Modelling thermal breakup on the Mackenzie River at the outlet of Great Slave Lake, N.W.T

F. Hicks, W. Cui, D. Andres
1997 Canadian journal of civil engineering (Print)  
Thermal breakup on the Mackenzie River at the outlet of Great Slave Lake was documented over the 4-year period, from 1992 to 1995. Measurements of ice and snow thickness, flow characteristics, open water development, air temperature, solar insolation, wind speed, and relative humidity facilitated the formulation of numerical models to forecast the development of open water downstream from the outlet of Great Slave Lake. The rate at which the open water developed was modelled using the complete
more » ... nergy budget equations and a more empirical linear approximation of the heat transfer processes. The linear heat transfer model, when calibrated with heat transfer coefficients from other studies, provided a good fit to the observed data for all 4 years of record. The results from the complete energy budget model were less consistent and it was concluded that given the practical limitations on the type and amount of data typically available to an engineer, the simpler heat transfer approach is more suitable for modelling thermal breakup at this site.
doi:10.1139/cjce-24-4-570 fatcat:ghdana27ifdtfjjrqcfnjsf2oe