The Environmental Risks of Arctic Shipping
COMMENT: Suggestions made here that the Arctic should be managed like the Antarctic, as a protected area, off-limits to development, have fallen on deaf ears. I suppose there are still many people who don't read www.sqwalk.com on a regular basis. Or ever. Alas.
Since Stephen Harper came out swinging to put Canadian gunboats in the Northwest Passage a few years ago we've offered the protective status scenario as a more benign alternative to national claim-staking and wanton resource exploitation.
Instead, oil and gas producers, and national governments, are all viewing a warming Arctic as Mother Nature's invitation to have their way with her. The Arctic Council, which produced this shipping report, appears to exist to figure out how nations and corporations can have their shipping, mining, drilling and territorial cakes while respecting indigenous peoples and the environment.
It's tragic in at least two ways - in what it says about human incapacity to act beyond greed and self-interest, and in the spectre of despoilation of this precious and vulnerable environment.
The Marine Assessment Report is available here (27 mb)
The Arctic Council website is at www.arctic-council.org.
By Stefan Milkowski
New York Times
June 29, 2009
 Whales in the Bering Strait between Alaska and Russia could be disturbed by an expected increase in shipping. |
As the Arctic warms, an expected increase in shipping threatens to introduce invasive species, harm existing marine wildlife and lead to damaging oil spills, according to a recent report from the Arctic Council, an intergovernmental forum of Arctic nations.
Seabirds and polar bear and seal pups are particularly sensitive to oil and can quickly die of hypothermia if it gets into their feathers or fur, according to the report. Whales, as well as walruses and seals, can have a harder time communicating, foraging and avoiding prey in noisy waters.
“Whether it is the release of substances through emissions to air or discharges to water, accidental release of oil or hazardous cargo, disturbances of wildlife through sound, sight, collisions or the introduction of invasive alien species, the Arctic marine environment is especially vulnerable to potential impacts from marine activity,” the report states.
As the climate changes, reductions in sea ice are likely to lengthen the shipping season, putting migrating animals into more frequent contact with ships. Bowhead and beluga whales share a narrow corridor with ships in the Bering Strait between Alaska and Russia and could be disturbed.
There is also greater risk of introducing invasive species through ballast water, cargo, or on ships’ hulls. “Introduction of rodent species to islands harboring nesting seabirds, as evidenced in the Aleutian Islands, can be devastating,” the report states. Shipping between the North Pacific and the North Atlantic is of particular concern, because it could transport species between areas with similar environmental conditions.
The Arctic Marine Shipping Assessment, as the study is called, was put together by Arctic Council nations, including the United States, and serves as a formal policy document, according to Lawson Brigham, a University of Alaska Fairbanks professor and retired Coast Guard captain, who chaired the study and presented it last week in Fairbanks.
It recommends that Arctic nations reduce emissions of greenhouse gases and other air pollutants from ships, work to lower the risk of oil spills, and consider setting aside special areas of the Arctic Ocean for environmental protection, among other things.
Mr. Brigham described an Arctic bustling with activity, where ice-breaking ships with special hulls sail stern-first through heavy ice and a shipping route across the top of the Earth is not out of the question.
“It’s not a question of whether the maritime industry is coming to the Arctic,” he said. It has, he added, already come.
Posted by Arthur Caldicott on 30 Jun 2009