Summary & rationale

INARCH will carry out a Common Observing Period Experiment (COPE) across the network of research basins, focusing on obtaining high-quality measurements to the extent possible, defining this as starting in 2022 to coincide with the start of the snow season in the southern hemisphere, and carrying on until 2024. During this COPE we would ensure all sensors are working, enhance observations at our mountain research basins, fly supplementary UAV acquisitions, run high resolution models and work together for comparison of processes, data sharing, and model testing in challenging environments.
Why have a COPE? This initiative provides an opportunity for inter-comparisons across the global network of INARCH research sites and basins. While different climates prevail across the network of sites and each are subject to temporally and spatially varying conditions and extreme events, we need to coordinate our own efforts and response to some of the observations and data and also coordinate the modelling. We need to engage the modelling community to ensure we have comparable observations for model testing and evaluation. In some instances there are teleconnections that may occur and can be of interest to examine. Further, by getting these instruments into place and the campaign underway, this would be a start for longer-term observations of higher quality that can be comparable. Tremendous value can accrue from activities such as this and the approach has been used in the past with various GEWEX initiatives (e.g., in western Canada some basins have stayed instrumented over time since the late-1990s). The other aspects are in providing testbeds for instrumentation that some of us may be developing and allowing us to share information about the density of instrumentation and other things that may be useful as people work on basins.
COPE steering committee

- John Pomeroy
- Ignacio Lopez Moreno
- Ekaterina Rets
- Eric Sproles
- Ulrich Strasser
- Lindsey Nicholson
- Rainer Prinz
- James McPhee
- Franziska Koch
- Vincent Vionnet
- Wouter Buytaert
- Ethan Gutmann
- Dhiraj Pradhananga
- Sebastián Krogh
- Stephen O’Hearn
- Chris DeBeer
Field campaign sites & research basins

See Research Basins for details on all INARCH experimental sites. Below is a list of sites that are particpating in the COPE initiative.
- Izas experimental catchment, Pyrenees Mountains, Spain
- Rofental Research Basin, Ötztal Alps, Austria
- Kyzylsu Glacier and monitoring sites, Western Pamir Mountains, Tajikistan
- Mount Everest/Mt.Qomolangma station, Himalayas, China
- NamCo Lake area, Nyenchen Tanglha Mountains, Tibetan Plateau, China
- Hengduan Mountain, Tibetan Plateau/Yunnan–Guizhou Plateau, China
- Yala Shampo Cryosphere Hydro-Ecological Station, Himalaya/Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, China
- Changdu Ecological Monitoring Station, Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, China
- Marmot Creek Research Basin, Rocky Mountains, Canada
- Fortress Mountain, Rocky Mountains, Canada
- Peyto Glacier, Rocky Mountains, Canada
- Zugspitze, Wetterstein Mountains, European Alps, Germany
- Brewster Glacier, Southern Alps, New Zealand
- Langtang Catchment, Himalayas, Nepal
- Hidden Valley, Himalayas, Nepal
- Djankuat research basin, North Caucasus Mountains, Russia
- Rheraya catchment, High Atlas Mountains, Morrocco
- Estero Las Bayas, Andes, Chile
- Valle Hermoso, Andes, Chile
- Bridger Range, Bridger Mountains, United States of America
- Salcca-Sibinacocha catchment, Andes, Peru
- Reynolds Creek, Owyhee Mountains, USA
- Guadalfeo Basin, Sirra Nevada, Spain
- Wolf Creek Research Basins, Coastal Range, Canada
- Dischma Catchment, European Alps, Switzerland
- Leiwuqi/Rioche Site (Changdu/Qamdo), Mt. Nyenchen Tanglha, China
- Dadongshu Yakou (Binggou River), Tibetan Plateau/Qilian Mountains, China
- Arou (Babao River), Tibetan Plateau/Qilian Mountains, China
- Torgnon, European Alps, Italy
- Atwater Study Plot / Little Cottonwood Canyon, Wasatch Mountains, USA
- Grand Mesa, CO Rockies, USA
- Senator Beck Basin, San Juans (CO Rockies), USA
- Sangvor, Western Pamirs, Tajikistan
- Col de Porte, Chartreuse, Western Alps, France
- Col du Lac Blanc, Grandes-Rousses, Western Alps, France
Instruments, sensors, & drones
There are a few researchers developing and deploying sensors and systems that might be used across a number of sites. During the COPE, we anticipate some comparisons where possible.
Modelling & software tools
For COPE we plan to take a variety of different models and apply them in different basins to see how they work, make sure we have the proper forcing information, try different forcing, at different scales, see what corrections are needed for those forcings, calculate snow and ice dynamics and hydrological dynamics at the surface, and look at these diagnostically with available measurements from ice and snow changes, to soil moisture, streamflow, and turbulent fluxes, as available. We aim to compare the results of diagnostic modelling to better understand why models produce various behaviours and to see if models benchmark various known aspects and regimes of the coupled atmospheric-cryospheric-hydrological system. This has not been done globally in alpine regions and could be potentially very powerful. Some of the models to be used include:
- Cold Regions Hydrological Model (CRHM), https://research-groups.usask.ca/hydrology/modelling/crhm.php
- openAMUNDSEN (distributed snow/ice/hydrological model), https://doc.openamundsen.org
- OGGM (open global glacier model), https://oggm.org
- Cosipy, https://cryo-tools.org/tools/cosipy/
- WRF\NoaaMP\CLM\LES models
- FSM2 (can be run stand-alone or within CHM), https://github.com/RichardEssery/FSM2
- Thethys-Chloris, https://doi.org/10.1029/2011MS000086
- SPHY, https://gmd.copernicus.org/articles/8/2009/2015/
- AMelt, https://doi.org/10.3390/geosciences11020078
- SNOWPACK/Alpine3D, https://models.slf.ch/
- SnowModel, https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/hydr/7/6/jhm548_1.xml
- AWSM/iSnobal, https://github.com/USDA-ARS-NWRC/awsm
- FSM-OSHD
- S3M, https://gmd.copernicus.org/articles/15/4853/2022/gmd-15-4853-2022.html
- TopoPyScale, https://gmd.copernicus.org/articles/7/387/2014/gmd-7-387-2014.html / https://github.com/ArcticSnow/TopoPyScale
- SURFEX-Crocus, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-5-773-2012 / http://www.umr-cnrm.fr/spip.php?article265
To manage COPE data and basin metadata across the network, we are using the custom-developed GWFNet Catalogue, which is a high-level information hub specialized for easily relating together different forms of records on water science research.