Alpine Zone Climate and Air Quality Impacts
Diaspensia (Diapensia Lapponica)
Observatory researchers, in collaboration with the Appalachian Mountain Club and the University of New Hampshire's Climate Change Research Center, are assessing climate and air pollutant trends and their influence on New England's high-elevation alpine ecosystems. Also supported by NOAA's Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research, this work builds on the Observatory's summit climate record and new observational systems, the AMC's long-term air quality and alpine ecosystem monitoring, and UNH's advanced pollutant measurement technologies.
In order to quantify the climatological controls on the alpine zone, a major focus of the Observatory's partnership with the AMC is the creation and analysis of a regional dataset of high elevation temperature and snow observations. These data are primarily those collected by AMC and Randolph Mountain Club staff at backcountry huts in the White Mountain National Forest. Currently (summer 2007) the majority of data have been compiled and digitized and analysis is beginning.
Another major focus of this project is the expansion of the measurements made at the Auto Road Vertical Profile (ARVP) stations to include humidity and ozone. In addition, we are expanding the ARVTP transect horizontally by placing modern observation equipment in select AMC huts.
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