Ilkka Matero from Svalbard Integrated Arctic Earth Observing System (SIOS) presented Arctic PASSION’s progress on co-development of the Shared Arctic Variable (SAV) on permafrost in the workshop on "Longyearbyen permafrost activities" in March 15-16, 2023.

Discussions in this workshop helped to identify new perspectives to gathering permafrost-related knowledge from different communities in Svalbard, and to initiate connections for bringing this expertise to the expert panels. 

“The goal is to identify existing permafrost observations and observing needs specific to Svalbard to include in the SAV definition process being piloted in the Arctic PASSION project,” Ilkka explains. “Workshop participants were very positive about the idea and we are looking forward to further discuss the expert panel work with selected participants from the workshop.”

Ilkka Matero in front of the Svalbard Science Centre in March 2023. Photo: Anna Sinisalo / GRID-Arendal.

The workshop brought together early career and senior researchers from the natural sciences, engineering and social sciences researching permafrost in various projects, and was hosted by the University Centre in Svalbard (UNIS).  Read more about the workshop on UArctic’s website in an article by Hanne H. Christiansen.