This session invites contributions that advance the understanding of groundwater in cold-climate hydrosystems. Groundwater in high-latitudes is controlled by prolonged cold winters, warm summers with intense vegetation growth, and precipitation distributed year-round. In these regions, atmospheric water is stored over winter as snowpack, soil frost commonly occurs, and permafrost may be absent, discontinuous, or temporary. Temperature plays a dominant role in cold-climate hydrogeological dynamics, making these systems particularly sensitive to global warming. In addition, these regions have recently experienced climate extremes, including unusually high temperatures and prolonged dry spells imposing new stresses. Land use and land cover are also climate-dependent, further exacerbating global change impacts. Across these regions, common hydrogeological patterns emerge: strong groundwater–surface water connectivity, widespread presence of wetlands, seasonality in groundwater recharge, short aquifer memory, typically low groundwater mineralization, and pronounced freeze–thaw impacts on infiltration and storage. Rapidly changing climate conditions are altering these dynamics, with implications for water resources, ecosystems, carbon and nutrient fluxes, and the resilience of communities and infrastructure.
Despite the widespread anthropogenic and ecosystem reliance on groundwater in cold-climates, there remains a gap in understanding how groundwater systems will evolve under climate change. In response, this session invites topics on the characterization of hydrogeological processes and their seasonal variability, cryohydrogeological mechanisms, northern groundwater vulnerability, ecosystem and biogeochemical linkages, droughts and floods, post-wildfire hydrogeological responses, and the quantification of environmental and climate-change impacts on cold-climate groundwater resources. We also welcome studies addressing groundwater management, adaptation measures, and interactions with ecosystems and society. The session will provide a platform to exchange ideas on field methodologies (including geophysics), challenges of long-term and year-round monitoring (in situ and remote), advances in data-driven and modeling approaches (including coupled hydro-climate models), and strategies for mitigating the impacts of global change. All scales of investigation are of interest, ranging from laboratory and field scale processes to regional and sub-continental systems.
Julia Guimond