ИСТИНА

Experimental measurements in Apatity town in Kola peninsula in Russia (which is 5th biggest town, located to the north from the Arctic circle, with population about 56000) during winter seasons in 2014-2015 years has shown existence of the strong temperature anomaly around the town: temperature difference between town and weather station, located in few kilometers from it, reached values up to 10°C (Konstantinov et al., 2015) with mean value about 2 °C. However, understanding the nature of such anomaly is quite complicated. On the one hand, it could be caused by urban heat island effect, which is well-studied for the cities in moderate and tropical climate zones, but poorly investigated for high latitudes. On the other hand, possible contribution of the topography should also be taken into consideration, because town is located at the top of the hill, and weather station - at lower point near basement of this hill, where cold air could accumulated under conditions of the stable stratification. In our study contribution of these two factors was analyzed with application of newest experimental measurements, remote sensing data and numerical experiments with regional climate model COSMO-CLM, extended by specific urban parametrization. Finally, three independent approaches show approximately equal contribution of relief and anthropogenic effect to the genesis of observed anomaly. Accordingly, mean intensity of urban heat island effect, created by the town itself during the winter season, coul