Norway: projects/activities

The Norwegian Radiation Protection Authority is responsible for a nationwide network of 33 stations that continuously measure background radiation levels. The network was established in the years following the Chernobyl accident in 1986, and was upgraded to a new and modern network in the period 2006-2008. Additional stations were added in 2009. The purpose of the monitoring network is to provide an early warning if radioactive emissions reach Norway.

The possibility of restoring the salmon stocks in the Tuloma system is assessed by collecting background information on the river system: present fish fauna, habitat quality, migratory routes etc. Planning the restoration including technical and management aspects is under way.

Geochemical mapping project based on multimaterial and -elemental method covering the NW Russia and adjacent areas of Finland and Norway. NW-Russia is of strategic importance not only for Europe but also for the sosio-economic development of the whole Russia for its richness in natural resources. Their use must be based on environmentally acceptable principles. In addition, within the area exist numerous industrial centres whose environmental impacts are unknown. The information produced by the project is significant for the future development of the area and remedial measures of the environment. The project lead by the applicant, will be carried out in 1999-2003 in cooperation with Russian and Norwegian partners.

Monitoring of the salmon stocksof the Teno and Näätämö river systems is based on long term data collection on juvenile salmon production, biological characteristics of the spawning stock, origin of salmon (wild/reared) and statistics on fishery and catches. Information on other fish species than salmon is also available.

Elevated levels of 137Cs caused by previous atmospheric nuclear weapons tests fallout and the Chernobyl accident have been observed in Finnmark, Northern Norway. Due to the large consumption of potentially contaminated reindeer meat, whole body measurements of 137Cs levels in reindeer herders have been performed since 1965.

Marine foodwebs as vector and possibly source of viruses and bacteria patogenic to humans shall be investigated in a compartive north-south study. Effects of sewage from ships traffic and urban settlements, on animals of arctic foodwebs will be studied.

During the last decade the concern regarding environmental effects of the offshore industry has shifted from effects of drilling discharges on benthic communities, towards a stronger focus on the water column and effects on the pelagic ecosystem. At the same time, oil and gas development is expanding in the Norwegian and Russian sectors of the Barents Sea. In this regard, a project has been initiated to look at responses of especially Calanus spp. and other copepod species to long-term, sublethal exposure to selected offshore discharges and discharge components, as well as accidental oil spills. Calanus spp. is ecologically the most important zooplankton species along the Norwegian shelf and in the Barents Sea. A laboratory based facility for culture through several generations is being developed through this project. In addition, the impact of oil compounds on the cold-water and arctic Calanus species-complex will be examined by carrying out a series of laboratory (some at Ny Ålesund) and ship based experiments. The response parameters will include both behavioral (feeding, mate finding, avoidance) and physiological (mortality, egg production, development rates, oxygen consumption and assimilation efficiency) parameters. The ultimate outcome of this research is expected to be a supporting instrument for ecological risk assessment of offshore discharges, which is highly relevant both to the North Sea, the mid-Norway shelf and the Barents Sea.

A millimeter wave radiometer is started operation at the Swedish Institute of Space Physics, Kiruna, Sweden. The location of the instrument (67.8 N, 20.4 E) allows continuous observation of the evolution of ozone and ozone related trace gases in the Arctic polar stratosphere. It is designed for measurements of thermal emission lines around 204 Ghz. At this frequency observations include of ozone, chlorine monoxide, nitrous oxide, and nitric acid.

The DOAS instrument consists of grating spectrometer covering the visible and near ultraviolet spectral region. Zenith-scattered sunlight is collected by simple one-lens telescopes and fed via optical fiber bundles into the spectrometers, where atmospheric absorption spectra are obtained. The instrument runs automatically. Total column densities of the stratospheric trace species ozone, NO2, BrO, and OClO are retrieved from the spectra using the DOAS algorithm. These are species that play a major role in ozone chemistry, either by themselves in ozone destruction (BrO) or as indicators of chlorine activation/deactivation (OClO). The chemistry and dynamics of ozone destruction is investigated, e.g. with respect to the location of the polar vortex during the winter. The instrument is also useful for detection of polar stratospheric clouds using the zenith-sky colour index method.

FT-IR spectrometers are capable to quantifiy the total column amounts of many important trace gases in the troposphere and stratosphere. At present the following species are retrieved from the Kiruna data: O3 (ozone), ClONO2, HNO3, HCl, CFC-11, CFC-12, CFC-22, NO2, N2O, NO, HF, C2H2, C2H4, C2H6, CH4, CO, COF2, H2O, HCN, HO2NO2, NH3, N2, and OCS Selected research topics and activities: chemical ozone depletion by observation of key species (O3, ClONO2, HNO3, HCl, ..) details of the ozone formation process by isotopic studies in ozone profile retrieval to detect dynamical changes transport studies of chemical tracers and tropospheric pollutants satellite validation

FT-IR spectrometers are capable to quantifiy the total column amounts of many important trace gases in the troposphere and stratosphere. At present the following species are retrieved from the Kiruna data: O3 (ozone), ClONO2, HNO3, HCl, CFC-11, CFC-12, CFC-22, NO2, N2O, NO, HF, C2H2, C2H4, C2H6, CH4, CO, COF2, H2O, HCN, HO2NO2, NH3, N2, and OCS Selected research topics and activities: chemical ozone depletion by observation of key species (O3, ClONO2, HNO3, HCl, ..) details of the ozone formation process by isotopic studies in ozone profile retrieval to detect dynamical changes transport studies of chemical tracers and tropospheric pollutants satellite validation

Objective: to collect climatology information on the seasonal and year-to-tear variability of stratospheric CFCs, water vapour and atmospheric electrical parameters.

Objectives 1. To develop the measurement technique further, providing more accurate measurements and extend the method to a larger number of trace species 2. To monitor the presence of CFC:s and other longlived anthropogenic tracers in the stratosphere 3. To use long-lived anthropogenic species as tracers of atmospheric motion, in particular for comparison with atmospheric models Reserarchers: Descartes is a joint research programme currently involving N.R.P Harris and J.A. Pyle, Centre for Atmospheric Science at the Department of Chemistry, University of Cambridge, U.K., and Hans Nilsson and Johan Arvelius, Swedish Institute of Space Physics, Kiruna, Sweden

Objective: to determine how solar activity influences temperatures, winds, electric currents and minor constituents and to allow possible anthropogenic influences to be determined. Uses primarily measurements by the ESRAD and EISCAT radars, plus ground-based and balloon-borne measurements of atmospheric electric fields and currents.

During the past years, atmospheric research in high latitudes has been focussed on processes causing ozone loss in the polar winter lower stratosphere1). Recent research efforts also dealt with regions up to the lower mesosphere, and studied the effects of charged particle precipitation on NO and ozone2)-5). However, the measurement techniques and hence the database for studying such processes in this altitude range are very limited. The Airborne SUbmillimeter Radiometer ASUR6),7) of the Institute of Environmental Physics of the University of Bremen has recently been equipped with a high-resolution spectrometer that will enable the retrieval of vertical profiles of ozone up to an altitude of about 65 - 70 km. Its measurement capabilities comprise also several other species of interest, especially NO. This makes the measurement technique particularly suitable for upper stratospheric/lower mesospheric studies. The lidar at ALOMAR is capable of measuring highly resolved vertical profiles of ozone up to an altitude of 60 km, thus giving the rare opportunity for intercomparison and validation studies in an altitude range reaching from the lower stratosphere to the lower mesosphere. Therefore we propose to perform simultaneous ozone measurements of the ASUR instrument with the ALOMAR lidar, supported by launches of ozone sondes.

Noctilucent clouds (NLC) remain a fascinating phenomenon of the upper atmosphere to study. The questions about the typical particle density and particle size distribution within a NLC are very prominent ones, to which a number of answers have been given, though some of the answers contradict each other. The parameters of particle size distributions can be derived from groundbased lidar measurements of the spectral dependence of the volume backscatter coefficient of an NLC. Such studies have been performed during a number of NLC events by e.g. the ALOMAR Rayleigh/Mie/Raman (RMR) lidar (von Cossart et al., GRL, 26, 1513, 1999). A drawback of these experiments is the wavelength limitation of the RMR lidar, the shortest wavelength of which is 355 nm. At this wavelength, the sensitivity of the lidar to particles with sizes smaller than, say, 25 nm is minimal. Because a considerable part of the entire particle population may have sizes below that threshold, a lingering question remains whether or not this drawback matters for typical NLC distributions. Using the ALOMAR ozone lidar, a measurement of the NLC volume backscatter coefficient at 308 nm becomes possible. Due to the l-4 -dependence of the backscatter coefficients, the latter are almost a factor of 2 larger at this wavelength than at 355 nm. For this reason and in order to gain a fourth wavelength to the spectral distribution, we aim at using the ozone lidar for the outlined project.

Waves play a major role for the momentum and energy transport in the middle atmosphere [Fritts and van Zandt, 1993] by modifying the local temperature field as well as the general circulation when the waves reach the saturation level and break [Holton, 1983; Fritts, 1984]. The MACWAVE rocket campaign is investigating the wave field in polar latitudes during summer and winter. To learn more about the horizontal structure of the wave field, it is important to measure at more than one station. For the monitoring of the vertical transport by the waves, measurements over a large height range are necessary. The combination of lidars, radiosondes and falling spheres will cover the region from the ground up to approximately 105 km. When comparing data, it is important to take into account the different measurement principles and integration times. The rocket will show small scale variations whereas the lidar permits a continuous monitoring of the temperature and wave situation

To investigate arctic foxes physiological adaptations to life at high latitudes. Resting and running metabolic rates, body weight, food intake, body core temperature, heart rate, and blood parameters were examined during different seasons and during periods of food deprivation.