The Arctic is warming two to three times faster than the rest of the Earth, to the point that our natural bulwark, the ice, is liquefying. Each summer leaves our northern frontier a little more accessible.
“When I was little, we were nomads all winter and spring. It was much colder than today. Now it looks like the sun is a lot closer, it’s a lot warmer,” says Annie Atighioyak, a Cambridge Bay elder who was born in an igloo before the Inuit were forced to settle.
Shortly before our meeting, in July 2022, it was so hot that thunderstorms passed through the region. Unheard of for most residents.
Canadian Defense is not blind to this phenomenon, quite the contrary. She now sees climate change as a “threat multiplier.”
Marc Lanteigne, associate professor at the Arctic University of Norway, agrees: global warming is by far the biggest threat to the region, as it is extremely rapid and brings a cascade of threats in its wake.
RESOURCE RACE
“If we project ourselves in 15 or 20 years, when there will be much less ice in the summer at the North Pole, that will allow Russia to deploy more vessels in the center of the Arctic”, says the Canadian installed in Tromsø, in the Norwegian Arctic.
And Russia is not alone. In Cambridge Bay, we even met Korean scientists, who have been conducting research there for years, with the avowed aim of not only better understanding the climate, but also strengthening diplomatic ties with our resource-rich country.
The Arctic contains 13% of the world’s undiscovered oil reserves and 30% of those of natural gas. There are also strategic minerals essential for producing mobile devices, electric vehicles and weapons.
NORTHWEST PASSAGE
“I fear that if we have less ice, other countries will use the Northwest Passage as a transit route. It’s a concern for me, because it’s a threat to our environment,” says Clara Evalik, vice-president of the Kitikmeot Inuit Association.
The Northwest Passage, in the middle of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago, is a very sensitive subject in Ottawa. Canada considers it an inland sea and therefore can control the comings and goings there. But our allies, especially the United States, disagree and see it as an international strait.
Formerly protected by pack ice, this passage is now open to navigation for a few weeks each summer. It is very attractive, because it constitutes a maritime route between Asia and the east coast of North America 7000 km shorter than that using the Panama Canal.
But an oil spill there would have catastrophic consequences on the fragile ecosystems of the Arctic and a rescue and clean-up operation there would be extremely costly and dangerous, if not impossible. In fact, Canada would not have the capacity to intervene quickly, since it does not have a port there.