CLIMATE CHANGE AND FUTURE SCENARIOS IN THE ARCTIC REGION

ROUND TABLE (Venice, 11-12th December 2014)

Roberta Burns

Resources Exploitation and Eco-Sustainability of the Arctic Region

Arctic Council

In 1996, the eight Arctic nations determined that an intergovernmental forum of cooperation – in close collaboration with representatives of the Arctic indigenous peoples – would be to the benefit of all and thus came together to form the Arctic Council. The Arctic Council is continuing to grow in importance as the world becomes more sensitized to the role the Arctic plays in global climate, weather, and ocean systems. Italy, as an accredited observer, plays a valuable role through the contribution of scientific expertise and public support to Council priorities. Through the work of Italian researchers in the Arctic Council’s six working groups and the resources available to the scientific community through the National Research Council of Italy’s Dirigibile Italia Station in Svalbard, Italy is demonstrating its commitment to promote sustainable development and environmental protection of this strategic space.

Last week, in Yellowknife Canada, the U.S. unveiled our proposed program for the upcoming Chairmanship of the Arctic Council. Before I launch into the details of our proposal, I should emphasize that this plan will evolve over the coming months. The Arctic Council is a consensus-based forum and thus we will be consulting closely with our partners on the Council to solicit their feedback on our initiatives. I also want to emphasize the important and valuable work that is currently being done by the Council under the Canadian Chairmanship, especially in terms of advancing economic development for the people of the Arctic Region.

Turning to our proposed plan, the U.S. Chairmanship brand will be “One Arctic: Shared Opportunities, Challenges and Responsibilities.” We chose this brand because we believe it is a message that must carry beyond any particular two-year chairmanship, and should be the general view of the Arctic beyond the scope and authorities of the Arctic Council.

Our proposed plan is organized around thematic pillars:

 Arctic Ocean Safety, Security and Stewardship  Improving Economic and Living Conditions  Addressing the Impacts of Climate Change

Allow me to briefly run through each of the three pillars. Arctic Ocean Safety, Security and Stewardship

The first thematic pillar of our proposed chairmanship program is promoting stewardship of the Arctic Ocean. To that end, we propose examining the development of a pan-Arctic network of Marine Protected Areas, while recognizing that the conservation of marine areas needs to go hand in hand with subsistence activities of indigenous communities. As much of the Arctic Ocean remains relatively pristine and under-studied, as compared to the other marine areas of the world, an Arctic Regional Seas Program could serve as a mechanism to coordinate research efforts, promote safe and security maritime operations, and bring together the growing body of international law and soft law applicable to the Arctic Ocean.

We also propose to build upon the Council’s oil spill preparedness and response work by increasing the sharing of information on the effects of spills and the availability and effectiveness of clean-up technologies. As human activity continues to increase in the Arctic Ocean, so does the need to improve Search and Rescue capabilities. As such, we hope to organize and conduct a tabletop Search and Rescue exercise, followed possibly by a live exercise in the Beaufort Sea involving the Arctic States and possibly others. These exercises would follow on past exercises to enable the sharing of best practices and to focus on improving our capabilities in this harsh environment.

Finally, under our Ocean Stewardship pillar, we propose to raise public awareness of Arctic Ocean acidification throughout the world. The Council released the first-ever Arctic Ocean Acidification Assessment in 2013 and among its recommendations was to continue and enhance acidification monitoring so that people understand the connection between acidification and climate change, the effect of acidification on marine ecosystems and local economies, especially shell fisheries, and what steps the average person can take to combat acidification by limiting their carbon footprint.

Improving Economic and Living Conditions

Moving on to our second pillar entitled improving economic and living conditions in the Arctic, we hope to carry on Canada’s Arctic Council chairmanship priority of putting people first by prioritizing “development for the people of the North.” Many small, isolated Arctic communities rely on old, dirty diesel engines to generate electricity. We hope that the U.S.’s “Remote Communities Renewable Energy” partnership will pave the way for providing remote villages with access to reliable, cost efficient, and cleaner options for electrifying their communities.

The high cost of local water treatment and sewage disposal services and the reliability of freshwater sources also pose tremendous challenges for Arctic communities. As such, we are proposing a project on Community Sanitation and Public Health, which would concentrate on developing more efficient and economically viable ways of delivering clean water and sewage disposal services to remote areas. We also propose to focus on freshwater security by expanding resources to assist communities with understanding the status of their freshwater resources. We plan to continue Canada’s emphasis on mental health and resilience in Arctic communities, particularly the work currently underway on suicide prevention. Developing common metrics and reporting systems that public health providers can use to evaluate systematic approaches to suicide prevention is especially important in the Arctic where vast geography and remote communities pose significant challenges.

Finally, we want to turn our attention to the current poor state of telecommunications infrastructure throughout the Arctic. The status quo is unsustainable as human activity in the region continues to increase. We propose to form an Expert Group of government representatives, industry specialists, and other interested parties to assess the Arctic’s current telecommunications infrastructure and develop recommendations on what needs to be done to build out a robust infrastructure throughout the region.

Climate Change

Finally, we come to our third thematic pillar, addressing the impacts of climate change. We propose that the Arctic States each develop domestic inventories of black carbon and methane sources and mechanisms for tracking progress in reducing emissions, with an initial focus on gas flaring.

We also want to focus on how climate change impacts Arctic inhabitants and ecosystems by developing easily understandable reports and fact sheets, targeted at laypeople, on high-priority climate risks and vulnerabilities in the region. We would like to see the development of resources that policymakers can use to incorporate climate adaptation and resiliency into the domestic policies of the Arctic states.

Moving on to Arctic Climate Science, we propose the development of a pan-Arctic digital elevation map. Improving the poor quality of topographic information available for the Arctic will enhance environmentally sound natural resource development, support search and rescue operations, support good land management and enhance scientific research. The continued development of an Arctic Indicators Network and a corresponding Early Warning Indicator System for the Arctic will allow for a more comprehensive understanding of non-linear changes in the climate system as well as potential tipping points and thresholds.