Climate change impacts, adaptation, and the technology interface - Environmental and Human Security in the Arctic - page 117

Arctic coast of Canada is emerging, or rising up, due to geological forces, the
area around Tuktoyaktuk is submerging, due both to geological forces and sea
level rise, and the coastal erosion is threatening infrastructure and buildings
near the coast. Sea level rise is caused by both seawater temperature changes
(usually considered to be the major contributor to sea level rise), and by ocean
water mass increase due to the melting of glaciers (Meier and Dyurgerov
2002) and the disintegration and melting of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet, as
'more open water allows stronger wave generation by winds, thus increasing
wave-induced erosion along arctic shores' (Hassol 2004:78).
Arctic vegetation zones are very likely to shift, causing wide-ranging
impacts. [For example, the] treeline is expected to move northward and
to higher elevations, with forests replacing a significant fraction of exist-
ing tundra, and tundra vegetation moving into polar deserts.
(Hassol 2004:10)
The treeline may be expected to move northward from 5 to 7.5km per year
and the southern boundary of the permafrost is also moving north (Maxwell
1997), causing soil instability and difficulties in engineering permanent
structures and transportation infrastructure (National Round Table on the
Environment and the Economy 2009). Climate warming in the North has
dramatically increased the importance of permafrost engineering as a pro-
fessional discipline (Andersland and Ladanyi 2004). Design in potentially
unstable permafrost conditions is of special importance to all infrastructure
development in the Arctic.
It has been reported by many northern residents that winters are getting
warmer in the North. The season for ice roads is getting shorter, on the aver-
age between two weeks and eight weeks per year. This tends to cause thinner
ice and more accidents. The overall effect seems to be negative as far as eco-
nomic activity is concerned. Shorter seasons for ice road use, combined with
longer periods between spring break up and autumn freeze up of the rivers,
means longer and therefore more expensive air transportation for food and
other perishable goods to mines and oil and gas facilities. There may be a
positive impact on economic activity in the tourism area, since a longer ice-
free period lengthens the season for tourist activity on the Alaska, Klondike
and Dempster highways. On the other hand, 'reduced sea ice is very likely
to increase marine transport and access to resources' (Hassol 2004:11) by
lengthening the navigation season and increasing marine access to the Arctic's
natural resources. For example, 'seasonal opening of the Northern Sea Route
is likely to make trans-arctic shipping during summer feasible within several
decades' (Hassol 2004:11). However, 'increasing ice movement in some chan-
nels of the Northwest Passage could initially make shipping more difficult'
(Hassol 2004:11). Furthermore, warming also reduced the number of days per
year in which travel on the tundra is allowed; for example, in Alaska it has