Effects of snow accumulation on soil temperature and change of salinity in frozen soil from laboratory experiments

In order to clarify the effect of snow depth on the ground temperature, snowfalls were occurred on soil samples using an artificial snowfall machine in the laboratory and variations of soil temperatures up to 30cm were measured during snowfall. The snow types used here were dendrites (type A) and sphere (type B). The snow depths on the soil surface were 10cm and 30cm for each snow type, so four deferent experimental results were obtained. At each experiment, two samples with deferent initial volumetric water content were prepared, about 10% and 20%. The initial soil temperature was set to 5°C and temperature in the laboratory was kept at -10°C. Soil temperatures were measured at the depths of 0cm, 10cm, 20cm and 30cm during the snowfall, and continuous measurements were conducted for ten hours after the stop of snowfall. From the experiments, it is confirmed that the soil temperature strongly depended on the depths of snow on the surface, density and water content. The soil sample using the type A with the depth of 30cm snow accumulation had the highest temperature at the surface, followed by the type A with 10cm snow, type B with 30cm snow and type B with 10cm snow. It was also pointed that temperature of the high water content samples showed the high temperature decrease compared with the low water one due to the high heat capacity except for the sample using type A with 10cm snow. Numerical calculation will be needed to explain these results. In addition, another experiment will be carried out to clarify the change of salinity during soil freezing with snow accumulation. The method to measure the salinity of soil is to measure the electrical conductivity of soil and volumetric water content at the same depth. The temperature condition in the cooling bath is ranged between -10 and 5°C and changed in 24 hours. Firstly, the temperature profiles will be measured to detect the frozen front, then measurements will start and discuss the results.