The Changing Arctic

Global warming has had a dramatic impact on the Arctic environment, including the ice melt that has opened previously ice-covered waterways. State and non-state actors who look to the region and its resources with varied agendas have started to pay attention. Do new geopolitical dynamics point to a competitive and inherently conflictual “race for resources”? Or will the Arctic become a region governed by mutual benefit, international law, and the achievement of a widening array of cooperative arrangements among interested states and Indigenous peoples? As an Arctic nation Canada is not immune to the consequences of these transformations. In Canada and the Changing Arctic: Sovereignty, Security, and Stewardship, the authors, all leading commentators on Arctic affairs, grapple with fundamental questions about how Canada should craft a responsible and effective Northern strategy. They outline diverse paths to achieving sovereignty, security, and stewardship in Canada’s Arctic and in the broader circumpolar world. The changing Arctic region presents Canadians with daunting challenges and tremendous opportunities. This book will inspire continued debate on what Canada must do to protect its interests, project its values, and play a leadership role in the twenty-first-century Arctic. Forewords by Senator Hugh Segal and former Minister of Foreign Affairs and of National Defence Bill Graham.

This volume brings together multiple perspectives on both the changing Arctic environment and the challenges and opportunities it presents for the shipping sector. It argues for the adoption of a forward-looking agenda that respects the fragile and changing Arctic frontier. With the accelerated interest in and potential for new maritime trade routes, commercial transportation and natural resource development, the pressures on the changing Arctic marine environment will only increase. The International Maritime Organization Polar Code is an important step toward Arctic stewardship. This new volume serves as an important guide to this rapidly developing agenda. Addressing a range of aspects, it offers a valuable resource for academics, practitioners, environmentalists and affected authorities in the shipping industry alike.

Rather than a single national perspective, The Fast-Changing Arctic brings together circumpolar viewpoints from North America, Europe and Asia for an integrated discussion of strategic military, diplomatic, and security challenges in the high North. Thoughtful analyses are included of different regions, climate issues, institutions, and foreign and security policies."--Pub. desc.

In one hundred years, or even fifty, the Arctic will look dramatically different than it does today. As polar ice retreats and animals and plants migrate northward, the arctic landscape is morphing into something new and very different from what it once was. While these changes may seem remote, they will have a profound impact on a host of global issues, from international politics to animal migrations. In Future Arctic, journalist and explorer Edward Struzik offers a clear-eyed look at the rapidly shifting dynamics in the Arctic region, a harbinger of changes that will reverberate throughout our entire world. Future Arctic reveals the inside story of how politics and climate change are altering the polar world in a way that will have profound effects on economics, culture, and the environment as we know it. Struzik takes readers up mountains and cliffs, and along for the ride on snowmobiles and helicopters, sailboats and icebreakers. His travel companions, from wildlife scientists to military strategists to indigenous peoples, share diverse insights into the science, culture and geopolitical tensions of this captivating place. With their help, Struzik begins piecing together an environmental puzzle: How might the land’s most iconic species—caribou, polar bears, narwhal—survive? Where will migrating birds flock to? How will ocean currents shift? And what fundamental changes will oil and gas exploration have on economies and ecosystems? How will vast unclaimed regions of the Arctic be divided? A unique combination of extensive on-the-ground research, compelling storytelling, and policy analysis, Future Arctic offers a new look at the changes occurring in this remote, mysterious region and their far-reaching effects.

The Arctic is the most northern part of our Earth. It is a huge area that spans over several countries including; Canada, Denmark (Greenland), Finland, Iceland, Norway, Sweden, Russia, and the USA. However, the largest part of the Arctic is not on land but is covered by water – the Arctic Ocean. For hundreds of thousands of years, large parts of the Arctic Ocean were covered by ice all year around. Many animals, such as polar bears, Arctic foxes, seals, fish and birds, and even some people have made this icy place their home. They have learned to live with the ice, and some animals even need it to live. But recently, things in the Arctic have been changing. You have probably already heard a lot about Climate Change. Climate Change impacts the long-term weather (climate) everywhere on our planet. Many areas get warmer, some get colder, and everywhere we see more extreme or unusual weather, such as storms, floods or droughts. But nowhere is Climate Change happening as fast as in the Arctic. You might have also heard about the “2°C goal”. This is a goal that many governments around the world have agreed to. The plan is essentially to make sure the average global warming of our atmosphere stays at less than 2°C compared to what people like to call “pre-industrial time” (the year 1948 is used as a reference). Right now, most of the world is at around 0.8°C warming. In the Arctic, we are already at 2.3°C warming – that is 0.3°C above what should be the absolute maximum according to the “2°C goal”. Now you probably ask why it is so bad that the Arctic is getting a bit warmer. That should make it a nicer place to live, right? Unfortunately, the warm temperature means that the ice that has covered the Arctic Ocean for all this time is melting. It looks like that will change the Arctic Ocean forever and with it the animals and people that call the Arctic their home. In this collection, we want to tell you what we, as scientists, know about the changes in the Arctic; how we investigate these changes and what we have learned from our travels to the Arctic and the analyses we do in our research institutes. We will tell you about how the higher temperatures in the Arctic change the ice. How very tiny animals can have a huge impact. We want to introduce you to life in the ice, under the ice, and at the seafloor. We will talk about processes that make the Arctic Ocean so special and chemicals that can travel from our homes and cities all the way to the Arctic.

The changing Arctic is of broad political concern and is being studied across many fields. This book investigates ongoing changes in the Arctic from a landscape perspective. It examines settlements and territories of the Barents Sea Coast, Northern Norway, the Russian Kola Peninsula, Svalbard and Greenland from an interdisciplinary, design-based and future-oriented perspective. The Future North project has travelled Arctic regions since 2012, mapped landscapes and settlements, documented stories and practices, and discussed possible futures with local actors. Reflecting the multidisciplinary nature of the project, the authors in this book look at political and economic strategies, urban development, land use strategies and local initiatives in specific locations that are subject to different forces of change. This book explores current material conditions in the Arctic as effects of industrial and political agency and social initiatives. It provides a combined view on the built environment and urbanism, as well as the cultural and material landscapes of the Arctic. The chapters move beyond single-disciplinary perspectives on the Arctic, and engage with futures, cultural landscapes and communities in ways that build on both architectural and ethnographic participatory methods.

Climate change in the Arctic Ocean has stirred a remarkable surge of interest and concern. Study after study has revealed the astonishing speed of physical, chemical, ecological, and economic change throughout the expanse of the Arctic. What is more, the consequences of the changing Arctic are not restricted to the Arctic itself, but affect everyone in the Northern Hemisphere, ranging as they do from extreme weather to resource availability and food security, with implications for politics, economics, and sociology. The challenge is to comprehend the full extent and variety of these consequences, and meeting this challenge will demand a multi- and transdisciplinary understanding. Only by this means can we hope to map out a knowledge-based ecosystem and move toward knowledge-based resource management—the essential precondition for any sustainable future. In this book, leading international experts, from many felds of science and across the entire pan-Arctic region, give their specifc takes on where the Arctic Ocean is heading. All have taken care in their writing not to exclude non-experts, in the conviction that multi- and transdisciplinarity can only be achieved when communication and outreach are not tribal in nature. The recurrent guiding theme throughout these pages is “Whith -er the Arctic Ocean?” Taken in concert, the essays synthesize the current state of scientifc knowledge to project how climate change may impact on the Arctic Ocean and the continents around it. How can and how should we prepare for the imminent future that is already lapping at the threshold of the commons? What readers will hopefully take from this multi- and transdisciplinary endeavor is not the individual perspective of each contribution, but the picture that emerges across the entire suite of essays. As we move into a near future that will encompass both the probable and surprises, this book attempts to conjure the multi-dimensional space in which a sustainable future must be brought into being.

The Arctic, in the polar region, the northernmost part of Earth, is the hotspot for climate change assessments and the sensitive barometer of global climate variability. This book includes the scientific observations in the Arctic region’s climate and the results obtained by scientists at the Indian Arctic station Himadri over the past decade. Designed and structured to incorporate multi-dimensional climate change research output, it is a significant contribution toward understanding, among other issues, the role of persistent organic pollutants and mercury, as well as the increase of carbon monoxide during ozone reduction in the Arctic. Features include: Highlights the achievements of climate change research in the Arctic region Includes case studies of scientists in the Arctic and their significant achievements through the Indian research base Himadri Provides a thorough review of palaeoclimate change studies, the impact of climate change on biotic components and the impact of climate change on abiotic components Provides specific details on the study of ozone depletion phenomenon over the Arctic region Covers a wide range of research contributions Details sea ice variability in the context of global warming over the Arctic region Connects seismogenesis with the climate change in the Arctic region This book will be an important read for researchers, students and all interested professionals.