By
Robert Corell, American Meteorological Society, and Pål Prestrud,
Norwegian Polar Institute
Confronted by manifold evidence of environmental changes in the
Arctic, the International Arctic Science Committee (IASC) and two
working groups of the Arctic Council are undertaking an assessment --
called the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment (ACIA) -- of the potential
impacts of climate change on the Arctic region. The goals of this
assessment are (1) to synthesize and evaluate current knowledge of
climate variability, climate change, and increased ultraviolet radiation
and their consequences in the Arctic, and (2) to provide useful and
reliable information on these topics to Arctic residents.
It is the intention of ACIA to produce a peer-reviewed summary of
current understanding of climate change and variability and increased UV
radiation; a set of realistic climate change scenarios; and an
examination of the potential impacts of climate change on ecosystems,
infrastructure, and human society. We plan to publish the assessment in
2003. Separately, the Arctic Council's working groups Arctic Monitoring
and Assessment Program (AMAP) and Conservation of Arctic Flora and Fauns
(CAFF) will consider a range of policy recommendations designed to aid
mitigation of or adaptation to the anticipated impacts. In addition to
environmental impacts, the assessment will include information on
potential socio-economic and human health impacts on Arctic residents.
The IASC governing body has approved this study, and we expect the
Arctic Ministers to approve it when they meet in Barrow in mid-October.
ACIA is being guided by a steering committee composed of representatives
from IASC, AMAP, CAFF, Native indigenous peoples organizations, and all
eight Arctic countries. Bob Corell is chair of the steering committee,
and Pål Prestrud serves as vice-chair. An ACIA Secretariat has been
established at the University of Alaska Fairbanks under the leadership
of Executive Director Gunter Weller.
Progress to date has been slow but deliberate. The steering committee
developed an implementation plan for the assessment and received final
approval of it at the recent Ministerial meeting in Barrow. Agencies of
the U.S. government have pledged to support the Secretariat and
publication costs, and other Arctic countries have indicated a
willingness to contribute as well. The steering committee has held five
meetings to date and made a number of initial policy decisions regarding
principal steps in the assessment, the scientific review process, and
communications and outreach.
In February 2000, the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration hosted a scoping Workshop in Washington, DC, to plan
initial steps in the ACIA process. At this workshop, over 40 people
drawn from both Arctic and non-Arctic countries discussed strategies for
scenarios, modeling and paleoenvironmental data and information;
indigenous people, Native lands, and societal issues; marine and coastal
systems; terrestrial environment and ecosystems; and infrastructure.
Some of the more significant conclusions of the workshop were:
- ACIA will be a circumpolar assessment, but it will
most likely to necessary to base it on sub-regional assessments. A
strong data and information base already exists for some
sub-regions, while this is not true for others.
- The participation of indigenous people and
stakeholders will be sought right from the beginning of the study.
- We should view Arctic processes in a global context.
While ACIA is not formally part of the Intergovernmental Panel on
Climate Change (IPCC), it is important that ACIA stay connected with
IPCC at every step. ACIA should also develop or strengthen
connections to other relevant bodies, e.g., the Global Climate
Observing System.
- Policy issues and recommendations should be left to
AMAP and CAFF and should not be part of the ACIA study proper.
- Considerable expertise in Arctic research exists in
non-Arctic countries, and ACIA should try to access this resource.
- ACIA must have a modeling task group to examine the
applicability of currently existing global climate models to the
Arctic. It will probably be necessary to develop an Arctic regional
climate model.
- There must be a scenario task group to begin
development of realistic climate change scenarios that can be useful
in assessing impacts on Arctic sub-regions.
In June 2000, the Danish National Environmental Research Institute
hosted a meeting of the steering committee at the Danish Polar Centre in
Copenhagen. At this meeting, committee members arrived at a preliminary
outline of the fourteen chapters that will constitute the assessment.
The chapters will be organized in three main sections that are concerned
with the Arctic as part of the global climate system, impacts on
physical and biological systems, and impacts on humans and their
activities. A final synthesis chapter will give an integrated
description of climate change impacts on ecosystems, economies, culture,
human well-being, etc. The anticipated impacts of increased ultraviolet
radiation will be treated in a number of different places in the
assessment, especially in the chapters on terrestrial and marine
ecosystems and human health.
Prior to the Copenhagen meeting, in response to a broadly distributed
solicitation, the ACIA Secretariat had received in excess of 300
nominations of potential authors for various parts of the assessment.
After lengthy deliberation, the steering committee decided who should be
invited to serve as lead authors. The process of recruiting these lead
authors is practically complete.
Let's try to look ahead a bit. Clearly, as our first order of business,
we must complete recruitment of lead authors for the assessment
chapters. The lead authors will become part of the steering committee to
help guide further steps in the assessment. Then, with their assistance,
we will recruit the contributing authors who can bring the required
breadth of knowledge to bear on the assessment process and get the
actual writing of the assessment underway.
In the near future we plan to assemble task groups on modeling and
scenario development. Most likely, they will hold workshops before
settling down to the job of writing their sections. And then, once the
draft chapters in the assessment are complete, we will need to carry out
a thorough scientific review process. Clearly, there are busy days
ahead. Success in this effort will depend on the willingness of the
international scientific community to become involved. And we will count
on cooperation by the U.S. climate impacts assessment community.
Further information on ACIA is available on the website http://www.acia.uaf.edu/
and from Dr. Gunter Weller, ACIA Executive Director, at 907-474-7371.