Arctic 2030: What are the consequences of climate change?

Abstract

Although scientists disagree about the rate at which Arctic ice is melting, climate change will greatly alter the northern latitudes in coming decades if greenhouse gas emissions are not curtailed. Many of the expected changes will be negative; already, permafrost is melting in Siberia, and apartments and factories are sinking into quagmires. The melting of Arctic ice, however, will also open sea-lanes to shipping and allow access to enormous oil and gas reserves beneath the Arctic Ocean. The prospect of increased Arctic commerce brings with it competition among countries and companies for control of the area’s riches, and international competition always carries the possibility of conflict. Three authors, all experts in national security and the Arctic, explore the military, diplomatic, environmental, and economic outlook for the Arctic in 2030: from Russia, Yury Morozov; from Canada, Rob Huebert (2012); and from the United States, George Backus (2012).

Warming caused by climatic factors and by the impact of humans on atmospheric processes from the late 1970s until early 2012 has reduced the area covered by permanent ice in the Arctic by almost half—from over 3 million to 1.6 million square miles—and the average annual temperature in the Arctic has increased by 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit, or 2 degrees Celsius. As it continues, this warming may create a fundamentally new situation in the Arctic and Russia’s far north over the next few decades. And what happens in the Arctic will have global implications.

On the negative side of the ledger, the melting of Arctic ice will cause the salinity of the Arctic Ocean to drop, possibly disrupting the “conveyor belt” of ocean currents that move water from equatorial regions to the Arctic and back. If the currents slow, northern Europe will grow colder, and the monsoon rains that are the main water source for much of South Asia may fail. Rising sea levels, melting permafrost, extended droughts, and more intense storm activity can all be expected, unless global carbon emissions are quickly controlled.

At the same time, as the northern ice melts, it is likely to become easier in the near future to engage in shipping and other commercial activities in the Arctic, which holds huge natural gas and oil reserves.

Russia plans to use its proximity to the Northern Sea Route and the Arctic’s undersea riches to make the area a strategic resource base. Because commercial and military competition involving other Arctic nations might hamper those plans, Russia is stressing international cooperation in its Arctic approach, supporting joint action against environmental challenges, national boundaries that are set according to the Law of the Sea, and management of air and sea traffic in the area according to international law and by agreement of the Arctic states.

Conflicting ice forecasts

Some international experts believe the Arctic Ocean could become ice free as early as 2019. Russian scientists from the Institute of the Arctic and Antarctica disagree with those forecasts. They believe the Russian sector of the Arctic will be completely open to navigation during the summer season (April to September) by the early 2030s, but the Canadian and US sectors will not be ice free until the early 2070s.

Despite contradictory forecasts, most scientists agree that it will become easier in the near future to engage in economic activities in the northern latitudes. That will make shipping via the Northern Sea Route more attractive—and an ace in the hole for Russia, as merchant and passenger ships will be able to traverse the most difficult section of the Northern Sea Route only in convoy with Russian nuclear icebreakers. The future is not entirely clear, but preparations for heavy traffic in the Arctic are already underway.

Above the Arctic Circle lie 30 percent of the Earth’s undeveloped natural gas reserves and 13 percent of its oil (Stankevich, 2012), and the melting Arctic ice is opening new vistas for oil and gas companies. Among other things, as the ice melts, those companies will no longer have to factor the costs of building an icebreaker fleet and expensive tankers capable of working in icy conditions into their operations.

In addition to the five Arctic littoral states—the United States, Canada, Denmark, Norway, and Russia—more than 20 countries are claiming access to this wealth. For example, China has conducted several expeditions in the Arctic in recent years, built a research base on Spitsbergen in Norway (with Norway’s assent), and converted a former Ukrainian ship into an icebreaker. It is also building a second icebreaker, thinking about developing an aircraft for landing at the pole, and considering drilling a deep well in the ice on a Russian island.

But as the north opens to commerce, the negative consequences of global warming could be severe, both in and far beyond the Arctic. Almost two-thirds of Russia’s coastline is on the Arctic Ocean; in fact, Russia’s Arctic shore makes up one-third of the world’s entire coastline. The coasts of the Laptev and East Siberian seas have been most affected by warming. Currently, up to 40 percent of the infrastructure of Russian cities and towns built on permafrost is in critical condition because the frozen ground is melting. Apartment buildings and factories are gradually sinking into quagmires. Buildings are collapsing and pipelines are rupturing.

As permafrost melts, underground organic carbon can be released into the atmosphere. According to the latest scientific data, there are more than 1.6 trillion tons of carbon held underground by permafrost—twice what there is in the atmosphere. Permafrost melting could therefore result in 100 billion tons of methane—a greenhouse gas—being released into the air this century.

Emissions of methane currently held underground by permafrost will accelerate global warming; that process has already begun. The concentration of methane in the atmosphere has grown over the past decade as the Arctic (and areas that extend inland in Russia’s Siberian region, Alaska, Canada, Greenland, and Scandinavia) warms at a record pace. Some Siberian lakes have quintupled in size since 2006, and increasing numbers of thermokarst lakes—that is, lakes formed by the meltwater from thawed permafrost—are appearing. These changes suggest that deep permafrost layers may disappear far sooner than initially thought—within 100, rather than 500, years (Ignatov, 2012).

But the effects of climate change are hardly confined to the Arctic. Rising sea levels, melting glaciers, and intense storms could produce social unrest in much of Africa, Asia, and South America, where resource shortfalls will prevent many countries from responding effectively to severe weather. If global temperature change cannot be held to 2 degrees Celsius, climate change will produce serious droughts from Portugal to the eastern border of Kazakhstan, and Africa and India will also suffer. Billions of people could be affected.

A different threat is looming over Bangladesh. Summer droughts coupled, paradoxically, with worsening flooding in coastal areas caused by increasingly severe storms are destroying farmland. Migration associated with climate change is already leading to violent clashes. If greenhouse gas emissions are not slashed, large-scale migration will be a threat within a few decades.

Even Europe is at risk. The Netherlands will suffer from rising sea levels. And as temperatures rise and the land area suitable for development decreases, overpopulation may well lead to violence that authorities in the Balkan states will be unable to curb. ¹

Moscow’s position on the Arctic

As the largest country in the Arctic, Russia has major development plans that are linked to global warming and are aimed at transforming the Arctic into a strategic resource base by 2020. Those plans give rise to a question—which of Russia’s strategic interests in the region are linked to climate change?

Warming temperatures in the Arctic facilitate Russia’s access to the riches of the north and support the use of the Northern Sea Route, which passes close by Russia’s land borders and is the shortest route from Europe to Asia. Via the Northern Sea Route, the distance from St. Petersburg, Russia, to Yokohama, Japan, is 7,456 miles; the distance through the Suez Canal is 12,738 miles. That difference could save ships 13 days of travel time and up to $300,000 per voyage. Therefore, the volume of freight traffic in 2012 could exceed five million tons and eventually increase from there more than tenfold (Borgerson, 2008). Thus, development of the Northern Sea Route could have an impact comparable to that of the Panama and Suez canals.

Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov recently promised that, in 2012, Russia will petition the United Nations to expand the boundaries of its sovereignty on the Arctic shelf. In the near future, a second expedition will be dispatched to the region to acquire scientific justification for Russia’s claims to territories in the vicinity of the Lomonosov and Mendeleyev ridges, which extend into the Arctic beyond the country’s 200-mile exclusive economic zone. If Russia acquires the rights to the Lomonosov Ridge, it would have control of 60 percent of the hydrocarbons detected in the region, thereby overtaking Canada and the United States in the race for the “treasures of the Arctic.”

So climate change will bring the mineral resources of the Arctic within reach and make regular oceangoing traffic between Europe and Asia via the Northern Sea Route more realistic. But international relations associated with climate warming in the Arctic threaten to hamper implementation of Moscow’s plans.

The issue of sovereignty over the Arctic territories was academic so long as the region’s harsh climate prevented the use of modern technology to exploit potential riches. Recently, however, Arctic glaciers and ice cover have been melting twice as rapidly as in other regions, and diplomatic temperatures related to the future of this twenty-first-century Klondike keep on climbing.

Russia, the United States, Canada, and the other Arctic nations are trying to secure for themselves rights to the Arctic seabed, which is estimated to contain billions of tons of oil and natural gas. Also still unresolved are ways to deal with environmental challenges in and militarization of the region. Arctic states, therefore, have adopted measures to protect their interests.

Russia’s president-elect, Vladimir Putin, has accused the West of having designs on Russian energy resources. “Many conflicts, foreign policy actions, and diplomatic moves reek of oil and gas,” he said (Putin, 2011). Russia’s defense minister has promised to add two additional brigades to the military forces stationed in the Arctic. Navy Commander-in-Chief Vladimir Vysotsky fueled passions when he said Russian economic interests are threatened by the navies of NATO, China, Japan, Korea, and such “well-known Arctic nations” as Malaysia and Thailand (VestiPK in Voronezh, 2010). Russia’s Finance Ministry joined in by announcing that, in the near future, Russia will expand its icebreaker fleet, which is already the largest in the world. Funds have already been allocated in 2012 to build three nuclear- and three diesel-powered icebreakers.

Russia’s newest national security strategy also makes it clear that the Kremlin is looking upon the Arctic as an area where military conflicts could occur. That document said, in part: “In a competition for resources, it cannot be ruled out that military force could be used to resolve emerging problems that would destroy the balance of forces near the borders of Russia and her allies” (Russian Federation, 2009).

At the same time, Russia is aware that it will need foreign investment and expertise to develop deposits lying under the seabed. The environmental conditions themselves are harsh; the Russian government sees no need to make the energy exploration situation even more difficult by transforming the Arctic into a zone of confrontation. In the interest of international cooperation, Moscow will maintain mutually advantageous bilateral and multilateral relations with the other Arctic states, based on international agreements to which the Russian Federation is a party (Russian Federation, 2009). The relations of the countries in the polar region should be based on their common interests, and those relations should include an increased ability to counter threats by responding jointly when they arise.

In the Russian view, there are three major tasks to be accomplished by international cooperation in the Arctic:

The boundaries of possessions in the region should be formalized in accordance with the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea.

To maintain peace and stability in the region, environmental and other challenges there should be dealt with jointly by the Arctic countries.

Air traffic across the Arctic and shipping via the Russian Northern Sea Route should be managed under the auspices of international law and by agreement among the Arctic states.

Russia is keenly interested in developing the Arctic economically, in reviving the Northern Sea Route and rebuilding Arctic ports, in investing in the development of Arctic resources, and in continuing research to support sustainable development and preservation of the environment in the north. It is aware of and preparing for the possibility that commercial competition could lead to military conflict in the Arctic, but Russia is doing all that it can to ensure that the Arctic’s future is peaceful, prosperous, and managed cooperatively by the countries with legitimate claims to the region.