0503 Arctic Ocean synthesis

Other changes in the physical environment in the Arctic shelf regions include increased river discharge, rising sea-level, thawing of permafrost and coastal erosion. Changes in albedo (light reflectance) associated with snow and sea-ice trends can result in a positive feed-back on warming trends. The potential biological impacts include shifts in species distributions, changes in the timing and magnitude of production cycles, risk to marine species dependent on sea-ice, and increased exposure of organisms to UV radiation through loss of snow and ice cover.

Impacts on society are wide ranging and include changing access to traditional foods, loss of hunting cultures, expanded marine shipping, increased access to marine natural resources, and enhanced Arctic fisheries (ACIA 2004). The challenges at both the regional and Pan-Arctic scales are to take the global-scale generalizations on climate change plus the functioning of each biological realm (e.g. Gradinger 1995, Smith and Schnack-Schiel 1990), and refine them with the details to assess past, present and future patterns.