December 4, 2010
Privatizing the Arctic
In August 2007, the Russian nuclear-powered icebreaker
Rossiya reached the North Pole, cut a round opening into the
sea ice, and lowered into it, by crane, two tiny submarines.
The crews of these submarines promptly dove 4,300 meters
(2 ½ miles) to the ocean floor, and, by means of a robotic arm,
planted a titanium tricolor Russian flag into the yellow mud
at the top of the earth. “The Arctic is ours,” declared
Arthur Chilingarov, explorer, oceanographer, State Duma
representative, and leader of the privately-funded expedition.
A new colonial race for control of the Arctic Ocean had begun.
On-going exploitation of oil and gas in the Arctic intensified.
Russian exploration is principally in the Barents Sea, Sakhalin
Island and West Siberia; United States’, principally on the North
Slope of Alaska; and Canada’s, principally in the Mackenzie
Delta and Alberta. Exploitation of its northern Alberta tar
sands is the major reason why Canada has increased its
greenhouse gas emissions by 27 percent, 1990-2009 – despite
its Kyoto Protocol pledge of a 6 percent reduction, 1990-2010.
Tar sands oil reserves are estimated at 175 billion barrels –
second only to Saudi Arabia’s reserves of 264 billion barrels.
The new frontier in the Arctic is its seabed. In 2008, the U.S.
Minerals Management Service sold $2.8 billion worth of Arctic
offshore leases; and, in 2009, the U.S. Geological Survey published
the first comprehensive assessment of oil and gas reserves in the
Arctic Ocean. Lottery winners are the U.S. for oil, and Russia for
natural gas. The Alaska Platform, an area which includes the
North Slope and an equal area offshore, contains some 28 billion
barrels of oil – equal to 1/4th of Iraq’s reserves. The South Kara
Sea, on Russia’s Northern Rim, holds 607 trillion cubic feet of
natural gas – twice the combined reserves of the U.S. and Canada.
The Arctic has an abundance of other natural resources, including
metals, diamond, timber and fish – the latter increasingly valuable
as large fish migrate northward. The countries which encircle the
Arctic Ocean [U.S., Canada, Iceland, Denmark (which rules Greenland),
Norway, Sweden, Finland and Russia] already have a milder climate,
and, to the envy of most of the rest of the world, also a wetter one.
Agriculture is benefiting. The Northwest Passage is opening up.
By 2009, all eight countries were either re-enforcing their military
and coast guard, or reviewing security arrangements. Immigrant
labor is cheap. The Arctic is now secure and ready for business.
The voraciousness of capitalism for natural resources which it
can convert into commodities for sale at a profit, knows no bound.
No head of any major state is attending the current 16th Conference
of the Parties of the United Nations Framework Convention on
Climate Change, in Cancun, Mexico. Bold action is not on the agenda.
We all pray that the “invisible hand” will prevent the 6,000
billion tons of carbon dioxide equivalents stored in the now
thawing northern permafrost from being released into the
atmosphere. The amount is more than twice that already in
the atmosphere, and 257 times more than that which humans
generate yearly by burning fossil fuels and manufacturing cement.
Such emissions would uncontrollably, and irrevocably convert
the only planet we have into a hell we could not survive.
References
Principal Reference:
Smith, Laurence. 2010. The world in 2050 – four forces shaping civilization’s northern future. New York, N.Y.: Dutton.
Pp. 6-7 [Eight countries control vast territories and seas extending as far north as the Arctic Ocean. They roughly encircle the Ocean. They are the United States, Canada, Iceland, Denmark (Greenland), Norway, Sweden, Finland and Russia].
Pp. 136-137 (In the past 40 years, Atlantic warm-water species have pushed northward a staggering ten degrees of latitude – almost 700 miles – supplanting cold-water species that are in turn retreating north).
P. 143 [A broad pattern of rising crop yields in Canada, some northern U.S. states, southern Scandinavia, the United Kingdom, and parts of Russia have been repeatedly demonstrated by climate change model simulations for years. The northern U.S. states of Michigan, Minnesota, and Wisconsin will likely benefit from rising average temperatures, even if production in the rest of the country declines. Similar north-south asymmetries in crop yield (with gains in the north and declines in the south) have been demonstrated for Europe and Russia. The general idea is that in the marginal northern fringes of present-day agriculture, rising temperatures and longer growing seasons will boost current crops and perhaps allow introduction of new ones. In marginal southern fringes, rising temperatures and drought frequency will harm crops. The northern-most U.S. states, parts of Canada and Russia, and northern Europe are among the few places on Earth where we can reasonably expect to see rising crop production from climate change).
Pp. 144 and 146 (The Chilingarov exploit. Photo, pp. 116-117).
P. 147 (A new colonial race for the frontier).
P. 149 [By 2009, all eight “Northern Rim Countries” (United States, Canada, Iceland, Denmark, Norway, Finland, Sweden, and Russia) were either re-building their militaries and coast guards, or at least pondering new security arrangements in the region].
Pp. 156-160 (The Northwest Passage).
Pp. 186-187 and 251 (The newest frontier is the Arctic seabed. A 2008 auction offered by the U.S. Minerals Management Service sold a whopping $2.8 billion worth of Arctic offshore leases. In 2009, a first comprehensive assessment of the Arctic Ocean’s oil and gas potential was published in Science by the U.S. Geological Survey . . . The Alaska Platform holds 28 billion barrels of oil. This number approaches the proved reserves of Nigeria, and is about 1/4th those of Iraq . . . Russia’s South Kara Sea holds 607 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. That number, if correct, is more than twice the proved reserves of the United States and Canada combined).
P. 188 (What is assured over the next 40 years is intensification of oil and gas exploitation in and around the places they already exist today. Offshore, these include the Barents Sea and Sakhalin Island in the Russian Far East. On land, they include West Siberia, the North Slope of Alaska, the Mackenzie Delta and Alberta).
Pp. 189-190 and 256 [The northern Alberta tar sands. The oil reserves the tar sands contain are estimated at an astonishing 175 billion barrels which, if correct and recoverable, is the second-largest oil endowment on Earth after Saudi Arabia (estimated at 264 billion barrels)].
Pp. 191 and 295 [The tar sands are the biggest reason why Canada not only failed to meet her pledged reduction in carbon dioxide emissions under the Kyoto Protocol (to 6 percent below 1990 levels, by 2010), but actually grew them, 1990-2009, to 27 percent above instead].
Pp. 200, 255, 257 and 307 [The mainstay of the Arctic economy (around 60 percent) is the export of raw commodities like metals, fossil fuel, diamonds, fish and timber].
Pp. 234-235 and 304 [As of 2010, the latest estimate is 1,672 billion tons (gigatons, Gt) of pure organic carbon frozen in the permafrost of northern soils. To put this figure in perspective, all of the world’s living plants hold about 650 Gt. The atmosphere now holds about 730 Gt of carbon, up from 360 Gt during the last ice age, and 560 Gt before industrialization. The world’s remaining proven reserves of conventional oil hold about 145 Gt of carbon, and of coal, about 632 Gt. Each year, we release around 6.5 Gt of carbon from burning fossil fuels and making cement. The total target reduction for “Annex I” (developed world) signatory countries to the Kyoto Protocol was 0.2 Gt per year].
Note: These figures all need to be multiplied by 3.67 to obtain the carbon dioxide equivalent. (1,672 x 3.67) = 6,136; (730 x 3.67) = 2,679; (6.5 x 3.6) = 23.86.
P. 250 [Today, scientists, through USGS oil and gas assessments and climate model projections, are convincing governments and investors that the region (“the New North”) is a place of rising strategic value that is opening for business.
Other References:
Corn, David, 2010. “Obama goes quiet on Climate Change.” Politicsdaily. December 2. P. 4.
http://www.politicsdaily.com/2010/12/02. Accessed December 5, 2010.
“The past decade is the warmest on record, the World Meteorological Organization announced this week. But bold action is really not on the agenda at Cancun . . . Obama won’t be attending Cancun, nor will the heads of state of the other major players.”
EarthProtect, 2010. “Cancun: Your five-minute Guide to the COP-16 Climate Conference.” November 26. P. 2.
http://www.earthprotect.com/blogs/cancun. Accessed December 5, 2010.
“No heads of state are expected to attend.”
New Mexico State University, Institute for Energy and Environment, undated. “Conversion Factors.”
http://www.nmsu.edu/~tdi/parking/newmexicogreen.html. Accessed December 5, 2010.
“To convert carbon equivalents into carbon dioxide equivalents, multiply by 44/12 = 3.667.”
Vision. 2010. “Low Turnout for Cancun Conference.” (Simon Hanna). Reuters. Month and day unstated. P. 1
http://www.vision.org/visionmedia/article.aspx?id=37753. Accessed December 5, 2010.
“UNFCCC Executive Secretary Christina Figueres: ‘The COP-16 in Cancun was never billed as a summit for heads of state.’”
Wikipedia 2010,
“Arthur Chilingarov.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki. Accessed December 5, 2010.
Chilingarov is a member of the State Duma from Nenets Autonomous Okrug.
“Nenets Autonomous Okrug.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki. Accessed December 5, 2010.
Nenets is a federal subject of Russia, an autonomous okrug of Arkhangelsk Oblast.
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