Arctic (Arctic Zone)

Main article: Earth (planet)

Arctic development

Main article: Development of the Arctic

Arctic climate

2021: Ice-free Arctic proves a threat to the world

Scientists at the University of Oulu in Finland identified the cause of heavy snowfall in the south Europe in 2018, which led to catastrophic losses in the grape harvest. According to the results of scientific work published in the journal Nature Geoscience, the loss of Arctic sea ice due to climate change can cause severe and cold winters in the middle latitudes.^[1] is briefly described] in a press release on the Phys.org^[2]

Scientific work explains how the disappearance of floating ice in the Arctic threatens the whole world, affecting global climate processes. The "snow paradox" is explained by the fact that the reduction of the Arctic sea ice cover by 50 percent led to an increase in the area of ​ ​ ice-free water and increased evaporation of moisture in winter, which led to more heavy snowfall in southern Europe. Researchers have identified geochemical features in atmospheric vapor moving south of the Arctic, which show that its source was the warm open water surface of the Barents Sea.

Europe was hit by the Beast from the East in 2018 - a powerful cyclone that caused snowfall in February that led to a loss of one billion pounds a day. It turned out that 88 percent of the snow that fell arose from the water evaporated from the Barents Sea.

In an analysis of long-term trends starting in 1979, researchers found that every next square metre of winter sea ice lost in the Barents Sea increased the mass of snow that fell by about 70 kilograms. Over the next 60 years, the Barents Sea is forecast to become completely ice-free, leading to a significant increase in winter precipitation in Europe.

Population and projects

2020: Residents of the Arctic zone in the Russian Federation number 2.5 million people

If by the end of the existence of the Soviet Union the population of the Arctic zone was about 3 million people, now it is about 2.5 million people. There is a fairly large outflow of population from the Arctic territories, which today we have practically nothing to stop.

Large-scale projects are being implemented, yes, Novatek is building Yamal-LNG, yes, Lukoil is developing new fields, yes, Gazprom and Rosneft are building new production enterprises, and, of course, they bring their employees there. But it so happened that there is a very large gap between what private oil and gas companies implement and what the state offers.

Data for July 2020

It is clear that for private companies, no matter how affiliated with the state, the main thing is profit, and they solve issues with personnel quite effectively. At the same time, as practice shows, in 2020 the bulk of people who work at mining enterprises are those who do not stay there to live.

Of course, living conditions in the North are not the best, and leaving people to live there is probably not always profitable. But people don't come into airless space. The Soviet Union left a fairly large legacy in the Arctic: many live and work there. Those who remained in the North after the collapse of the Soviet Union and/or work in the service infrastructure around these oil and gas producers are probably one of the most vulnerable social categories today.

Statistics demonstrate that sometimes the wages of workers in the Arctic in a number of areas, primarily in the service sector, if they are not equal to the same wages in Central Russia, then they differ more than much. But the cost of living in the Arctic is higher than in middle Russia. In addition, if in the middle lane a conditional library worker can start a vegetable garden to feed on it a little, then in the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug - hardly.

Of course, it did not contribute to people staying, and the adoption of the pension law, which was extended to the Arctic zone. The cold did not decrease, the climate did not get better. If earlier those who worked in the Arctic in the Far North had a preferential retirement, now this age has caught up with all other Russian citizens. Why people who invested in the development of the Arctic should suffer - no one said.

Of course, we need to solve the question of how to consolidate personnel in the Arctic. Moreover, it so happened that today it is even approximately unclear how many personnel we need. There are still disputes about how we can develop these territories. Should people live in the Arctic on a permanent basis or should they come and leave better?

On the one hand, there is Soviet experience in the development of the Arctic. There is Norilsk, there is Vorkuta - cities that were built beyond the Arctic Circle, and, probably, you can refer to this experience. But let's see what happens to the same Vorkuta, how many abandoned apartments are there now. On the other hand, it will not be possible to develop the Arctic on a rotational basis. It is not for nothing that the Norwegians on Svalbard maintain a constant population while we evacuate our population from Svalbard. There has to be some particular balance.

For people to actually travel and stay in the Arctic to work, find incentives, there must be a whole set of measures to improve life in the Far North. Unfortunately, today there is not only no integrated approach of the state to this, but also some rollback is visible, as with the same law on retirement age. I really want to believe that calls to master the Arctic, not to leave the Arctic, to find a new economic lever for the development of the whole country will be followed not just by empty promises, but by some concrete steps.^[3]

Armed Forces

2023: Map of the world's military bases in the Arctic

The Arctic is a new place for Russia and NATO, where they will increase their military power, Bloomberg wrote in March 2023.

Russia is deploying nuclear submarines in a region whose strategic importance to major powers, including the United States and China, will increase.

The extent of Arctic seabed resources is not well understood, but the region is estimated to contain a fourth of the world's oil and natural gas reserves, and sea lanes can reduce the time of traditional commercial shipping by days or even weeks.

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