bildt81_ Alexander RyuminTASS via Getty Images_northern sea route

The Arctic Comes in from the Cold

Oct 20, 2020 Carl Bildt

The more that global warming reduces the ice cover in the Arctic, the greater the need there will be for multilateral arrangements to govern trade, resource extraction, and other issues across the region. Without forward-looking cooperation, a zero-sum scramble will ensue, leaving everyone worse off.

STOCKHOLM – Whether we are heading for a future of cooperation or of increasing confrontation in the Arctic remains to be seen. But it is already clear that the region will command far more attention than it has in the past.

The main reason is of course climate change, which is accelerating the rate of ice melt and causing arctic temperatures to rise twice as fast as the global average. Owing to their pace and scale, these changes have obvious geographic, economic, and strategic implications. As the vast ice sheet that spans the region has melted, new fossil-fuel reserves and shipping routes have opened up, including the Northern Sea Route (NSR) along Russia’s Siberian coast and the Northwest Passage through Canada’s northern archipelago. However, the same trend has also fueled the loss of permafrost, threatening billions of dollars’ worth of infrastructure that may soon be standing in mud instead of on firm ground.

Moreover, indigenous communities that have lived in the Arctic for millennia are increasingly voicing concerns about the growing threat to their livelihoods. Nearly half of the Arctic’s land area is in Russia, as are around 70% of the four million people who live in the region. Most live in the Kola Peninsula area near Norway and Finland, which is also home to Russia’s Northern Fleet and most of its sea-based nuclear deterrent. But other parts of the region are no less important, strategically and demographically. Approximately two-thirds of the inhabitants of Canada’s arctic areas are indigenous people, as are the vast majority of the 56,000 people living on Greenland (which itself is the size of a small continent).

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Carl Bildt

Writing for PS since 2009
84 Commentaries

Carl Bildt was Sweden’s foreign minister from 2006 to 2014 and Prime Minister from 1991 to 1994, when he negotiated Sweden’s EU accession. A renowned international diplomat, he served as EU Special Envoy to the Former Yugoslavia, High Representative for Bosnia and Herzegovina, UN Special Envoy to the Balkans, and Co-Chairman of the Dayton Peace Conference. He is Co-Chair of the European Council on Foreign Relations.

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ven ze Oct 26, 2020

The Arctic Comes in from the Cold @ProSyn:
While the ice in the Arctic gradually yet absolutely thaws, certain international issues warm. The need for multilateral solution to the use of Arctic ocean naturally arises.
An amicable agreement is desirable, the earlier the better..
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Bill Farley Oct 24, 2020

Not much about Canada's legal position when it comes to the Northwest Passage. As a Canadian, I can only say we will be steadfast with respect to the sovereignty of our Arctic region. Whether the Northwest Passage is considered international waters or a sovereign part of Canada will be a major part of future negotiations.
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Michael Public Oct 21, 2020

The tragedy of the commons marches on. The mining of resources under the northern ice will sets in motion a snowballing effect of a heating planet revealing ever more resources - until the system cannot sustain itself - releasing the entire motherload of C02 trapped in the ice caps, creating a lovely greenhouse of 5-8 degrees warmer than now. Food production will no longer be possible where it once was - once fertile lands (like the US corn growing areas) turning into Sahara style dustbowls - sea levels may rise enough to cause sea flooding. This will trigger economic disaster, revolution, civil war, mass (illegal) migration - coming soon to a once lovely city near you. But at least my mining stocks portfolio will be nicely up.
- Alan Smithee Oct 24, 2020
  
  Actually.... from Science Daily 2019 article about corn production.
  
  "... as temperatures increased due to global climate change, planting days got earlier and earlier, shifting by about three days per decade. ... Early planting means the corn has more time to mature before the end of the growing season. There is also a second, more surprising trend that has benefited corn yields. Whereas the vast majority of temperatures have warmed over the last century, the hottest days during the Midwestern growing season have actually cooled.
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Edwin Hoffman Oct 21, 2020

Must we convert the entire planet into an exploited wasteland?
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j. von Hettlingen Oct 21, 2020

Carl Bildt points out that global warming has led to a rapid depletion of the Arctic sea ice. This will have a devastating impact on the environment, when new fossil-fuel reserves and shipping routes open up. The Northern Sea Route (NSR) - a shipping lane between the Atlantic Ocean and the Pacific Ocean running along the Russian Arctic coast from Murmansk on the Barents Sea to the Far East - will be significant for trade. Normally parts of the NSR are free of ice for only two months per year. With the warming in the Arctic, the passage can link Yokohama, Japan, to Hamburg, Germany. This route is 40% shorter than the current one that runs through the Suez Canal.
The same applies to the Northwest Passage, a sea route that connects the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans through the Canadian Arctic Archipelago. In the past, the Passage has been impassable because it was covered by thick, year-round ice. However, in recent years, climate change enables commercial traffic to pass through the Arctic via this once-impossible route. The benefits of a clear Northwest Passage are significant. Ship routes from Europe to eastern Asia are 4,000 kilometers (2,500 miles) shorter. Alaskan oil could move quickly by ship to US ports in the east coast. The vast mineral resources of the Canadian North will be much easier and economical to develop and ship to market.
According to the author, instead of raising concern about global warming, there is a rush for resources in the Arctic. Since 1996, the eight Arctic countries – Russia, Norway, Finland, Sweden, Denmark (Greenland), Iceland, Canada, and the United States – have cooperated through the Arctic Council, mostly to address environmental issues.” Today the Arctic has become a venue for “great-power” rivalry. “In 2013, China, India, Singapore, South Korea, and Japan were granted observer status within the Council, in recognition of their scientific research commitments and interest in future shipping opportunities.”
What is alarming was that “at the Council’s ministerial meeting in Rovaniemi, Finland, last year, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo shocked everyone when he refused” to sign an agreement on challenges in the Arctic, leaving the Council unable to agree on a final declaration. A failure to reach a consensus on combating climate change has jeopardised cooperation between the eight Arctic states. It was the first time a communiqué was cancelled since the Arctic Council was formed in 1996. Pompeo “instead used the occasion to attack China for its own designs on the region.” Last year Trump’s bid to buy Greenland was not a prank after all, given the vast untapped resources in the Arctic.
The author worries what happens when Iceland passes the Council’s biennial rotating chairmanship to Russia next year. Moscow will unlikely “squander its two years in the driver’s seat. Over the past decade, the Kremlin has devoted significant resources to strengthening its Arctic positions, reviving defunct Soviet military facilities and building new ones. This military build-up has set off alarms within NATO, even though a sober analysis would find that in most cases, such facilities pose no particular threat to anyone – except, perhaps, polar bears.”
Tensions will rise if Russia “regulates all of the shipping through the NSR, and thus will enjoy outsize control for as long as other parts of the Arctic remain covered with ice. But as more ice melts, new shipping channels will open up well north of Russia’s jurisdiction, and this will introduce a slew of new legal issues.” Degradation of near-surface permafrost can pose a serious threat to the utilisation of natural resources, and to the sustainable development of Arctic communities, putting billions of dollars’ worth of infrastructure at risk, “that may soon be standing in mud instead of on firm ground.”
The next executive meeting of the Arctic Council is taking place in Reykjavik next month. The world should be aware of “what the future holds” for the region. As if there are not enough contentious issues for the US, Russia, China, and others to clash over, now climate change in the Arctic is posing another global challenge to the international community.
Sadly the world powers - especially the US - do not “recognize a shared interest in preserving and further developing an open, collaborative framework for the world’s northernmost region.” Instead of flexing muscles, they should opt for “a mutually beneficial cooperation, not war.”
The EU is currently working towards updating its Arctic policy, seeking to respond to two major changes that affect the region and the role of the EU in the Arctic - accelerated climate change and increased geoeconomic and geopolitical competition.
The EU finds itself in a rather unique position. As a supranational institution with competences in parts of the Arctic, and with member states having territories in the region, as well as institutionalised linkages with Arctic countries Iceland and Norway — with whom the EU shares the European Economic Area (EEA) — it aims to balance sectoral policies and priority areas to address the challenges. But it may not be enough.
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