Alaska

I just returned from a week in Alaska. I am overwhelmed by the large response to this blog during the week I was gone. For those of you who sent in comments or questions, I will try and respond as soon as possible.

Alaska faces many unique and not-so-unique environmental challenges and I did want to write about two of the visits we made. First, we met with Larry Hinzman, Director of the International Arctic Research Center in Fairbanks. The Center receives funding from EPA. We discussed evidence of warming in the polar regions of the Northern Hemisphere and the potential causes for this warming.

Second, the EPA delegation enjoyed the hospitality of the native village of Nuiqsut. Nuiqsut clings to the Colville River near the Beaufort Sea in the far north. We got out on the river and saw, among other things, erosion along the river banks that the native Alaskans believe is caused by warming. They think warmer air is melting the exposed permafrost below the soil and causing the soil to slump into the river. Below is a picture of erosion on the Nigliq Channel near one of the Nuiqsut fish camps. Erosion can reduce water quality in the river that can, in turn, affect fish populations and other uses of the waterway.

According to Dr. Hinzman, some of the warming in the polar regions is natural and some is the indirect result of greenhouse gas emissions from across the globe. To the extent global greenhouse gas emissions contribute to these changes, how can we get together, as a planet, and mitigate their effects in the future without harming our energy security or economy?

Last Thursday the President invited over a dozen major economies, including India and China, to meet in Washington DC on September 28 and 29, 2007. This will kick-off a collaborative process that, by the end of 2008, should result in the major economies, including large developing economies, having in place a framework that could include a long-term global goal for improving energy security and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. This process will be historic and will necessarily complement the significant unilateral work the United States, including EPA, is already doing in both areas.