Let’s save the Arctic, the earth’s AC system

Narayani Ganesh
Senior journalist

During a 2002 family trip to Argentina, we visited glaciers at Ushuaia, located close to Antarctica, on the southernmost tip of Argentina’s landmass. At the Martial Glacier, the guide was talking to us of global warming and receding glaciers. Even as he spoke, a huge portion of ice was carving off, falling into the waters with a thunderous splash, to become icebergs and eventually merge with the ocean. That was an up close experience of climate change and global warming.

In the two decades since, much water has flown — to our horror — only confirming the fact that the age-old polar ice sheets, both in the Arctic and Antarctic, have been melting away, and the newly formed ice sheets are not strong or durable enough to withstand even the slightest change in temperature. This means that from being the frozen tundra and ice world, the poles are now more of water and thin ice.

Receding glaciers, thinning ice sheets and shrinking ice caps are contributing to a rise in sea levels, alterations in wildlife populations and changes in the lifestyles of indigenous populations. Thawing ice opened up shorter shipping routes; business became better. But now, with no abatement in melting, this is a cause for alarm, as an unfrozen North Pole may have several adverse effects.

“Nearly everything in the Arctic, from ice and snow to human activity, is changing so quickly that there is no reason to think that in 30 years much of anything will be as it is today,” says Rick Thoman, a climate specialist at the University of Alaska, who is one of the editors of an Arctic assessment called the Arctic Report Card, produced annually by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, USA.

Experts say that while the entire planet is suffering from global warming, the Arctic is heating up twice as fast as the other places, leading to disappearing permafrost, fires in boreal forests and unprecedented changes in geography and biodiversity. Most of the melting ice is freshwater, so we are losing potable water reservoirs. Just as the Third Pole, the Himalayas, are also losing their freshwater reservoirs. Permafrost loss releases huge amounts of methane hitherto trapped beneath, further accelerating the greenhouse effect.

India has been an active participant in Arctic studies, and its draft Arctic Policy was released in January 2021. At the virtually held Third Arctic Science Ministerial meeting in May 2021, India welcomed collaborations towards strengthening observational systems and sharing of data to enhance knowledge. Although India is 7,000 km away from the Arctic, the region affects variations in the Indian monsoons that are an integral part of India’s weather patterns that affect agriculture.

Another factor is the crucial role the Arctic could play in energy security and it is also a source of rich minerals and hydrocarbons. India’s long coastline of more than 7,500 km could also get inundated if there is a further sea level rise brought on by the albedo effect — when ice sheets get reduced, the surface ice that reflects sunlight back to the skies also gets reduced, leading to overheating, which in turn causes further melting of ice.

Countries that are a part of the Arctic region include Canada, Denmark (Greenland), Norway, Russia, the USA (Alaska), Finland, Sweden and Iceland, all members of the intergovernmental Arctic Council. Most of the four million inhabitants of the region are indigenous people.

India is mainly concerned with science and research activities, economic and human development cooperation, transportation and connectivity, governance and international cooperation, and national capacity building. It is by now clear that changes in the Arctic could impact water security and sustainability, weather and monsoon patterns, coastal erosion and glacial melting, economic security and other critical aspects of national development, says a report in Mongobay.

India’s research station in the Arctic, the Himadri, is reputed. India was made an observer on the Arctic Council in 2013, one among 13 countries to have that position. The status was renewed in 2018. India first connected with the Arctic in 1920, becoming party to the Svalbard Treaty. That was a century ago. The first Indian expedition to the Arctic was undertaken in 2007 and India established the Himadri station at Nyalesand, Svalbard, in 2008.

India’s approach needs to focus on science and technology and how best we can conserve the ecology and frozenness of the polar region in order to prevent further deterioration. India could also negotiate for itself ways to share knowledge and gain economic benefits from engaging with Arctic countries and actively participating in Arctic-related policy measures.

“India needs to enhance its presence for launching scientific projects to study the interactions between cryosphere, atmosphere and ocean in order to understand long-term impacts on the country. It is essential that India defines its strategy as well as a policy for the Arctic in the near future and contributes towards generating strategic knowledge for the region. Such knowledge will help ensure food, energy and resource security for the country,” write Shailesh Nayak and D Suba Chandran in a paper published by the National Institute of Advanced Studies, Bengaluru.

Extreme weather changes brought on by global warming could redistribute heat, alter the earth’s weather and climate, slow down the Atlantic currents and the temperatures in North America and Europe may dive, affecting precipitation patterns in the tropics, say experts, also pointing out that this could bring on the tipping point in the earth system.

Among civil society initiatives to save the Arctic is the Parvati Foundation that promotes the Marine Arctic Peace Sanctuary (MAPS), a global initiative to transform the Arctic Ocean above the Arctic Circle into the world’s biggest marine preserve. This could help preserve the remaining ice, so that ice can “grow” back and eventually restore the natural balance in the region. Just as the Himalayas are perceived as Asia’s freshwater reservoir, the Arctic is the earth’s air-conditioning system that regulates and protects the earth’s weather and climate. Let’s not lose it.