Global Warming, toxins threaten Arctic meltdown
by Dr. Reese Halter
The arctic is a barometer of the planet's health. Its indigenous peoples, animals and plants are marvelously adapted to the harsh environment. Airborne toxins and global warming are rapidly altering life in the Far North.
The area north of the 66th parallel is called the Arctic Circle . Eight countries have presence in the Arctic .
The Inuit, Dene, Metis, Inupiat (some still called Eskimos), Aleuts, Yup'ik, Chuckchi, Nenets, Saami, and the Faroese - all Arctic peoples - eat 194 different species of wild animals, most of them from the sea.
Marine blubber is low is saturated fats and high in omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids, which significantly lower the risk of heart disease. Those fatty acids also reduce the risk of developing Alzheimer's and, perhaps more importantly, omega-3 nourishes and stimulates brain development, especially in the womb.
Meat from marine mammals is also high in antioxidants, which can prevent cancer.
Beluga meat contains 10 times the amount of iron compared with beef, five times more vitamins and 50 per cent more protein. Six ounces (170 grams) of narwhal (whale) contain the same amount of vitamin C as a glass of orange juice or a cup of strawberries.
The indigenous people of the Arctic are able to nourish themselves despite the lack of fresh fruits and vegetables - a remarkable feat.
Today, more than 200 toxic pesticides and potent industrial compounds are found in high concentrations in animals and peoples of the Far North.
Polychlorinated biphenyl compounds, known as PCBs, have leaked from electrical transformers into the environment. Although banned in the 1970s by most countries, at least 21,000 old transformers exist in the U.S. alone, and they contain at least 45 million kilograms of PCBs.
When PCBs enter the environment, they circulate in the air, and on the land. Eventually they are deposited on the snow the ocean in the Arctic . Essentially, PCBs hop around the planet like the movement of grasshoppers.
About 60 tonnes of PCB gases arrive each year in the Arctic . Two-thirds of them stay put, the rest continue to move.
PCBs are endocrine disruptors. This means they alter sex hormones, significantly impairing fetuses by damaging the development of the brain in addition to affecting all vital organs.
In the Arctic , they accumulate in ocean sediments. They infiltrate single-celled plants, which are eaten by copepods. Copepods are eaten by cod, cod are consumed by narwhals and, in turn, narwhals are eaten by the Inuit. Moreover, ringed seals eat cod, and polar bears and humans eats seals.
At each level of the food chain, the PCBs are passed along and concentration becomes magnified - a process called biomagnification.
Polar bears and people of the North are carrying much greater concentrations of PCBs than the waters where their food originates.
PCBs are stored in fat cells, clinging to the body rather than flushing through it. Female mammals pass doses of PCBs to their offspring through their milk The milk of Arctic women have 10 times more PCBs and pesticides than mothers from any of the major cities in Canada . Women from Nunavik have 22 chemicals, 10 insecticides and 12 PCB compounds in their bodies at extraordinarily high levels.
Two thousand polar bears near the Kara Sea contain the highest recorded levels of PCBs, 12 times more than Alaskan bears.
Each year, between 4.5 tonnes and nine tonnes of mercury enter Earth's atmosphere. Between 50 per cent and 75 per cent of the mercury in the environment is human induced. Coal-fired power plants, the planet's key electricity source, and chemical factories are emitting mercury.
Mercury is a powerful neurotoxin. Ninety-three per cent of the women tested from eastern Greenland and 68 per cent of those from Nunavut exceeded guidelines designed to protect fetuses from neurological damage due to mercury poisoning.
Each year, 45 tonnes to 272 tonnes of mercury gas flow into the Arctic . It's transported from thousands of kilometers away. In the spring, when the first rays of light interact with the salt in the air and the mercury, a photochemical reaction occurs.
It's called mercury sunrise and it forces mercury into the snow and ultimately into the ocean.
Global warming is occurring five to 10 times faster in the Arctic than anywhere else on the planet. Sea ice is disappearing at a record rate. Six months ago, the Arctic was forecast to be ice-free in 2060. Today, it is predicted to be ice-free by 2040. Less ice translates into more toxins in the Arctic Ocean .
The sea surrounding Alaska 's Aleutian Islands has been laid waste by global warming. Missing are 115,000 sea otters. Orcas living near the Aleutians traditionally ate Stellar sea lions and seals, both rich in blubber and loaded with calories.
In the early 1980s, water in the Gulf of Alaska rose by 2C. The sea lions and seals soon disappeared, leaving just the otters. The orcas changed their diet and began to eat the otters.
Once the otters vanished, the number of sea urchins skyrocketed. The sea urchins have eaten most of the massive, six metre-tall kelp forests, formerly the otters' habitat.
Rising ocean temperatures have killed off the plankton, which fed the copepods and krill, which in turn fed the shrimp and Alaska king crabs.
Shrimps, crabs, capelin and herring are gone. A once brimming diversified ecosystem has been reduced to just sea urchins, cod, Pollack, and sharks.
The speed in which all these species have been lost has been likened to the loss of the dinosaurs.
- April 2007
Dr. Reese Halter is an award-winning conservation biologist, research scientist, and author. Visit his website for more information.