Check out the Weather in Svea!
Svea has a new weather station
Svea now has its first meteorological weather station in operation, for the first time since the mining settlement was returned to nature. It was Dr. Eero Rinne, Associate Professor at UNIS, and guest researcher Anna Allen who went out to install the instruments. The data, which is now once again available to the public, will provide valuable weather information to both researchers and the local population. “We will make the weather data link available so that it can also be used for planning private trips,” Rinne explains.
The weather station is placed on a container near the field station, where it measures air temperature, humidity, pressure, incoming shortwave radiation, wind direction, and wind speed. In addition, a temporary temperature and soil moisture sensor is placed in the snow. The weather station is an important part of the research conducted at the Svea station and provides valuable information for anyone traveling in the area. It was funded by the Norwegian Space Agency as part of a project aimed at strengthening Svalbard as a European reference site for satellite measurements of ice and snow. These satellite measurements will in turn improve our ability to quantify melting and thinning of glaciers and sea ice—both in Svalbard and globally.
In addition to the new station in Svea, UNIS operates several weather stations near Longyearbyen and in the Isfjorden area. These include five stations linked to the UNIS-led PermaMeteoCommunity project, nine stations on boats operating in Isfjorden, and on lighthouses along the coastline of Isfjorden.