Talk:Permafrost

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 14 January 2020 and 30 April 2020. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): RachelLibby1.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 06:25, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Untitled

The band Permafrost was formed in 1996 in Ukraine. They only ever released two albums. Lunar poetry and forgotten evil (1996) and Darkness falls over these mountains (1998). The band members actually got together in spring 1995, however they couldn't decide on a name so they went around as Ukraine 32. They then changed the band name to Frost and after that to Permafrost because they thought that implied an eternal winter. The members in 1995-1996 were: Thermagoth (vocals and guitars) Alkine (Bass guitar) Thomas Alpersćuk (drums) Thomas was kicked out of the band in 1996 because of problems he developed regarding drugs. They recruited another drummer Nhico Caršvaý.

In 1999 Thermagoth was found dead in a graveyard, he was murdered. His killer is currently still in prison and will be released at the end of 2009.

Intresting notes:
→ Darkness falls over these mountains was nominated for an award, but Thermagoth declined for whatever reason.
→ Thermagoth served a short time in prison for assault.
→ Band broke up when they found Thermagoth was murdered.
→ Alkine now lives in Sweden.
→ Before Thermagoth was murdered, the band was working on their third album called Satanic Hymns calling to the Hatred in my Heart. The band had nearly finished it. So an imcomplete version was released.
→ Satanic Hymns calling to the Hatred in my Heart was recently recorded in 2005 with Alkine on bass and Caršvaý on drums. They recruited a vocalist from Sweden for the last two tracks which Thermagoth did not feature on. The man from Sweden was strangely not given credit.
→ Varggoth, frontman of the band Nokturnal Mortum, contacted Permafrost because he believed they had breached a copyright on their album, Lunar Poetry. The result was that Permafrost had to pay royalties to Nokturnal Mortum for any copies of Lunar Poetry and Forgotten Evil.

Shouldn't this be its own article? Fishhead64 07:56, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

Yes. In my experience, it would be handled as a new article. -- Paleorthid 00:37, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

Image removed

Time taken for permafrost to reach depth

This image has been replaced by a table. Mssnlayam 07:56, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Solifluction in Greenland?

The caption on the photo suggests it's of solifluction in Greenland, whereas the metadata in commons suggests Svalbard. Which is correct? 131.111.21.21 (talk) 11:42, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Things found in permafrost

Their record made to things found in permafrost. e.g.,

• Mammoths
• Palm trees and tropical vegatation. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Standforder (talk • contribs) 23:39, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

Things not found in permafrost: palm trees and tropical vegetation... Where does this idea come from – it can't have a reliable source. Richard New Forest (talk) 16:08, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Well that is That is inaccurate.

"An extraordinary testimony to the widespread watery destruction of animal life...They are sometimes found in a near-perfect state of preservation, with undigested tropical vegetation in their stomachs." - Earth’s Most Challenging Mysteries.--Standforder (talk) 00:08, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

The "ice age" wasn't a long period, the term is misleading. The earth previous to this brief "ice age" was tropical-like. This rapid freezing put the earth in freezing [temperature]]s. The "ice age" occured nearly 4,400 years, (Compare Genesis 7:18, 21).--Standforder (talk) 00:08, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

"A sinking of the sea basins would cause the waters to collect there, allowing dry land to appear again. Compare Psalm 104:8. In the oceans today there is more than enough water to have accomplished what the Bible describes; 71 percent of the earth’s surface is water, with an average depth of two and a half miles."--Standforder (talk) 00:08, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia is a factual encyclopaedia. It works on reliable sources, not pseudoscience or religious texts. Richard New Forest (talk) 00:16, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

Chlorpromazine

Chlorpromazine is also abbreviated CPZ. I think a disambiguation page must be made —Preceding unsigned comment added by Awanta (talk • contribs) 03:53, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Yes – done. Richard New Forest (talk) 10:55, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Hello,

I am new to this site as a participant. A citation is requested in the second prargraph of this article and I thought the following might be useful?

Cryosols as a test of our knowledge of Earth as a system: Review by J.G.Bockheim, page 1. retrieved 14/01/11 from http://www.ldd.go.th/swcst/Report/soil/symposium/pdf/0219.pdf)

Thanks SE — Preceding unsigned comment added by Shamalaevans (talk • contribs) 21:13, 14 January 2011 (UTC)

Report in Nature Geoscience suggested...

I took out:

Report in Nature Geoscience suggested in April 2012 that huge 'surges' of methane are released by melting permafrost. These are methane fields on a scale not seen before. The emissions went directly into the atmosphere.(Rob Waugh "Global warming puzzle becomes even MORE complex - as methane is detected seeping directly from the Arctic ocean" The Daily Mail, 24 April 2012) The Arctic meltdown has grave consequences for the entire planet.Arctic & Climate Change

for a couple of reasons. Firstly, as a science-type article, refs from the mail or greenpeace aren't good enough. Secondly, we have Arctic methane release and this stuff probably belongs there not here. Third its all a bit overenthusiastic and... what you'd expect from the mail, really William M. Connolley (talk) 12:48, 18 May 2012 (UTC)

Fast facts about permafrost

I've left some suggestions with Kent Pørksen about how he (or another editor) can develop his good-faith contribution of "Fast facts" to better conform with Wikipedia's Manual of Style. User:HopsonRoad 13:01, 14 September 2013 (UTC)

The new fast facts contribution contains material that mostly belongs in other sections. I plan to move much of the material there. "Fast facts" is not a title that evokes the substance of the section. I would recommend a summary of important facts that are beyond the scope of the lead section. User:HopsonRoad 01:45, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

The fast facts section contain interesting information. I would like, very much like HopsonRoad, to see it included in the prose of the other sections. As prose it would fit Wikipedias Manual of Style. Dentren | ^Talk 08:37, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

Thank you, Dentren. That's consistent with my intentions. User:HopsonRoad 17:04, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

Unreferenced items moved from former section entitled, "Fast facts about permafrost"

Editors who can provide suitable references for the following statements are welcome to move them into the narrative of pertinent sections in the main article.

• In northern Siberia and Canada, the permafrost can extend down to depths of more than 700 meters.
• When the climate becomes warmer, the permafrost layer thaws completely or partially in parts of the landscape. In areas where ice caps are melting and glaciers are retreating, permafrost will again be formed.
• Permafrost does not disappear from Greenland, because the permafrost is more than 100 meters thick in large parts of Greenland. Only the upper 1–2 m of permafrost is threatened by thawing in the coming years.
• Permafrost may include both soil and solid rock. Rocks contain no organic material, while soil contains large amounts of organic material. If soil layers thaw due to global warming, the warming may increase the microbial decomposition of organic material.
• Areas covered by permafrost are often a mosaic of areas with herbaceous plants, ericaceous plants, low scrub with willow bushes, and marshes, ponds and streams. In the areas bordering the Arctic permafrost is common in open forests with tree species such as birch, pine, larch and spruce.
• The plant cover of permafrost in Greenland is dominated by a few hardy and hardy plants such as the Arctic Willow, heather, saxifrages, Dryas and various species of mosses, lichens, grasses and sedges. Under the extreme growing conditions in the high Arctic even 100 year old specimens of Arctic Willow are just a few centimeters high. In Russia, Scandinavia and Canada large areas of permafrost are covered with pine and birch forest. Due to global warming, plant growth in the Arctic increases and the tree line moves north.
• Different groups of microorganisms produce carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and other greenhouse gases when permafrost thaws. Carbon dioxide is formed by a multitude of fungi and bacteria during break down of old plant material in soil. Methane is formed exclusively by a specific group of archaea (bacteria-like microorganisms) and converted to carbon dioxide by certain groups of bacteria. Nitrous oxide is formed by certain bacteria, which may also convert the nitrous oxide to atmospheric nitrogen (N₂).
• Measured over a 100 year period, the warming potential of methane in the atmosphere is 25 times higher than carbon dioxide. Methane formed in deep soil layers may be converted into carbon dioxide by micro-organisms in the upper layer of soil prior to the release from the soil surface to atmosphere.
• Permafrost may contain large quantities of ice, which is released as water when the permafrost thaws. This may cause soil collapse and increase transport of solutes, including organic matter, nutrients and pollution, which may be carried long distances by river or sea water.
• Permafrost properties can rarely be assessed from the surface or from satellite images, so it is necessary to drill through the permafrost to measure its distribution and condition.
• A warmer climate and less permafrost can open up a number of advantages for the people of Greenland, e.g. in relation to agriculture and extraction of minerals.

User:HopsonRoad 00:26, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

Former "See also" items to be worked into article

I deleted all but one of the following from "See also", which didn't meet WP guidelines for that section. They can and should be incorporated into the article, itself:

• Arctic methane release
• Drunken trees
• International Permafrost Association
• Palsa
• Permafrost carbon cycle
• Pingo
• Qingzang Railway
• Utility tunnel
• Yedoma

User:HopsonRoad 15:35, 2 March 2014 (UTC)

Now incorporated in article. User:HopsonRoad 17:12, 2 March 2014 (UTC)

Moved from External links

WP:External Links limits the number and character of these, so I have parked the following here as resources to be worked into the article, as appropriate:

• Center for Permafrost (CENPERM)
• International Permafrost Association (IPA)
• What is Permafrost?, Geological Survey of Canada
• Romanovsky, Vladimir E. (13 July 2004). "How rapidly is permafrost changing and what are the impacts of these changes?". Essays on the Arctic. National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration.
• Melting Russian Permafrost Could Accelerate Global Warming - ENS (7 September 2006)
• Smith, Mike W. "Permafrost in Canada". Department of Geography and Environmental Studies, Carleton University.
• "Earth's permafrost starts to squelch". BBC. 29 December 2004.
• PERMAFROST: A Building Problem For Alaska
• Permafrost Young Researchers Network (PYRN)
• United States Permafrost Association (USPA)
• Conversion Calculator
• Legget, R.F. (1954). "Permafrost Research" (PDF). Arctic. 7 (3–4). Arctic Institute of North America: 153–8. doi:10.14430/arctic3839. ASTIS record 9741.
• Geophysical Institute Permafrost Lab, University of Alaska Fairbanks

User:HopsonRoad 20:31, 8 November 2014 (UTC)

Repetition of word, "permafrost," in titles

I believe that the word "permafrost" is redundant in all or most of the section titles, since that's the subject of the article. Unless I hear objections, i will delete it from most section titles. User:HopsonRoad 17:50, 8 March 2016 (UTC)

Southern map

The map of the extent and type in the Northern Hemisphere is awesome! Would it be useful to have a similar one for Antarctica? The text implies that most but not all of the continent is permanently frozen. -- Beland (talk) 22:50, 22 April 2016 (UTC)

@Beland: I added a link to the copyrighted map of permafrost in Antarctica. I'll improve the description, as well. User:HopsonRoad 02:39, 23 April 2016 (UTC) I have improved the description for Antarctica and the description of alpine permafrost in the Andes. User:HopsonRoad 03:04, 24 April 2016 (UTC)

Thaw

Shouldn't we mention something on the use of natural gas locked in the permafrost, and due to be released soon. My understanding is that this is carbon negative. I also brought up the issue at Talk:Natural_gas#Emissions KVDP (talk) 14:25, 17 June 2016 (UTC)

External links modified

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified one external link on Permafrost. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:

• Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20151015155733/http://www.lter.uaf.edu/dev2009/pdf/1350_Tarnocai_Canadell_2009.pdf to http://www.lter.uaf.edu/dev2009/pdf/1350_Tarnocai_Canadell_2009.pdf

When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true or failed to let others know (documentation at {{Sourcecheck}}).

This message was posted before February 2018. After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{source check}} (last update: 5 June 2024).

• If you have discovered URLs which were erroneously considered dead by the bot, you can report them with this tool.
• If you found an error with any archives or the URLs themselves, you can fix them with this tool.

Cheers.—^{cyberbot II}_{Talk to my owner:Online} 10:26, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

Illustration in Construction On Permafrost

The photo of an unevenly settled house doesn't belong here because Tomsk is to the south of the permafrost limits. Unevennes in this case was caused by shallow foundation and seasonal frost-thawing cycles. RlyechDweller (talk) 16:08, 8 February 2017 (UTC)

Thank you for that observation, RlyechDweller. The image is a legacy from a much earlier version of the article. The caption of the source image doesn't mention permafrost. The vegetation in the image doesn't suggest a permafrost area. So, I've deleted the image. Sincerely, User:HopsonRoad 16:24, 9 February 2017 (UTC)

Further update, RlyechDweller, the image has been recategorized and renamed in WP Commons. User:HopsonRoad 16:42, 10 February 2017 (UTC)

Svalbard Global Seed Vault and Permafrost melting

At Talk:Svalbard Global Seed Vault#Recent publicity over acute melting weather I have been in an interesting discussion about recent sources that reported flooding of the seed vault. At issue is whether the flooding was caused by rain and snowmelt, or whether the permafrost itself actually melted, with what looks like reasonable sources for both claims. I could use some help sorting this one out. --Guy Macon (talk) 03:39, 4 June 2017 (UTC)

External links modified

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 4 external links on Permafrost. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:

• Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-21549643
• Corrected formatting/usage for https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/feb/21/temperature-rise-permafrost-melt
• Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20111005174426/http://globaltwitcher.auderis.se/artspec_information.asp?thingid=44751 to http://globaltwitcher.auderis.se/artspec_information.asp?thingid=44751
• Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20160304103247/http://www.lter.uaf.edu/pdf/1754_Zimov_Zimov_2012.pdf to http://www.lter.uaf.edu/pdf/1754_Zimov_Zimov_2012.pdf

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

This message was posted before February 2018. After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{source check}} (last update: 5 June 2024).

• If you have discovered URLs which were erroneously considered dead by the bot, you can report them with this tool.
• If you found an error with any archives or the URLs themselves, you can fix them with this tool.

Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 00:49, 30 December 2017 (UTC)

Mercury

Is there mercury in the permafrost ? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.122.61.124 (talk) 02:23, 19 February 2018 (UTC)

Mercury (element) is extremely rare and not known to occur in areas underlain by permafrost. User:HopsonRoad 02:49, 19 February 2018 (UTC)

Extraterrestrial permafrost

Kixean777, thank you for adding images of Martian permafrost in a new section. MOS:OVERSECTION suggests that there is not enough material here to warrant a section. Can you supply some supporting text that explains the images that you supplied? Cheers, HopsonRoad (talk) 22:01, 21 February 2021 (UTC)

Brown University EEPS1960X course assignment

This article is or was the subject of a class project aimed at updating IPCC references to the most recent report (AR6). More details can be found on the course page. Student editor(s): JF726. Updates will be made according to the IPCC citation guide. — Preceding undated comment added 18:23, 5 May 2022 (UTC)

Soil surface temperature or air temperature?

It says, "Thus, if the mean annual air temperature is only slightly below 0 °C (32 °F), permafrost will form only in spots that are sheltered—usually with a northern or southern aspect (in north and south hemispheres respectively) —creating discontinuous permafrost. Usually, permafrost will remain discontinuous in a climate where the mean annual soil surface temperature is between −5 and 0 °C (23 and 32 °F). In the moist-wintered areas mentioned before, there may not be even discontinuous permafrost down to −2 °C (28 °F)."

First, air temperature is referred to, then soil surface temperature, and then just temperature. So at best, it's unclear. Furthermore, the soil surface temperature is never defined in the article, and the phrase is used exactly twice, while in all other instances, it is air temperature that is referred to. So it looks to me like "air" should be substituted for "soil surface". The link in the citation was of no use to me.

Secondly, shouldn't that be, "in the northern and southern hemispheres respectively"? Polar Apposite (talk) 07:15, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

Nothing About The History Of Permafrost?

Something important missing from this article is a section on the history of permafrost, how it formed in the first place, what holarctic conditions were like before there was permafrost, where all the carbons now sequestered within and beneath permafrost today were in the environment, &c. My understanding is that permafrost in the holarctic region is a geologically recent phenomenon, tied to the Ice Epoch of the Pleistocene period, but I'm not an authority. It was confirmation of this, and details related to the origins of permafrost is why I came to this article in the first place. I understand that climate science has very real worries about the release of permafrost sequestered carbon dioxide and methane, via a positive feedback loop with human caused global warming, but, for me, it begs the question: if permafrost in the arctic region is only ≈ 2 million years old, then where was all that carbon before that? How were global climate and temperatures affected before there was any permafrost? If anyone has sourceable information to include in this article about the origin of permafrost, I think it would be a useful addition to this article. 2604:3D08:2678:84E0:E1F2:4175:F60C:2CB3 (talk) 05:36, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

I agree this sounds quite interesting. Perhaps this kind of information is already included in some other Wikipedia articles that deal with the history of planet Earth? We have this one: History of Earth but it only mentions permafrost once. EMsmile (talk) 10:23, 13 July 2023 (UTC)

What are current weaknesses of this article?

Hi User:InformationToKnowledge I see you did a lot of work on this article recently (the tool "Who Wrote That" tells me that you have written about 30% of the article). I have just now changed the article quality label from C to B. I would like to know from you what are remaining weaknesses in this article that you can identify? If you had time, or if someone else had time, what would you recommend they focus on? One thing I noticed from looking at the section sizes (see table at the top of the talk page) is that the section "Revival of ancient microorganisms" might be overly big, possibly violating WP:DUE, i.e. too much weight for it. Do you see room for condensing this or would you say the space that it takes up matches with its importance compared to other issues?

I am also wondering whether "permafrost thaw" should be a separate sub-article. For now I have redirected permafrost thaw to Permafrost#Impacts of climate change. As the article on permafrost is not too large yet (37 kB (5857 words) "readable prose size"), a split-off for "permafrost thaw" is probably not warranted yet. EMsmile (talk) 10:37, 13 July 2023 (UTC)

P.S. I really like the work you have done on the article, e.g. the way you have made the lead into a better summary of the article and also restructured the section headings, giving it a more logical flow (in particular the section about impacts of climate change). Thanks for this excellent work! EMsmile (talk) 10:49, 13 July 2023 (UTC)

Glad to hear it!

To me, what is currently the last section of the article, "History of scientific research" is definitely the weakest part. Loose, grammatically questionable sentence structure, disproportionate amounts of detail about ~150 year-old publications, and yet effectively nothing about any research which had taken place starting from around 1950. While the section title might be setting overly high expectations (I am not sure if anyone can easily assemble a timeline of permafrost research based on online RS alone, while avoiding overlap with the other sections), what is currently there is just subpar.

Another thing this article needs is "In Popular Culture" section, as permafrost has featured in quite a lot of stories - particularly in speculative sci-fi of all kinds. The idea of plagues and the like emerging from the thaw is a particular favourite - which is one reason why I do not think that the microorganism section is excessive, as it discusses what appear to be long-held concerns in the popular imagination. Similarly, I find the idea of splitting off permafrost thaw really weird, when this article isn't too large, and when permafrost carbon cycle already exists (and has relatively few views, suggesting that splitting off the main reason most people care about permafrost isn't likely to be a good idea.)

I am also not sure if the "Classification" sections are as well-written as they could be, but I do not see any obvious improvements myself. And it would be nice to have some image for "Ecology" - the simplest solution might be to move the second image from the gallery (peat plateau complex) to it, while replacing its spot in the gallery with that image you just removed. However, there might be better options as well. InformationToKnowledge (talk) 17:07, 13 July 2023 (UTC)

Thanks, these are great pointers for the next round of improvements for someone! EMsmile (talk) 16:48, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

GA Review

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

This review is transcluded from Talk:Permafrost/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Chiswick Chap (talk · contribs) 13:08, 26 August 2023 (UTC)

Comments

I'll do this one. Chiswick Chap (talk) 13:08, 26 August 2023 (UTC)

This is in the main a well-structured, well-cited, and well-illustrated article, largely ready for GA status.

• However there are texts, including the first paragraph of the article body, the whole "In fiction" section, and several images that require citations. Reviewers have the choice of quick-fail for articles in this sort of state.

Addressed. InformationToKnowledge (talk) 17:47, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

• The "In fiction" section is, in addition, formatted as a list of what looks much like pop-culture trivia. The options are to remove it, or to rewrite it as a paragraph of discursive with reliable secondary sources, i.e. not attempting to rely on the media themselves but naming and citing critics or scholars who reliably discuss and analyse the media.

I saw such sections on several similar articles, and decided to try adding one just in case. Removed. InformationToKnowledge (talk) 09:55, 4 September 2023 (UTC)

• In "Base depth" is the assertion "The table to the right shows that the first hundred metres of permafrost forms relatively quickly but that deeper levels take progressively longer." This has several problems: "to the right" is false on small screens where the table will be above or below the text; it is uncited; and the table does not have a row for "100 metres" so it's not easy to see how the claim (cited or not) can be derived from the table. The sentence needs to be replaced with a statement that can be based on Lunardini 1995 or a similar source, and cited to that source.

Replaced with a much simpler and more easily supported statement. InformationToKnowledge (talk) 09:57, 4 September 2023 (UTC)

• Why are italics used in "Massive ground ice"? Seems inconsistent.

Strictly speaking, discontinuous permafrost section uses them too, and for the same purpose - to highlight specific terms, which may otherwise get overlooked. The logic of whichever editor did that years ago seems to make sense to me, but I'll admit I didn't check what WP:MOS has to say on this particular point. InformationToKnowledge (talk) 10:12, 4 September 2023 (UTC)

Best remove them in both places then.

Done. InformationToKnowledge (talk) 17:47, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

• The section on "Landforms", main link Patterned ground, provides 8 detailed images but only a very brief text. Since the illustrated landforms appear relevant, a slightly more detailed summary is needed that at least states what a palsa and a pingo is, and that mentions very briefly how palsas, pingos, polygons, rings, and ice wedges form, and what solifluction is.

Done. InformationToKnowledge (talk) 17:47, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

• Two "excerpts" are used in the article ("excerpt|Permafrost carbon cycle#Carbon release from the permafrost|paragraphs=1-3}}" and "excerpt|Permafrost carbon cycle#Cumulative"). I'm very doubtful if this is (ever) a wise approach when the relationship between science articles is parent topic to child topic, as the coverage requirements are completely different in the two cases. This, the parent article, should provide not an excerpt/copy of the same text, but a brief summary-style paragraph of the key points, with a "main" link to the child/subsidiary article. This may well use some of the same citations as the child article, but it should be briefer and not go into any of the details. The sort of inappropriate detail is well illustrated by "would add 0.06 °C (0.11 °F) (with a range of 0.02–0.14 °C (0.036–0.252 °F)) 50 years after the last anthropogenic emission,". Instead we should be saying (broadly) that the scenarios are serious and would have major effects on global temperatures over timescales of decades to centuries.
  • I have now replaced those excerpts with a much more condensed section. Will start addressing the remaining points in the next few days. InformationToKnowledge (talk) 16:51, 13 September 2023 (UTC)

    Good work. Chiswick Chap (talk) 18:38, 13 September 2023 (UTC)

• The section "Revival of ancient microorganisms" is almost 1000 words long, on a topic which is at best tangential to the subject of the article, in other words WP:COATRACK probably applies. It should be replaced by a "main" link and a short summary of the key points; the "main" link should point to a subsidiary article called Revival of ancient microorganisms in permafrost or something similar.

I would rather not simplify warming effects too much. There is no reason to use numbers and percentages with geographic data yet go vague with climatological information, and doing so would only breed confusion. Still, you make fair points about the reliance on excerpts and section size: I aim to write a couple of summary paragraphs for the carbon cycle, and to split off the microorganism section into something like Microbiology of permafrost (not to mention expanding the section on landforms). These changes are going to be time-consuming, though, so don't expect much progress until around the weekend. InformationToKnowledge (talk) 10:12, 4 September 2023 (UTC)

This isn't about further simplification, but staying on-topic. Chiswick Chap (talk) 10:15, 4 September 2023 (UTC)

Done. InformationToKnowledge (talk) 17:47, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

• In "History of scientific research", you mention "the Russian term vechnaia merzlota". Since this is then discussed and the English translation is criticised, we need to know what the Russian actually meant in detail. Suggest you format this as {{lang|ru|vechnaia merzlota}} and provide both the Cyrillic script of the Russian words and a literal translation (vechnaia seems to mean "eternal, everlasting" and merzlota seems to mean something like "frozen soil", needs checking).

It's not that big of a point when compared to the rest of the article, and the source is not fully available without subscriptions, so it may be easier to omit or minimize the mention of this. I'll see what works later on. InformationToKnowledge (talk) 10:12, 4 September 2023 (UTC)

Added language formatting and found a very recent source providing an alternate translation. I also found another article which talks in depth about the objections to the term brought up in the paywalled book which I originally cited. While the article appears really detailed, I don't know if citing that particular website is in line with best practices, so I'll ask for your input on this. InformationToKnowledge (talk) 17:47, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

Citing a nonprofit org. is fine but since it may be political I'd suggest you say it's a nonprofit when introducing it, i.e. "According to the nonprofit organisation" or "...the pressure group ..." or something like that. But it doesn't sound as if you really need it anyway?

No, not really. It certainly is political, and while the parts where the article seems to retell the book are fine, they are combined with what seem to be their own opinion in a way that'll likely be too confusing to disentangle. The other reference should be fine. InformationToKnowledge (talk) 19:13, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

Images

• Possibly too many, too similar images of Herschel Island. The image next to "frozen debris lobes" in "Thaw-induced ground instability" possibly actually shows such a lobe, in which case the image needs to be labelled as such. If not it's probably superfluous.

Replaced two of those images with alternatives. InformationToKnowledge (talk) 17:49, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

• When an image caption is not a complete sentence, but consists only of a noun phrase, it should not end with "."; there are multiple images in this state.

Should be addressed by now? InformationToKnowledge (talk) 17:49, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

• The image at top of "Classification and extent" contains substantial commented-out text including citations. Not clear why that is; a citation is certainly needed, and (brief) explanation would probably be appropriate?

Well, I am not sure when this happened, but uncommenting the text results in a really awkward and overly large caption, in addition to a couple of simple paragraphs that do not easily fit into the current structure. I'll have to think more about how to rewrite this properly. InformationToKnowledge (talk) 10:28, 4 September 2023 (UTC)

I should also say that I'm not sure about some of the "citation needed", particularly the ones in the construction section. What kind of a reference would be needed for those images/sections, specifically? InformationToKnowledge (talk) 10:28, 4 September 2023 (UTC)

Exactly as for text anywhere else, reliable sources that support the claims made. Chiswick Chap (talk) 10:58, 4 September 2023 (UTC)

@Matti&Keti: you seem to have made more than a few edits to this article, and over a longer period of time than I have. I wonder if you would be willing to comment on this, or if you have any ideas on how to improve the citations of the images that are currently tagged? InformationToKnowledge (talk) 13:45, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

• The key point is that where a caption strays from simple description (in the manner of 'a house on stilts') to argumentation ('...intended to prevent the thawing of permafrost') then a citation is required. This can be fixed by citing the caption, or by cutting it down to simple description. Chiswick Chap (talk) 17:26, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

Commented-out caption has been rewritten and added back into the text, and the other issue with captions should be addressed by now. InformationToKnowledge (talk) 17:49, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

• The images appear to be properly licensed on Commons.

Sources

• Sources are mostly in Last, First format, but there are several instances of "vauthors=" (giving a format like Bloggs JC rather than like Bloggs, John C., e.g. refs [104], [105]) which should be (globally) replaced with Last, First.

• Spot-checks on sources are mostly ok but see the following items. I've spelt out a couple of page ranges for you.

• It's a bit surprising to have New Yorker cited in a science article but the instance seems reasonable here.

• [2] says "(15% of the exposed land surface area in the Northern Hemisphere)" but our "Classification and extent" section makes the different claim "Because permafrost zones are not entirely underlain by permafrost, only 15% of the ice-free area of the Northern Hemisphere is actually underlain by permafrost.[2]" --- needs fixing.

• [21] (Circum-Arctic...) needs all its authors, publisher.

• [33] is EB; surely we can find something better than that.

• [51] (French 2007) needs ISBN, page number(s). The three instances may need different pages. Curiously, the sentence "Intrasedimental or constitutional ice ... injection ice." is cited to French (without pages) and Shumskiy & Vtyurin 1966, but multiple other sources, post-1966, with discussion, are commented out. Are French and Shumskiy & Vtyurin the right sources to cite here?

Rewrote that entire section. InformationToKnowledge (talk) 17:59, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

• [95] (Russia declares emergency) should use Last, First format.

• [96] USES CAPITALS.

• [102] is apparently written by a certain Mr. U.N.E. Programme: something wrong here.

All the simple corrections are done. Rewrote [2] to not just match the text but also hopefully be more readable. Replaced [33] with a scientific paper, and had to rewrite quite a bit of the section to reflect its information. With Shumskiy & Vtyurin, I am wondering about the necessity of citing so old myself now. I will most likely seek newer, alternate sources this upcoming weekend. InformationToKnowledge (talk) 09:54, 4 September 2023 (UTC)

Is this item still outstanding?

No, it was about the section I rewrote. Kept that particular 1960s reference for posterity, looked up a couple of those old, commented-out references and folded them back into text, but I also found 5 or so references from the last 5 years to balance it out and keep the section up to date. InformationToKnowledge (talk) 19:13, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

• Following recent edits, refs [104] and [108] contain pointers to IPCC refs that don't exist.

This should be fixed by now? I went through practically all the references, discovering many issues in the process (i.e. some references not using a template, others only a generic "Citation", imprecise dates on many references, lack of DOI links on too many journal citations, etc.) While the preview window still flags two reference template maintenance messages and one maintenance error, I can't spot where they are, and I don't think it's to do with the IPCC citations. InformationToKnowledge (talk) 17:59, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

Summary

This article has several issues which may take some time to fix. There isn't a hurry but we need to agree a timescale, and keep to it, so please let me know what you want. Chiswick Chap (talk) 14:31, 26 August 2023 (UTC)

Thank you for doing this review! I see your concerns, and I'll try to present the first round of improvements to the article this upcoming weekend. InformationToKnowledge (talk) 15:53, 28 August 2023 (UTC)

Hello Chiswick Chap and InformationToKnowledge, I just wanted to give you moral support for this work, and say thank you to both of you for your work on bringing this article to GA status! Much appreciated. EMsmile (talk) 07:06, 21 September 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for writing this! Can't wait to see this article officially marked with the status, and to finally see it highlighted on DYK! InformationToKnowledge (talk) 19:13, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

InformationToKnowledge: there are a couple of questions above on items where I'm not sure we're complete. Please have a look! All the best, Chiswick Chap (talk) 18:45, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

I think have addressed them all now? InformationToKnowledge (talk) 19:13, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Undefined ref

@InformationToKnowledge: you forgot to fill in a source for the ref name "Douglas2020". -- Fyrael (talk) 17:07, 13 September 2023 (UTC)

I have now ended up outright replacing the image which used that ref with a more suitable one. Still, thanks for letting me know! Now, to discover where the last few stubborn maintenance messages are from... InformationToKnowledge (talk) 18:18, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

Transcribe the lead of this article to cryosphere?

I was just looking at the cryosphere article today and noticed its section about permafrost. It is mostly unsourced and seems outdated to me. I am thinking of deleting the entire content that is there about permafrost and replacing it with an excerpt from here. Thoughts? And is there anything at Cryosphere#Frozen ground and permafrost that would be worth keeping and perhaps incorporating to here? EMsmile (talk) 11:12, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

Adding a "main" link there and copying and citing the lead section of this article would be great. Using "excerpt" is not great as the lead here, while it contains some of the citations, also contains refs to citations made in full in the article body, so they'd break... best to have a stand-alone copy. Chiswick Chap (talk) 11:48, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for your reply, Chiswick Chap. I don't understand what you mean with "also contains refs to citations made in full in the article body, so they'd break..."? Did you mean the short ref style? As far as I can see they are all long ref style. I would prefer to use the excerpt tool, rather than copy & paste because the permafrost article's lead will likely be updated and improved further in the future. The permafrost article will be a GA article soon, whereas the cryosphere article is only C. So transcribing from a GA article to a C article makes sense, I think. - But perhaps I misunderstood what your exact concern was? EMsmile (talk) 13:28, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

Whatever. You'll find shortrefs like the [[United States]] or [[China]].<ref name="Schuur2022" /> in the lead here, not to mention <ref name="Nelson2002" /> among others. As for your point about updates, it's always unwise to bet on the future; changes can go in any direction (and usually do). There is no guarantee that they'll cause the excerpts to "improve" from the point of view of the article including them, and every likelihood that they won't. Please don't do it. Chiswick Chap (talk) 13:46, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

The beauty about the excerpt tool is that those refs won't get broken. It's a very smart tool. The only refs that get "broken" are those that use short refs and those could be copied across separately under a section called "sources". I can understand that a featured article should not include excerpts but an article like cryosphere, which is C class and has been lingering unimproved for a very long time, I think it's an improvement. You are a general opponent of excerpts then, I take it? - I use them regularly, and I've seen others, like User:InformationToKnowledge use them a lot as well. I think they are a brilliant tool, especially for B and C class articles (not for FA articles). EMsmile (talk) 19:26, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

Is any of this useful?

Is anything from this textblock worth keeping and integrating into the permafrost article? It's not very well sourced though and possibly outdated, so I doubt it. It stems from cryosphere which is where intend to cut it out and then replace it with an excerpt from the lead of this article (or a copy of the lead but I think an excerpt would be better in this case).

++++++++

Frozen ground and permafrost

Frozen ground (permafrost and seasonally frozen ground) occupies approximately 54 million km² of the exposed land areas of the Northern Hemisphere (Zhang et al., 2003) and therefore has the largest areal extent of any component of the cryosphere. Permafrost (perennially frozen ground) may occur where mean annual air temperatures (MAAT) are less than −1 or −2 °C and is generally continuous where MAAT are less than −7 °C. In addition, its extent and thickness are affected by ground moisture content, vegetation cover, winter snow depth, and aspect. The global extent of permafrost is still not completely known, but it underlies approximately 20% of Northern Hemisphere land areas. Thicknesses exceed 600 m along the Arctic coast of northeastern Siberia and Alaska, but, toward the margins, permafrost becomes thinner and horizontally discontinuous. The marginal zones will be more immediately subject to any melting caused by a warming trend. Most of the presently existing permafrost formed during previous colder conditions and is therefore relic. However, permafrost may form under present-day polar climates where glaciers retreat or land emergence exposes unfrozen ground. Washburn (1973) concluded that most continuous permafrost is in balance with the present climate at its upper surface, but changes at the base depend on the present climate and geothermal heat flow; in contrast, most discontinuous permafrost is probably unstable or "in such delicate equilibrium that the slightest climatic or surface change will have drastic disequilibrium effects".

Under warming conditions, the increasing depth of the summer active layer has significant impacts on the hydrologic and geomorphic regimes. Thawing and retreat of permafrost have been reported in the upper Mackenzie Valley and along the southern margin of its occurrence in Manitoba, but such observations are not readily quantified and generalized. Based on average latitudinal gradients of air temperature, an average northward displacement of the southern permafrost boundary by 50-to-150 km could be expected, under equilibrium conditions, for a 1 °C warming.

Only a fraction of the permafrost zone consists of actual ground ice. The remainder (dry permafrost) is simply soil or rock at subfreezing temperatures. The ice volume is generally greatest in the uppermost permafrost layers and mainly comprises pore and segregated ice in Earth material. Measurements of bore-hole temperatures in permafrost can be used as indicators of net changes in temperature regime. Gold and Lachenbruch (1973) infer a 2–4 °C warming over 75 to 100 years at Cape Thompson, Alaska, where the upper 25% of the 400-m thick permafrost is unstable with respect to an equilibrium profile of temperature with depth (for the present mean annual surface temperature of −5 °C). Maritime influences may have biased this estimate, however. At Prudhoe Bay similar data imply a 1.8 °C warming over the last 100 years (Lachenbruch et al. 1982). Further complications may be introduced by changes in snow-cover depths and the natural or artificial disturbance of the surface vegetation. EMsmile (talk) 20:35, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

References

EMsmile (talk) 20:35, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

Nearly all of this is based on a 50-year old article? Effectively useless. I cannot think of anything here which newer references do not address already, and some sentences appear extremely dated. I am amazed that it stayed this way for so long, effectively unnoticed, and agree that using an excerpt was long overdue! Thank you for being the one to finally act on this. InformationToKnowledge (talk) 18:29, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

Did you know nomination

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by Vaticidalprophet talk 10:12, 12 October 2023 (UTC)

(

• Comment or view
• Article history

)

• ... that there are around 20,000 sites containing toxic materials that are frozen in the permafrost, many of which are expected to start thawing and releasing their pollutants in the near future? Source: . (From "Release of toxic pollutants" section of the article.)
  • Reviewed:

Improved to Good Article status by InformationToKnowledge (talk). Self-nominated at 19:01, 28 September 2023 (UTC). Post-promotion hook changes for this nom will be logged at Template talk:Did you know nominations/Permafrost; consider watching this nomination, if it is successful, until the hook appears on the Main Page.

General: Article is new enough and long enough
New enough: Long enough:

Policy: Article is sourced, neutral, and free of copyright problems
Adequate sourcing: Neutral: Free of copyright violations, plagiarism, and close paraphrasing:

Hook: Hook has been verified by provided inline citation
Cited: Interesting:

QPQ: Done.

Overall: The source for the hook states that there are between 13,000 and 20,000 sites containing toxic materials. Perhaps change the hook to state "up to 20,000" rather than "around 20,000". Otherwise the length is good, the promotion to good article was recent enough, the article is sourced, and the hook is interesting. No QPQ requirement because this is only your second DYK nomination. Well done. Nathan121212 (talk) 22:03, 8 October 2023 (UTC)

Thank you! And as for your comment, this figure "between 13,000 and 20,000" refers to only one type of a toxic site, and there are two. The source's exact wording is

Here we identify about 4500 industrial sites where potentially hazardous substances are actively handled or stored in the permafrost-dominated regions of the Arctic. Furthermore, we estimate that between 13,000 and 20,000 contaminated sites are related to these industrial sites.

So, the wording I chose - "there are around 20,000 sites containing toxic materials" - was actually meant to deal with this uncertainty by adequately describing both the 4,500 industrial sites, and the 13,000 to 20,000 contaminated ones. If you add the two together, you get a minimum of ~17,500 and a maximum of 24,500. This is why I think "around 20,000 sites" would be the most appropriate descriptor. InformationToKnowledge (talk) 12:42, 9 October 2023 (UTC)

In that case, all good. Approved. Nathan121212 (talk) 17:09, 9 October 2023 (UTC)

References

Relationship with article permafrost carbon cycle

For anyone watching this page but not the permafrost carbon cycle one, please take a look at this discussion where I try to optimise how the permafrost article interlinks with the permafrost carbon cycle article. It currently feels sub-optimal to me. EMsmile (talk) 11:51, 12 October 2023 (UTC)

Short definition shortened

Hi User:Matti&Keti: I've made the short definition shorter because the short description has a specific format and needs to be short. It is not a definition, see Short description#SDNOTDEF. My proposal is: Type of soil in frozen state. Previously it was (which I think was overly detailed): Soil frozen for a duration of at least two years. EMsmile (talk) 19:55, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

"Widespread Permafrost Zone" listed at Redirects for discussion

The redirect Widespread Permafrost Zone has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2024 September 11 § Widespread Permafrost Zone until a consensus is reached. 1234qwer1234qwer4 19:15, 11 September 2024 (UTC)