Ice-affected soil systems under rapid climate warming - insights from the past

Abstract

Current climate warming is expected to lead to ongoing geotechnical change in ice-affected soils. Examining past climate change, particularly cold stage:warm stage transitions can provide an insight into the potential nature of this change and may inform assessments of sites. The evidence is sometimes ambiguous, with periglacial and seismic processes producing similar results. Ice core evidence suggests that cold-warm transitions, such as during the onset of the Greenlandian stage of the Holocene can be high magnitude, but also may feature reversals that add instability to soil systems. Consideration of future geotechnical change in ice-affected soils must therefore take into account potentially complex climate forcing.