Cryosphere Research Infrastructure

CRYO-RI

CRYO-RI develops research infrastructure to monitor the rapid changes in snow, ice, and frozen ground in Northern Finland. We are building a research platform with measurement infrastructure and open data accessible to public and private sectors. We work with state-of-the art equipment, and go beyond by developing new IoT, remote sensing and big data methods for snow, ice and frost research.

Funders

AKA logo
Funded by the European Union NexGenerationEU
Snow and Ice on River Oulanka. Picture: Pertti Ala-ah
Ice and snow on Oulanka river. Picture: Pertti Ala-aho

Project information

Project duration

-

Funded by

Research Council of Finland

Project coordinator

University of Oulu

Contact information

Project leader

Researchers

Project description

Snow and ice shape the identity of Northern Finland, but are rapidly changing due to climate warming. Diminishing and more variable snow and ice conditions challenge regional ecosystems, infrastructure, and services that were designed for stable conditions. To adapt, monitoring and management systems must be renewed and harmonized.

The CRYO-RI research infrastructure responds to rapidly changing snow and ice conditions by creating an interdisciplinary, regionally focused research cluster. It aims to modernize and harmonize monitoring and management systems, advancing discoveries, measurement methods, and cross-disciplinary research.

The CRYO-RI-Platform provides data and measurement infrastructure that are accessible for regional civil engineering, consulting, hydropower companies, and tourism to boost snow and ice-related operations and planning. The platform facilitates excellent science and offers unique possibilities to train new generations of scientists and practitioners. The CRYO-RI platform will advance the regional preparedness for adapting to the rapidly changing snow, ground frost, and river ice conditions. The CRYO-RI platform is maintained and operated in a regional collaboration between the University of Oulu and three regionally important research institutes.

Project actions

In the project, we will:

  1. Develop and update the existing cryolaboratory to facilitate state-of-the-art analysis of geomaterial properties subject to freeze and thaw

  1. Develop low-cost IoT solutions to monitor snow, frozen ground, and river ice conditions locally

  1. Utilize emerging technology (drones, distributed temperature sensing, stable water isotopes) for advanced monitoring and research of the cryosphere

  1. Develop a state-of-the-art snow, ground frost, and river ice monitoring station network to deliver instantaneous data for snow and ice conditions

  1. Develop a data sharing platform to allow instantaneous, easy access to the CRYO-RI data.

Research groups

Snow Hydrology and Modeling

Geotechnical Engineering

Equipment catalogue

The equipment established in the CRYO-RI project can be viewed through the link below.

For each equipment, you will find the main technical specifications, use cases, and contact persons to ask for more details and possibilities of shared use of the equipment.

CRYO-RI equipment catalogue

External link

Data browsing and access

From this map-based web interface, you will find the datasets produced in the CRYO-RI project. The data upload is in progress and will be continuously updated as the datasets are completed.

Map-based web interface

External link

Finnish Environment Institute

PI: Kati Anttila

Geological Survey of Finland

PI: Jarkko Okkonen

Finnish Meterological Institute

External link
PI: Anna Kontu

Other contact persons of the project: