Global Distribution of Cryosols with Mountain Permafrost: An Overview

About 30 per cent of the mountain soils with permafrost have an active layer depth (ALD) of less than 1 or 2m and, therefore, can be classified as Cryosols. Mountain Cryosols have a total area of approximately 1.26 million km(2) and account for approximately 12 per cent of the Cryosols worldwide. An ALD of less than 2m appears to occur only where the mean annual air temperature is<-6 degrees C. There is a negative correlation (R=0.86; p <0.001) between latitude (degrees N) and elevation (m) at which the ALD occurs at less than 2m. Mountain Cryosols are most abundant in the western Cordillera of the USA and Canada (360 000km(2)), the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau of China (280 000km(2)), Greenland (185 000km(2)), the Yablonoi-Sayan-Stanovoi Mountains of Russia (153 000km(2)) and the Ural Mountains of Russia (90 000km(2)). Despite that the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau contains 70 per cent of the world's mountain permafrost, only about 20 per cent of the soils are Cryosols, because they are limited to areas above 5100m asl. Cryosols occur in the central Andes above 4900m asl and in the southern Andes above 1000m asl. Potential impacts of recent climate warming on mountain permafrost and Cryosols are discussed. Copyright (c) 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.