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May 11, 2015

 

The Nordic Region Meets the United States of America: A Shared Arctic Agenda, May 11, 2015 (Webinar). On April 24th, the United States took on the chairmanship of the Arctic Council. What are its priorities in the Arctic Council and what about the all-important challenge: climate change? What is the role of the Nordic countries? Participants include: Karl Stoltz, Deputy Chief of Mission, American Embassy in Denmark; Kenneth Broman, Chief of Staff, Nordic Council of Ministers; Julia Gourley, U.S. Senior Arctic Official; Erik Vilstrup Lorenzen, Arctic Ambassador; Gitte Seeberg, CEO, WWF; Cathleen Kelly, Senior Fellow, Center for American Progress; Marianne Røgeberg, Head of Arctic Affairs, Nordforsk; Margareta Johansson, Researcher, University of Lund; and, Jakob Nielsen, Moderator, Politiken.  

 

Today's Congressional Action:   

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The House is not in session. The Senate is expected to consider non-Arctic legislation.

 

 

Media  

 

Ilisagvik Ilisagvik College, Nation's Northernmost, Marks 20-year Anniversary. When you live at the far north of the world, you might expect getting training for jobs in your area might be a bit more difficult and involve a lot more travel than it would in the state's urban centers. But 20 years ago, North Slope leaders came together to create Ilisagvik College from earlier efforts to provide vocational and higher education programs in Barrow. Anchorage Daily News 

 

Arctic-Spanning Fiber-Optic Project Moves Ahead in Alaska. Alaskans are playing a bigger role in an international project that seeks to link Europe and Asia with a fiber-optic cable running along the Arctic Ocean, with anticipated offshoots to remote Alaska communities and the oil-field complex of Prudhoe Bay. But while the Alaska phase of the project remains on track to be completed by the end of next year, the 10,000-mile-long effort connecting Japan with the United Kingdom won't happen within that time frame, as previously hoped. Alaska Daily News

 

Alaska Researchers Turn Up 12,300-Year-Old Artwork. At the edge of a spruce forest in Interior Alaska, archaeologists have unearthed bone pendants that might be the first examples of artwork in northern North America. During the last two summers, teams led by the University of Alaska Fairbanks' Ben Potter have expanded the breadth of the Mead Site, a white spruce bench that overlooks Shaw Creek Flats north of Delta Junction. Within the boundaries of the Mead Site, researchers have found what they believe are tent outlines. Inside the oval of what was probably a hide-covered structure 12,300 years ago, a student working with a trowel found a tiny bone pendant with delicate crosshatching on the edge. Fairbanks Daily News-Miner

 

Shoddy Data Hampers Canadian "Hardest-Place-To-Live" Study. The hardest place to live in Canada? If you guessed Nunavut, you would have been right - but only maybe and not with a high degree of certainty. That's a finding from a somewhat uncertain study released May 7 by the Mowat Centre, an Ontario-based think tank located at the University of Toronto. In it, they said the quality of data that Statistics Canada and other agencies are able to provide for small geographic sections of the country is poor to non-existent. Nunatsiaq Online

 

[Opinion] Should All Nunavut Suicides Get an Inquest? The ongoing suicide crisis in Canada's North continues without let up. Millions are spent on what seem to be worthless efforts to try and stem the tide that is taking the lives of so many. Both the late Bill MacKenzie and I felt for years that the concept of trying to prevent a person from ending their life does not work. All this effort and money has made no difference. Nunatsaiq Online

 

russian flag Russian Government Subsidizes Arctic Expedition Research. Russia's Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev signed an order to allocate 205.2 million rubles (almost $4 million) for resuming national research expeditions in the Arctic, the government's site reported on Monday, TASS announced. The North Pole drifting station is a major factor of Russia's presence in high-latitude regions of the Arctic, which confirms "Russia's priority in complex research in the Arctic region," the website reads. Focus News

 

UAVs to Be Banned in Arctic, Antarctic. This week two major associations representing tour operators in the Arctic and Antarctic respectively, have stated that they will not allow visitors to bring recreational Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) into the regions. The International Association of Antarctic Tour Operators (IAATO) reached an agreement at its 26 Annual Meeting to forbid the use of the devices for the 2015-16 season. Similarly, the Association of Cruise Operators (AECO) announced today that they will be banning UAVs as well. The Maritime Executive

 

Legislative Actionfutureevents  

 

No Arctic legislation was formally considered Friday.

 

Future Events 


 

Neighbors in the North: Canada, the United States, and the Arctic Council, May 14, 2015 (Bellingham, Washington, USA). The Border Policy Research Institute, the Center for Canadian American Studies, the Consulate General of Canada, and Western Washington University host this event to consider what it means for the Arctic and the US when the chairmanship of the Arctic Council passes from Canada to the United States. 

 

Effects of Oil on Wildlife, May 18-22, 2015 (Anchorage, Alaska, USA). This event is co-sponsored by International Bird Rescue and "Aiuka," which is a Brazilian conservation organization.  The event will focus on polar wildlife issues and integrating wildlife into oil response, etc.  Alaska Clean Seas is also a sponsor.  North Slope Borough will also be a part of this meeting. 

 

IARPC webinar on outcomes from Arctic meetings in Japan (ASSW, ISAR & ICARPIII), May 19, 2015, 3pm EDT. Connect via WebEx or teleconference to learn highlights from Drs. Larry Hinzman (IASC VP) and David Hik (IASC President) from Arctic Science Summit Week, in Toyama, Japan (April 23-30) that involved almost 700 international participants who helped plan future Arctic research.
 

The House of Sweden Conference, May 19-20, 2015 (Washington, DC, USA). A two day conference focusing on changes, adaptations and opportunities for a changing Arctic. The conference will be divided into separate, but intertwined thematic segments - policy, science, climate change and green technologies. The conference is organized by the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs, the Swedish Polar Research Secretariat, the Embassy of Sweden in Washington, DC and the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), and is aimed at Arctic oriented policy-makers, researchers, business representatives and NGO's in the lead-up to the U.S. chairmanship of the Arctic Council. Chair of the US Arctic Research Commission Fran Ulmer is scheduled to participate on a panel discussing the Next Steps of Arctic Cooperation.
 

The European Union and Arctic (2015 EU-Arctic Conference), May 29, 2015 (Dundee, UK). The School of Law, University of Dundee, UK and the K. G. Jebsen Centre for the Law of the Sea, University of Tromsø, Norway are pleased to announce the registration open for "The European Union and the Arctic" (2015 EU-Arctic Conference). This conference will bring together academics and practitioners from relevant disciplines such as international law, international relations, political science and marine biology, NGOs, representatives from EU institutions and international organizations to discuss the EU's potential contribution to enhance Arctic governance. A roadmap for increasing the effectiveness of the EU's action in the Arctic will be drawn at the end of the conference. 

 

Polar Research Board Spring Meeting, June 2-3, 2015 (Washington, DC, USA). The Polar Research Board is a part of the Division on Earth and Life Studies of the National Academies.  The Polar Research Board will host its spring meeting in Washington, D.C.  Please see the link for the agenda.

 

7th International Conference on Arctic Margins, June 2-5, 2015 (Trondheim, Norway).  The next meeting, the 7th International Conference on Arctic Margins (ICAM VII), previously announced to be arranged in St. Petersburg, will be held in Norway.  ICAM VII is hosted by the Geological Survey of Norway. The International Conference on Arctic Margins (ICAM) was founded by the U.S. Department of the Interior Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, formerly the Minerals Management Service, in 1991 with the underlying two-point theme of 1) Arctic understanding, 2) international cooperation in Arctic research. To these ends, ICAM has provided a successful forum for the exchange of information, collaboration in research, and presentation of results. ICAM is organized, hosted, and conducted by scientists for scientists which makes it a unique forum.

 

16th International Congress on Circumpolar Health: Focus on Future Health and Wellbeing, June 8-12, 2015 (Oulu, Finland). The congress will focus on human health and well-being in the Arctic and northern areas. It is open for everyone interested in Arctic issues, especially scientists, researchers, health care professionals, policy analysts, government agency representatives and community leaders. The congress is organized by the Thule Institute, University of Oulu in collaboration with the International Union of Circumpolar Health (IUCH), the Nordic Society for Circumpolar Health, the Society of Arctic Health and Biology, and the Rokua Health & Spa. The InternationaI Congress on Circumpolar Health (ICCH) series are arranged every three years in Arctic countries or countries related to Arctic issues. First congress of the series was arranged in 1967, and it was previously hosted by Oulu in 1971.

  

52nd Annual Conference of the Animal Behavior Society, June 10-14, 2015 (Anchorage, Alaska, USA). The Animal Behavior Society was founded in 1964 to promote the study of animal behavior in the broadest sense, including studies using descriptive and experimental methods under natural and controlled conditions. Current members' research activities span the invertebrates and vertebrates, both in the field and in the laboratory, and include experimental psychology, behavioral ecology, neuroscience, zoology, biology, applied ethology, and human ethology as well as many other specialized areas.

 

2015 ESSAS Annual Science Meeting, June 15-17, 2015 (Seattle, WA, USA). This symposium, to be held at the University of Washington, is intended for interdisciplinary scholars who will be prepared to discuss their research in the sub-arctic North Atlantic, sub-arctic North Pacific, and the Arctic Ocean that bears on the issue of how changes in sea ice are likely to affect these marine ecosystems. The symposium will also consider the people who depend upon these ecosystems and how they may be able to cope with the changes in the ecosystem goods and services that are coming. These goods and services include the availability of transportation corridors, the availability of subsistence foods, and the opportunity for commercial fishing. To put the present day in a longer perspective, the symposium will include a session on the paleo-ecology of people in sub-arctic and arctic regions that were forced to adjust to changing sea-ice conditions in the past.

  

6th Symposium on the Impacts of an Ice-Diminishing Arctic on Naval and Maritime Operations, July 14-16, 2015 (Washington, DC, USA). This biennial symposium, co-hosted by the US National Ice Center and the US Arctic Research Commission, brings together nationally and internationally recognized experts on Arctic observations, climate change, and maritime operations. Past symposia expanded the discussion to include the impact of an ice-diminishing arctic on other nations and their maritime operations including commercial transportation, oil and gas exploration and exploitation, fisheries, and oceanographic research. The continuing reduction in Arctic sea ice extent remains a central focus. 

 

Polar Law Symposium (8th) will be held in Alaska (Sept. 23-24, UAF; Sept. 25-26, UAA). It's sponsored by UAF, UAA (and ISER), UAA Justice Center, UW Law School. Abstracts due 3/15/15. This year's conference theme is, "The Science, Scholarship, and Practice of Polar Law: Strengthening Arctic Peoples and Places."

2015 Arctic Energy Summit, September 28-30, 2015 (Fairbanks, Alaska, USA).The Institute of the North's 2015 Arctic Energy Summit builds on our legacy efforts to address energy as a fundamental element of the sustainable development of the Arctic as a lasting frontier.Central to this concept is a focus on providing pathways for affordable energy development in the Arctic and for Arctic communities.

 
The Polar Oceans and Global Climate Change, November 3-6, 2015 (La Jolla, California USA.)  The American Polar Society will host this Symposium at Scripps Institution of Oceanography.  A flyer with a partial list of presenters is available on the Society's website (americanpolar.org) and from the Society's Membership Chairman by email.

Due North: Next Generation Arctic Research & Leadership, November 5-8, 2015 (Calgary, Alberta, Canada). The Association of Canadian Universities for Northern Studies (ACUNS) will convene an interdisciplinary conference of early career scientists working on Arctic issues. The organizers have issued a call for abstracts, due 5/31/15, on the following topics, full descriptions of where are available here, Arctic Communities, Arctic Sustainable Development, Arctic Wildlife, Ecosystem and Biodiversity, Arctic Food Security, Arctic Landscapes, Climate Change and Adaptation, Disaster Risk Management, Policy, Politics and Leadership, Arctic Environment (Data and Techniques), Arctic Resources, and Future of Arctic.

  

11th International Conference on Permafrost (ICOP 2016), June 20-24, 2016 (Potsdam, Germany). The Alfred Wegener Institute has teamed up with UP Transfer GmbH and the University of Potsdam to organize a great conference for you, permafrost researchers. The conference aims at covering all relevant aspects of permafrost research, engineering and outreach on a global and regional level.

  

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