Title: Data examining the comparative effect of salt and soil pores on the freezing characteristic curve of laboratory and field soils
Citation: Amankwah, S., Ireson, A., Maule, C., Brannen, R., Mathias, S. (2021). Data examining the comparative effect of salt and soil pores on the freezing characteristic curve of laboratory and field soils. Federated Research Data Repository. https://doi.org/10.20383/102.0391
Study Site: the field studies were conducted at the St Denise National Area in the Canadian prairies and the Boreal Ecosystem Research and Monitoring Sites (BERMS) Old Jack Pine (OJP) site in Saskatchewan, Canada,The field studies were conducted at the St Denies National Area in the Canadian prairies and the Boreal Ecosystem Research and Monitoring Sites (BERMS) Old Jack Pine (OJP) site in Saskatchewan, Canada
Purpose: The data sets were used in studying the role of salt and soil pore on the freezing characteristic curve of frozen soils. In the laboratory, the soil moisture characteristic curve (SMC) of a silica sand was measured using a Hydraulic Property Analyzer (HYPROP). The soil freezing characteristic curve (SFC) of the same sand was measured using a series of column experiments with controlled total water content and pore-water salinity. In the field, data were collected from the St Denis National Wildlife Area (SDN), a mixed grassland cropped site in the Canadian prairies in Saskatchewan and the Boreal Ecosystem Research and Monitoring Sites (BERMS) Old Jack Pine (OJP) site in Saskatchewan, Canada. The data were used to validate the performance of three alternative SFC models (capillary, salt exclusion, and the combined capillary salt models).
Abstract: The phenomenon of freezing point depression in frozen soils results in the co-existence of ice and liquid water in soil pores at temperatures below 273.15 K, and is thought to have two causes: i) capillary effects, where the phase transition relationship is modified due to soil-air-water-ice interactions, and ii) solute effects, where the presence of salts lowers the freezing temperature. The soil freezing characteristic curve (SFC) characterizes the relationship between liquid water content and temperature in frozen soils. Most hydrological models represent the SFC using only capillary effects with a relationship known as the Generalized Clapeyron Equation (GCE). In this study, we develop and test a salt exclusion model for characterizing the SFC, comparing this with the GCE-based model and a combined capillary-solute effect model. We test these models against measured SFCs in laboratory and field experiments with diverse soil textures and salinities. We consistently found that the GCE-based models under-predicted freezing-point depression. We were able to match the observations with the salt exclusion model and the combined model, suggesting that salinity is a dominant control on the SFC in real soils that always contain solutes. In modelling applications where the salinity is unknown, the soil bulk solute concentration can be treated as a single fitting parameter. Improved characterization of the SFC may result in improvements in coupled mass-heat transport models for simulating hydrological processes in cold regions, particularly the hydraulic properties of frozen soils and the hydraulic head in frozen soils that drives cryosuction.
Summary: This dataset was included in the Global Water Futures collection.,This data appears in collection of Global Water Futures that is a University of Saskatchewan-led research program.
Research: Global Water Futures
Further Info: Cite as: Seth Kwaku Amankwah, Andrew Ireson, Charles Maule, et al. Quantifying the soil freezing characteristic: the dominant role of salt exclusion. ESS Open Archive . March 30, 2021.
DOI: 10.1002/essoar.10506652.1,Cite as: Seth Kwaku Amankwah, Andrew Ireson, Charles Maule, et al. Quantifying the soil freezing characteristic: the dominant role of salt exclusion. ESS Open Archive . March 30, 2021
DOI link: 10.1002/essoar.10506652.1
Status: Complete
Keywords:
hydrology,
salt,
soil pore,
Freezing characteristic curve,
Geographical coordinates: North: 53.92, South: 52.2084 East: -104.69 West: -106.0926
Bounding Temporal Extent: Start Date: 2014-01-01, End
Date: 2020-12-31
