NSA Barrow Facility

Location: 71° 19' 23.73" N, 156° 36' 56.70" W
Altitude: 8 meters

The Barrow facility was dedicated in July 1997 and chosen because the Arctic is particularly sensitive to climate changes. Barrow is located at the northernmost point in the United States, 330 miles north of the Arctic Circle.

Also known as the Top of the World, Barrow is Alaska's largest Eskimo village (home to 4,581 people). Tax revenue from the Slope's oil fields pay for services borough wide, and natural gas is used to heat homes and generate electricity in Barrow. Many residents, however, maintain traditional lifestyles. Subsistence foods include whale, seal, polar bear, walrus, duck, caribou, grayling and whitefish.

The Barrow facility has a trailer and platforms to support the instrumentation and data system. Significantly, an extended range AERI (ER-AERI) is operating at Barrow. The ER-AERI was built specifically for the high latitudes where low water vapor concentrations are common. ACRF also operates many of the same instruments, including a 35-GHz cloud radar, that are located at its warmer sites. However, many of these instruments have been hardened to withstand temperatures that drop below -40 C/F.

Barrow Instruments

Current list of Barrow instruments.

Co-located Science Projects

Research funded by the National Science Foundation Arctic System Science Land-Atmosphere-Ice Interactions is immediately adjacent to our Barrow facility. In addition, NOAA's Climate Monitoring & Diagnostics Laboratory is located behind the ACRF Barrow facility.