Overview
The Mount Baker Climate Laboratory (MBCL) is a unique high-altitude observational site in the North Cascades of Washington State, located at the base of one of the snowiest mountains in the world. The MBCL provides continuous temperature measurements in strategic arrays in a maritime mountain environment. Because Mount Baker regularly receives extreme snowfall, the dataset offers critical insights into snow accumulation, melt processes, and mountain climate variability and extremes under conditions that closely mirror future projections of wetter and warmer winters in many mountain regions.
The published MBCL dataset consists of distributed near-surface air and soil temperature measurements from the southern aspect of Mount Baker, Washington, USA, from July 2018 – July 2024. The measurements were made in strategic arrays at nine sites ranging from elevations of 1000 m to the summit (3287 m). Measurements are on Mount Baker are ongoing as part of this project.
Team
This project is led by Michael Town, with active collaboration from:
Gen Dron-Smith, Kaf Adventures
Susan Howard, ESR
Devin Parry, Lakeside School
Logan Searl, Lakeside School
It was designed in collaboration with Chip Mehring (Lakeside School, emeritus).
Partners
Earth and Space Research, Lakeside School, The United States Forest Service
Project website
Citations and access
Data may be accessed through Pangaea:
https://doi.pangaea.de/10.1594/PANGAEA.984453
Please use the following citation for the MBCL dataset:
Town, Michael S; Wang, Felicity; Mehring, Chip; Parry, Devin; Searl, Logan; Dron-Smith, Gen; Block, Greta; Albrecht, Alexander; Anand, Tanvi; Bashore, Colman; Borowski, Mila; Bowen, Elizabeth; Bradford, Anne Elise; Bridge, Ryan; Carpenter, Lucy J; Chen, Jerry; Concepcion, Anabelle; Dauber, Mason; Dudley, Nila; Dull, Stella; Eleveld, Bobby; Fitzgerald, Jennifer; Fries, Xander; Gale, Skyler; Ganapathy, Tanvi; Gates, Phoebe; Hollander, Ai-Li; Howard, Daniel; Howard, Susan; Kolenski, Drew; Lamble, Mira; Lamble, Miles; Lisin, Noah; Mankoff, Kenneth D; Mapes, Jennifer; Martinez, Charles; Meader Yetter, Phillip; Milne, Skye; Nelson, Michael; O’Donnell, Logan; Osborne, Carl; Park, Kaiden; Patrick, William; Porter, Jimmy; Purcell, Jon; Ricker, Reagan; Romero, Armando; Schuler, Ian; Schuler, Miles; Scott, Jack; Shelton, Mea; Spencer, Jeffery; Stevens, Christopher Max; Susskind, Tea; Swaner, Shepard; Takayama, Bryent; Tan, Alison; Theobald, Grace; Toll, Mia; Traverse, Sam; Walker, Adam; Whitt, Cameron; Wineland, Samantha; Yee, Sophia; Young, Derek; Yu, Allistair; Yuan, Isabelle; Zong, Zara: Distributed near-surface air and soil temperatures from the southern aspect of Mount Baker, USA from 2018-2024 [dataset bundled publication]. PANGAEA, https://doi.pangaea.de/10.1594/PANGAEA.984453 (dataset in review)
Funding
Funding for this project was provided by Lakeside School, Ballard Data, and the Donchas Nolan Fund through the San Diego Foundation.