THE top of the world is melting. Since 1979, when satellites began recording the extent of Arctic sea ice, the ice cap’s annual minimum size has shrunk by some 900,000 square kilometres, an area roughly twice the size of Sweden. As this environmental catastrophe unfolds, governments, companies and individuals are racing to secure the riches that are being exposed by the retreating ice. And there is more there than oil and minerals. Archaeological treasures, rich stocks of fish and lucrative trade routes are being uncovered, as is very curious geology. In the following pages, we map what’s up for grabs.
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1. Earth’s first cryovolcano
Yamal Peninsula, Russia
The sudden appearance of huge craters pockmarking the remote Siberian permafrost in 2014 caused quite a stir. Some speculated that global warming was triggering the explosive release of buried methane hydrates. Others suggested meteorite impacts were to blame. But the real answer may be stranger. Andrey Bychkov and his colleagues at Lomonosov Moscow State University believe the craters are the remnants of cryovolcanoes, a geological feature we have previously only glimpsed on alien worlds such as Titan and Ceres.
Rather than molten rock, cryovolcanoes spew a mix of icy water and gas into the air. Bychkov suggests they are seeded when a lake above the permafrost freezes. This leaves a reservoir of waterlogged soil surrounded on all sides by ice, known as a talik. As the water in the soil gradually freezes, it expands. The resulting pressure forces out dissolved carbon dioxide, which pushes the earth above into a mound of soil-covered ice called a pingo. Eventually, the pressure of this gas overcomes the weight of the pingo and the ice volcano erupts, leaving a crater. It is like what happens when you leave a bottle of wine in the freezer for too long.
Although pingos have collapsed before, no one has attributed it to cryovolcanism. But Bychkov and his colleagues say that is the for one of the huge craters that appeared in 2014. This particular one is 25 metres across and has sheer sides that suggest its cryovolcanic origins. The team reckons global warming might boost the freeze-thaw cycle in soil beneath the permaforst and thus the incidence of cryovolcanism. If true, this could increase the opportunity to study Siberia’s ice volcanoes, improving our understanding of similar processes on distant planets and moons.
2. Mammoth hunting
Kolyma river, Russia
Every summer, prospectors migrate to north-east Russia looking for mammoth tusks. Using high pressure hoses to burrow blindly into the banks of the Kolyma, they search for the bones of ancient megafauna that lie preserved under the frozen soil. Sold as ivory, a single tusk can be worth what these people would earn in five years in a legitimate business. The skulls of prehistoric rhinoceroses are also a choice find. They end up in the hands of practitioners of traditional Asian medicine, ground up to form a supposed aphrodisiac.
Early this year, geneticists at Edinburgh Zoo, UK, revealed they had detected the presence of mammoth DNA in ivory trinkets purchased at markets in Cambodia. It is impossible to say whether this secondary source of ivory will relieve pressure on elephants, or fuel the market further.
Most of the mammoth hunters, however, will leave empty-handed, hoping to return the following summer to try again. In their wake, they leave a trail of destruction in one of Earth’s most pristine wildernesses. Their days may be numbered, though: Russia hopes to clamp down on illegal activities like this through an increased military presence in the high north (see “Snow patrol”).
3. The world’s mostnortherly mine
Svalbard, Norway
Against the dazzling white mountains of the island of Spitsbergen, piles of black coal sit waiting for transport by sea. Gruve 7 is the last operating mine on the Svalbard archipelago, providing fuel for nearby communities. Spitsbergen has been home to coal mines since the early 1900s, but only a small part of this industry remains.
Looking more widely, though, the Arctic boasts rich mineral deposits on land and under sea. Mining operations to recover palladium, nickel, phosphate, the aluminium ore bauxite and rare earth elements are planned or in progress in Russia and Greenland. Some 90 per cent of Russia’s nickel and cobalt deposits, 60 per cent of its copper and 96 per cent of its platinum all lie within the Arctic Circle. China, meanwhile, has interests in zinc and rare earth elements in Greenland, where 100 mines have now been proposed.
With the closure of their own mines, Swedish companies are hoping for a boom in the sale of extreme weather equipment such as drills, vehicles and habitation to other nations. It is expensive work and few Arctic mining operations will be profitable. There are easier places to procure these metals, says Reinhard Hüttl, head of the GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences.
So why all the interest? China has plenty of minerals within its borders and mining in freezing conditions is tough. The reason probably comes down to geopolitics. China is less interested in what is below the ground in Greenland than in the tactical advantages derived from increased access to the area (see “Shipping shortcut”).
“China is interested in resources, but also to position itself in the Arctic when the opportunity opens up,” says Katarzyna Zysk, director of research at the Norwegian Institute for Defence Studies. “It has been very active in the past two years, conducting bilateral negotiations with the Arctic nations.”
4. Shipping shortcut
The North-West Passage
Explorers have been searching for a safe sea route across the top of the world for centuries. They dreamed of the North-West Passage, which would allow ships to sail from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific without having to circumnavigate Africa or the Americas. Nowadays, such a shortcut would also allow ships to avoid the high fees for using the Suez and Panama canals, and steer clear of pirate-infested waters off Somalia and around South-East Asia. It would be especially welcome given that the shipping industry, which carries some 80 per cent of international trade, has encountered some rough financial seas of late.
The dream is now a reality. In 2013, the Nordic Orion became the first large cargo ship to sail through an ice-free North-West Passage, delivering coal from Canada to Finland. Several other polar routes are open too, including the North-East Passage. And while the UK, US and European Union insist they are international straits, Canada, Denmark and Russia all claim that they pass through their territorial waters, meaning they can tax or control the flow of shipping.
Political wrangles aren’t the only danger. The Arctic seas are remote and treacherous. This forces ships to travel slowly to avoid striking icebergs, eating into potential profits. Still, Russia is building infrastructure to support greater shipping in the Arctic, including ports, relief vessels and a fleet of icebreakers to keep lanes open.
It isn’t just sea routes that are being contested. The North Pole itself may be up for grabs. There are proposals to allow Arctic nations to expand their territorial claims based on the reach of their undersea continental shelf. “One potential problem is the shelf may extend under the North Pole,” says Zysk. “Denmark and Russia claim it, and Canada is likely to as well.” Zysk says diplomats are hard at work on a mutually acceptable decision.
5. Snow patrol
Franz Josef land, Russia
The most imposing part of Russia’s Arctic infrastructure can be found on Franz Josef Land, a bleak archipelago in the Arctic Ocean. On one island, Alexandra Land, a huge military base is taking shape. Once complete, the sprawling Arctic Trefoil facility will house 150 military personnel on 18 month rotations. It will be supported by an existing base on Kotelny Island far to the east, as well as the nearby Nagurskoye airstrip. Four more bases are planned across the Arctic, underscoring the strategic importance Russia attributes to the area. “Russia has been expanding military infrastructure, rebuilding what was abandoned in the 1990s after the collapse of the USSR,” says Zysk. “It expects the region will see increased human presence in the future, so now is the time to strengthen their position.”
As well as fending off hungry polar bears, troops will have to cope with extreme isolation, months of darkness and temperatures that regularly drop to -40°C. On the bright side, the Arctic Trefoil will have a cinema, chapel, library and gym where soldiers can while away the long winter nights.
“Apart from the odd polar bear, troops will have to cope with months of darkness”
Other nations are ramping up their Arctic military activities too. The US is designing a new class of icebreaker ship for the coastguard and increasing cold-weather training for troops. Yet it would be a mistake to read this as inevitably the first signs of a new cold war. As the Arctic opens up to industrial activity, the military will have more to do to police and monitor the area. Still, in the febrile political climate, shows of military strength are another factor that feeds unhelpfully into geopolitical turbulence.
6. Frozen fish
Arctic Ocean
Not since the cod wars of 40 years ago, when Iceland and the UK clashed over fishing rights in the north Atlantic, have fish been at the centre of so much diplomacy. As the oceans warm, cold water fish such as cod and halibut are migrating north, drawing fishing boats with them. So who has the right to fish in the “doughnut hole”, an area of soon-to-be-accessible sea around the North Pole ringed by the territorial waters of the Arctic nations (see map).
There were fears of a serious dispute, but in 2018, those countries, plus the EU, China and Japan, agreed to set aside a 2.8-million-square-kilometre reserve to protect stocks. The moratorium will be in place for at least 16 years while research takes place into the sustainability of the fish stocks. For the moment though, the protected area falls mostly within the existing ice cap, meaning there is plenty of open ocean still available to fish.
There is a history of similar sharing agreements in the polar regions, such as the 1959 Antarctic Treaty. Perhaps the ends of the Earth might be one place about which the world powers can find agreement.
7. Ghosts of epidemics past
Brevig Mission, Alaska
In 2016, nomadic people in Salekhard in the far north of Russia started getting sick. In the end, doctors found that 72 of them were infected with anthrax. One 12-year-old boy died.
Anthrax is rare, but the bacteria that cause it can survive for centuries in the frozen ground, as can many other microbes. The spores that killed the nomadic boy are believed to have come from a reindeer carcass exposed during a spell of unusually warm weather.
Worse could be lying in wait. Russian scientists recently warned that smallpox may be released from mass graves in the Siberian tundra. In 1997, we recovered fragments of the virus responsible for Spanish influenza, the worst pandemic on record, from the lungs of a woman buried in the frozen ground of Brevig Mission, Alaska. Yet there are discoveries to be made, too. In 2015, scientists discovered a giant virus in the Siberian ice that may force a rethink of the way we classify life.
8. Oil bonanza
Tazovsky, Russia
Secreted away under the Arctic ice is a veritable glut of petrochemicals. A US geological survey in 2009 estimated that a quarter of the planet’s undiscovered oil and gas lies hidden in the region, mostly under the seabed.
How much of it will see the light of day is another matter. As is the case for mineral mining (see “The world’s most northerly mine”), the extreme cold makes it difficult to extract oil and gas in the Arctic. In 1968, Soviet geologists discovered huge quantities of oil and gas in Russia’s Tazovsky region, but extraction is only just starting.
Likewise, the petrochemical giant Shell has spent some £4.6 billion prospecting for oil in the Chukchi Sea near Alaska. But facing resistance from environmental groups – and having found only meagre oil reserves anyway – the firm pulled the plug on the project a few years ago. “The exploration and understanding of these fields is interesting, but extraction is probably not economic,” says Hüttl.
9. Icy archaeology
Lendbreen glacier, Norway
Digging up graveyards gives us unrivalled insights into how past humans lived, loved and died. The Arctic is no exception, except that here the permafrost keeps things exceptionally well preserved.
When the Likneset graveyard in Svalbard was excavated in 1990, for example, archaeologists found the remains of many 17th and 18th-century whalers. Exhumations revealed a life of malnutrition, scurvy and brightly patterned woollen hats that helped the men recognise one another in the atrocious weather.
As the Arctic warms, the archaeological opportunities come thicker and faster. Lars Holger Pilø at Oppland Council in Norway is one of a team combing the melting snow in the north of Norway every summer, including around the Lendbreen glacier. As well as ancient , swords, harpoons and bows used to hunt deer, he has uncovered many scare sticks. These wooden stakes have a small piece of wood tied to the top that flutters in the wind, scaring reindeer and funnelling them towards hunters.
“When we started fieldwork in 2006, we were finding stuff from the Iron Age,” says Pilø. Then it was Bronze and quickly Stone age. “The ice is melting fast, we’re speeding back in time.”
The artefacts are shedding light on mysteries like when and where humans first began to use skis. Until now, most of the evidence came from ancient skis entombed in lowland bogs and gave only a partial picture.
For glacier archaeologists like Pilø, it is a race to catalogue these artefacts. Once exposed, many are quickly destroyed by the elements. “It’s a terrible conundrum,” says Pilø. “The ice retreat exposes these finds, but we’re losing artefacts and the ice itself, which contains climate information, radioactive markers, pollen, insects, ancient DNA.” Likneset’s long frozen whaler graves are also disintegrating, while in Alaska’s Walakpa Bay, archaeologists studying the remains of an indigenous Inupiaq .
