript

Short summary

This study investigates how soil moisture retention characteristics impact ice and moisture redistribution, heat transport and active layer thickness under permafrost conditions. This is relevant for understanding how climate change interacts with permafrost, which is important because there is much stored carbon in permafrost, which may be released to the atmosphere as permafrost degrades and may then act to further enhance climate warming.