Melting Arctic Ice Creates International Drilling Free For All

Melting ice will open up much of the Arctic to undersea excavation of natural resources.

'The United States, Russia, Canada, Norway, Denmark, and other interested parties are all attempting to claim jurisdiction over the opening Arctic territory... Increasingly lost in the race for Arctic hydrocarbons are the concerns of environmentalists.'

By Bruce Pannier / January 29, 2009

Many see the problem of global warming and the melting polar ice caps as a looming ecological disaster.

Others, however, see it as an opportunity -- a chance to gain access to lucrative energy deposits long hidden under layers of Arctic ice.

NATO officials meeting in Reykjavik -- including Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer and John Craddock, the supreme allied commander in Europe -- say the race for the Arctic poses serious new security threats.

The United States, Russia, Canada, Norway, Denmark, and other interested parties are all attempting to claim jurisdiction over the opening Arctic territory. The Reykjavik meeting aims to discuss the possibility that disputes over shipping routes may turn into military conflicts.

Russia has already spent years jockeying for position.

Moscow asserts that it has the right to control an area equivalent to the size of France. As early as September 2008, President Dmitry Medvedev was calling for clear legislation on his country's activities in the Arctic.

"Our priority task is to turn the Arctic into Russia's resource base of the 21st century," Medvedev said. "In order to fulfill this task, we should first resolve a number of special issues. The main issue is to ensure and firmly defend Russia's national interests in that region."

Race For Undersea Resources

The Arctic has long been seen as a rich but inaccessible resource base. Energy experts estimate there may be as much as 25 percent of the world's oil and gas reserves lying beneath the Arctic seabed.

"The Arctic presents Russia with a range of interests, especially as an energy supplier. Even by preliminary estimates, the Arctic shelf is one of the biggest supplies [of energy resources] of oil and gas," says Dmitry Abzalov, an expert at the Center for Current Politics, a Moscow-based think tank.

Environmentalists worry about the effect of increased resource extraction."Besides that, we're talking about a number of other things. The Arctic is a vital military strategic area for the countries around the North Pole. Without a doubt, the development of this region is connected traditionally to the use of bioresources -- first and foremost the fishing industry," Abzalov tells RFE/RL's Russian Service. "But of course, there's no less interest in its hydrocarbon wealth."

Medvedev's call to adopt a federal law on delineating the southern border of Russia's Arctic zone last autumn drew sharp reactions from other countries with a claim on Arctic territory.

Canada responded by threatening to impose stricter registration requirements for ships sailing in the Northwest Passage, the sea route crossing over the northern coast of North America.

The United States, Norway, and others have argued that any attempt by Russia to draw up its own Arctic borders would have no basis in international law.

Such concerns haven't stopped Russia from demonstrating an aggressive interest in the region. Russian strategic bombers have made a series of test flights across the Arctic toward Canada and the United States; submarine expeditions have been conducted at Moscow's behest to lay claim to gas and oil fields below the ocean floor.

Such moves have only sparked concerns that the race for the Arctic may quickly escalate into a multilateral military confrontation.

Disputed Geography

Maritime law is part of the problem. The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea says any littoral state can lay claim to territory within 200 nautical miles (370 kilometers) of its shoreline, and can develop any natural resources within that zone.

The law, however, also stipulates that that distance can expand to some 350 miles (648 kilometers) if the littoral state can provide scientific proof than an undersea continental plate is a natural extension of its territory.

Russia is now seeking to claim as its territory the Lomonosov Ridge -- an 1,800-kilometer-long section of the continental crust running from the New Siberian Islands to the Canadian Arctic islands.

Moscow says the Lomonosov Ridge is a natural extension of its continental plate, and has launched highly publicized expeditions to obtain the proof necessary to make a case before the United Nations that the territory is Russia's. (Canada and Denmark also claim the ridge is an extension of their territory.)

The UN has asked the Arctic states to submit their territorial claims for review by May 2009. But Abzalov of the Center for Current Politics says he does not believe the issue will create great difficulties between the five Arctic countries.

"Considering the battle for the Arctic started long ago, I wouldn't say that this would lead to any new confrontation," Abzalov says.

Increasingly lost in the race for Arctic hydrocarbons are the concerns of environmentalists. They worry that increased traffic and exploration in the Artic may do irreparable damage to the region's fragile biosphere.

[RFE/RL's Russian Service correspondents Irina Lagunina and Lubov Chizhova contributed to this report.]

Source / Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty

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Rush to Arctic As Warming Opens Oil Deposits

US Coast Guard Cutter Healy will embark on Arctic Voyage this week to determine the extent of the continental shelf in Alaska and to map the ocean floor, data that could be used for oil and natural gas exploration. Photo by Prentice Danner / AP.
'It’s a scramble for the spoils of global warming'
By Zachary Colie / August 12, 2008

It’s a scramble for the spoils of global warming as the rapid melting of Arctic sea ice is opening access to previously unreachable deposits of oil and gas, setting off a race by northern nations - including the United States, Canada and Russia - to claim them.

The pursuit of those resources will be underscored this week as the U.S. Coast Guard cutter Healy sails north from Barrow, Alaska, on Thursday to map the sea floor of the Chukchi Cap, an area at the northern edge of the Beaufort Sea. The maps could bolster U.S. claims to the area as part of its extended outer continental shelf.

The U.S. Geological Survey confirmed last month what the oil industry had long suspected when the agency released an estimate that the area north of the Arctic Circle may hold as much as 90 billion barrels of oil and 1,669 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, or roughly 13 percent of the world’s total undiscovered oil and 30 percent of the undiscovered natural gas.

The dash to stake out territory across the Arctic has accelerated since Russia sent one of its submarines last August to plant the country’s flag on the sea floor beneath the North Pole, provoking an outcry by other nations that viewed it as an unauthorized land grab.

Earlier this month, Canadian officials at a geology conference in Norway detailed their territorial claims to the Lomonosov Ridge, an underseas mountain range that runs beneath the North Pole. Canada argues that the ridge is part of the North American continent, not part of Siberia, as Russia has asserted.

Denmark backs Canada

The Danish government joined in backing Canada’s argument, even though those two nations have also clashed over claims in the Arctic. Why? Because Denmark, which controls Greenland, believes Canada’s assertion could boost its own contention that part of the energy-rich ridge should be Danish territory.

These northern powers are all rushing to complete assessments of how far their underseas territory may extend. Under international law, countries control all natural resources within the “exclusive economic zone,” which extends 200 nautical miles offshore. But if a country’s continental shelf extends far into the ocean, the nation can claim underseas land up to 350 miles offshore under the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea.

The United States has signed the Law of the Sea Treaty, but the Senate has not ratified it. Margaret Hayes, who directs the State Department’s Office of Oceanic Affairs, said on a conference call Monday that while the United States moves toward ratifying the treaty, it must gather all the scientific data it will need to justify its territorial claims.

During the Healy’s three-week voyage, scientists from National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and University of New Hampshire will use a device called an echo sounder to create a three-dimensional map of the sea floor. The Healy will make a second voyage, from Sept. 6 to Oct. 1, carving a path through the ice, while a Canadian ship, the Louis S. St. Laurent, follows, gathering seismic data about the thickness of the sediments along the sea floor.

While it’s a scientific mission, USGS scientist Deborah Hutchison acknowledged that oil companies will be eager to see the results, which could yield major clues about the size and location of oil and gas deposits.

“The cruises are not intended to look for energy resources. … That is not a primary or even a secondary objective,” Hutchison said. “However, it’s inevitable because there are so few data in this area (of the Arctic), there will be great interest in using this data” to assess the potential for drilling.

Alaska favors drilling

Alaskan officials, who rely on oil revenue and face declining oil fields along the North Slope, see more Arctic drilling as a way to keep the state’s oil economy afloat. While the Atlantic and Pacific coasts have been off-limits to drilling under a federal ban for nearly three decades, the Interior Department is already leasing areas of the Beaufort Sea and Chukchi Sea.

Environmentalists warn of the perils of oil exploration in the region. Critics say that conditions in the Arctic - shortage of natural light in winter, extreme cold, moving ice floes and high winds - make it extremely difficult to respond to an oil spill.

“Ultimately what is going to be needed is a more comprehensive ecological study of that region and some indication as to whether or not any technology that we have today is likely to be able to clean up spilled oil in that set of conditions,” said Richard Charter, a coastal advocate for Defenders of Wildlife Action Fund.

The voyage of the Healy this week is being made possible by the swift melting of the sea ice. Last year, Arctic sea ice retreated at a record-setting pace.

Northwest Passage open

The Inupiat residents of Barrow were stunned last fall when a cruise ship and 400 Germans showed up in their town. They had arrived from Europe via the Northwest Passage over Canada, which for the first time in recorded history was ice-free.

Larry Mayer, an oceanographer at the University of New Hampshire who helped lead a similar Arctic trip last summer, said he was shocked at how easily the team could navigate through the region. He noted the irony that the rapid melting “was bad for the Arctic, but very, very good for mapping.”

© 2008 The San Francisco Chronicle

Source / SF Gate

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Giant Chunks Break Off Canadian Ice Shelf

This satellite image shows a large, rectangular chunk of ice at center that broke away from the Ward Hunt Ice Shelf. Other pieces also broke away from the shelf. Photo from NASA.
Cracks had been earlier found on Ward Hunt; 'more could go' this summer
July 29, 2008

OTTAWA - Giant sheets of ice totaling almost eight square miles broke off an ice shelf in the Canadian Arctic last week and more could follow later this year, scientists said on Tuesday.

In a development consistent with climate change theories, the enormous icy plain broke free sometime last week and began slowly drifting into the Arctic Ocean. The piece had been a part of the shelf for 3,000 years.

Temperatures in large parts of the Arctic have risen far faster than the global average in recent decades.

The ice broke away from the shelf on Ward Hunt Island, a small island just off giant Ellesmere Island in one of the northernmost parts of Canada.

It was the largest fracture of its kind since the nearby Ayles Ice Shelf — which measured 25 square miles — broke away in 2005.

Scientists had earlier identified deep cracks in the Ward Hunt Ice Shelf, which measures around 155 square miles. The shelf is one of five along Ellesmere Island in the northern Arctic.

"Because the breakoff occurred between two large parallel cracks they're thinking more could go this summer before the freeze sets in," said Trudy Wohlleben of the Canadian Ice Service. "More could be a piece as large as the Ayles Ice Shelf."

Ellesmere Island was once home to a single enormous ice shelf totaling around 3,500 square miles. All that is left of that shelf today are five much smaller shelves that together cover just under 400 square miles.

Melting ice shelves don't raise sea levels because they are already in the water, but their demise can speed up retreating glaciers, which do raise sea levels.

Sea ice, glaciers also shrinking

"The breakoff is consistent with other changes we've seen in the area, such as the reduction in the amount of sea ice, the retreat of the glaciers and the breakup of other ice shelves," Wohlleben said.

She said a likely reason for the shelf breaking away was a strong wind from the south.

Warwick Vincent, director of the Centre for Northern Studies at Laval University in Quebec, said much of the remaining Ward Hunt Ice Shelf is now in a vulnerable state.

"It underscores the fact that each year we're now crossing new thresholds in environmental change in the High Arctic, and of course our concern in the longer term is that these may signal the onset of serious change at all latitudes, much further to the south, for example," he told Reuters.

Derek Mueller, an Arctic ice shelf specialist at Trent University in Ontario, said he was concerned by the rapidity of changes in the High Arctic over the last few years.

"It's a bit of a wake-up call for those people who aren't yet affected by climate change that there are places on Earth that are, and the same could be true for them (these people) if you fast-forward a decade or two or three," he said.

'No longer ... in balance'

Mueller initially estimated that 1.5 square miles of ice had broken off the shelf but increased that figure to eight square miles after studying the data more closely.

"Whatever has kept this ice shelf in balance for 3,000 years is no longer keeping it in balance," he told Reuters, saying he too would not be surprised to see more ice breaking away from the Ward Hunt shelf this year.

Wohlleben said the ice shelves, which contained unique ecosystems that had yet to be studied, would not be replaced because they took so long to form.

"Once they've broken off they're gone," she said.

Mueller was careful not to blame the Ward Hunt breakup specifically on climate change, but said it is consistent with the theory. The current Arctic climate certainly isn't reinforcing ice shelves.

"We're in a different climate now," he said. "It's not conducive to regrowing them. It's a one-way process."

A crack in the shelf was first spotted in 2002. Last April, a patrol of Canadian Rangers found the weakness had spread into an extensive network of cracks, some 40 yards wide and 11 miles long. The crack-riddled section of ice was like a jigsaw puzzle, with the pieces held in place only by each other.

Formed by accumulating snow and freezing meltwater, ice shelves are large platforms of thick, ancient sea ice that float on the ocean's surface. Ellesmere Island was once entirely ringed by a single enormous ice shelf that broke up in the early 1900s.

At 170 square miles in size and 40 yards thick, the Ward Hunt shelf is the largest of those remnants — even bigger than the Antarctic shelf that collapsed earlier this year and seven times the size of the Ayles Ice Shelf chunk that broke off in 2005 from Ellesmere's western coast.

Despite a period of stability in the 1980s, the Ward Hunt shelf and its characteristic corrugated surface has been steadily declining since the 1930s, said Mueller. Its southern edge has lost seven square miles over the last six years.

Icebreaker searching for sea ice

It's the same all over the Arctic, said Gary Stern, co-leader of a major international research program on sea ice.

Speaking from the Coast Guard icebreaker Amundsen in Canada's north, Stern said the Ward Hunt breakup is related to what he's seeing thousands of miles away.

He hasn't seen any ice in weeks. Plans to set up an ice camp last February had to be abandoned when usually dependable ice didn't form for the second year in a row.

"Nobody on the ship is surprised anymore," said Stern. "We've been trying to get the word out for the longest time now that things are happening fast and they're going to continue to happen fast."

Many scientists now believe that the Arctic will have ice-free summers by 2013 instead of 2030 as predicted by the International Panel on Climate Change.

"It's all connected to the warming climate. Everything is connected together," Stern said.

Source / MSNBC

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