Estimating the carbon mobility from permafrost using DEM difference derived from ArcticDEM at a pan-Arctic scale

Permafrost in the Arctic and Subarctic regions contains a significant amount of carbon from ancient vegetation and animals remaining and started to thaw at an alarming rate due to global warming and the Arctic amplification, posing significant risks of releasing ancient carbon into the atmosphere and affecting global carbon neutrality. However, the magnitude and rates of carbon release from permafrost at a global scale remain unclear. Among the various processes associated with permafrost thaw, mass movements such as retrogressive thaw slumps (RTSs) play a critical role in transforming local hydrology, geomorphology, and ecosystems and moving soil organic carbon from permafrost to the environment. To advance the understanding of carbon release from permafrost, we utilized high-resolution (2 m) topographic change data (DEM differences) and multi-temporal/source satellite imagery to identify RTSs and estimate the carbon mobility during the RTS development. Specifically, we (1) delineated regions of elevation loss from 2-meter-resolution topographic change data using the Segment Anything Model, (2) fine-tuned a vision-language model (e.g., CLIP) model and used it to classify areas of elevation loss into RTS-induced and others using multi-temporal/source satellite imagery, and (3) calculated the volume of matter removed from permafrost using the DEM difference and estimated the carbon mobility using the northern circumpolar soil carbon database. The DEM difference was derived from approximately 200 TB of ArcticDEM, covering all land in the Arctic and SubArctic (https://doi.org/10.18739/A2ZS2KF4B). This is a newly funded project that started in January 2025, and we will present some preliminary results and look forward to the collaboration and contribution from Arctic scientists and carbon experts.