The permafrost temperature monitoring system is being rolled out in Anadyr.
The stable layer of seasonal thawing in Anadyr is 1.2 meters, but in recent years it has begun to increase intensely and in some areas it reaches a depth of up to 1.8 meters.
"First of all, monitoring was deployed in areas of active cryogenic processes of soil temperature, which will make it possible to monitor the level of safe operation of buildings and structures built on Arctic land," said Oleg Tregubov, head of the Anadyr Division of the Northeastern Integrated Research Institute of the Far Eastern Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences.
Observations are being conducted in urban settlements with multi-storey buildings, since soil warming will cause a man-made catastrophe at these facilities in the first place. After Anadyr, a permafrost monitoring system will be created in the northernmost seaport city of Pevek.
Permafrost occupies about 65% of the territory of Russia, which is more than 10 million square kilometers. More than 30% of the country's proven oil reserves and about 60% of natural gas deposits are concentrated in this zone.
Expensive and very vulnerable infrastructure has been created on permafrost: oil and gas facilities, oil and gas pipelines stretching thousands of kilometers. Tens of thousands of residential buildings have been built and operated, the infrastructure of thousands of cities and towns has been created.
The degradation of permafrost certainly affects the operational characteristics of engineering structures, the environment, human economic activity and threatens with enormous damage to the national economy.
According to experts, in Russia, the potential economic damage from the melting of permafrost by 2050 is estimated at 5 trillion rubles, rossaprimavera.ru writes.
Alex Shishlo for Rough&Polished
