Remote sensing systems have been used to assist in locating and tracking oil spilled in the open ocean for remediation purposes. However, methods for detecting oil in ice and snow are in the early stages of development and require further research as the presence of ice impedes detection. Due to the inhomogeneous nature of sea ice, often air, sediment, salt, and brine are incorporated into the material greatly complicating the interactions between the oil and sea ice as well as the interactions of the remote sensing signal. However, active microwave remote sensing has the potential for detecting oil in sea ice through the measurement of the normalized radar cross-section (NRCS) of the ice. The NRCS of sea ice depends on the roughness of the ice surface as well as the complex permittivity profile of the ice, which in turn depends on the ice temperature and bulk salinity profiles. In the event of an oil spill in the Arctic, it is speculated that the temperature and salinity properties will be influenced through the inclusion of oil in the sea ice and the subsequent evolution of the ice, thereby affecting the NRCS of the sea ice.

During experimentation, an artificial mesocosm utilizing a 3 m diameter by 1 m deep fibreglass tank will be used to test the interactions of oil and ice. This tank will be filled with salt water in which it will subsequently facilitate the growth of ice. Injection of crude oil into the water column will then be performed in order to monitor the oil and ice interactions through NRCS measurements, and ice core samples will be taken to measure the temperature and bulk salinity profiles of the ice. In addition to this, the spatial locations of crude oil components which have been absorbed into the sea water, adsorbed just below the sea ice, and which have percolated up into the sea ice will be dertermined through examination with analytical instrumentations in order to to see which components effect the remote sensing capabilities the greatest. Last, the use of micro imaging x-ray spectroscopy will allow for the imaging of contaminated sea ice cores, providing the spatial locations and contributing ratios of the sea ice components, namely air, brine, ice, and oil.

Fieldwork site: Sea Ice Environmental Research Facility (SERF), University of Manitoba, Winnipeg (Canada)

PI: G.Stern, M.Pucko, D.Barber

Project lead: Gary Stern

Project Participants: Gary Stern (CEOS), Thomas Neusitzer (CEOS), Nariman Firoozy (CEOS), Tyler Tiede (CEOS), Sterling Desmond (CEOS), Monika Pucko (CEOS), David Barber (CEOS)

Fieldwork summary/photo blog