Seismic Monitoring of Glacier Activity on Svalbard, 2014

Climatic change is of incredible importance in the polar regions as ice-sheets and glaciers respond strongly to change in average temperature. The analysis of seismic signals emitted by glaciers (icequakes) is thus gaining importance as a tool for monitoring glacier activity. To better characterize dynamical glacier activity, this project aims to use available seismic data of the past 15 years recorded on permanent seismic stations on Svalbard and independent glacier observations to investigate regional icequakes, both for patterns in their temporal and spatial distribution as well as their waveforms. By this, the key elements of the study are the improvement of source location estimates for glacier-related seismic events on Svalbard and the use of adapted automatic pattern recognition methods to classify their signals. This project will help to understand the relation between glacial processes and seismicity and to evaluate the potential of continuous seismic glacier monitoring.