Study of conditions for long-term storage of food products in permafrost on the Taimyr Peninsula

The article describes the history of the organization of a real-life experiment for the long-term storage of food products, which was begun in 1900 on the western coast of the Taimyr Peninsula by the fi rst Russian polar expedition of the Russian Academy of Sciences led by the geologist and geographer Eduard Vasilyevich Toll. The main tasks of scientifi c work on the study of physicochemical and organoleptic quality indicators of food and industrial products during long-term storage in conditions of unregulated negative temperatures in the permafrost of the Arctic zone of Russia are presented. A historical background on the course of the scientifi c experiment from the moment the storage facility was discovered in 1973 to the present is given. The technical data and settings of the highly economical two-channel autonomous loggers of TR-5L thermometers used for measuring storage conditions since 2010 are indicated. The results of the studies of temperature and relative air humidity indicators inside the containers with food products placed in permafrost at a depth of 0.5 meters for long-term storage at Cape Depo of the Taimyr Peninsula are presented. Statistical processing and analysis of the temperature and relative air humidity values in the storage facility for the periods of 2010-2016 and 2016-2022 have been carried out. The trend to the general increase in temperature both in summer and in winter months is found. An analysis of the humidity of the storage conditions made it possible to determine that the absolute humidity of the air decreased from 1.5 g/m3 at the time of laying the products to 0.1 g/m3 during the initial cooling process and then had an upward trend, reaching a maximum value of 5 g/m3 in 2022. The reasons for the increase in moisture content, as well as the divergence of the process of increasing the relative humidity of the air in the upper and lower parts to the anti-phase mode, are found. The depth of the new repository was determined based on the results of thermography of the exposed soil. The possibilities for analyzing the storage conditions of products in permafrost on the Taimyr Peninsula in the next observation period of 2022-2027 have been expanded by installing an additional logger. The results of the work performed in the framework of the experiment are summed up. It is proposed to develop the technology of compact long-term storage by designing computerized chests and expand the experiment in terms of increasing the volume of stored products when placed in the mines of underground storage facility in permafrost in the Arctic.