Canada publishes first comprehensive atlas, maps geological riches of Arctic mineral resources

This article belongs to the Polar melting, Arctic mining and mineral resources story arc.

ottawacitizen.com :

Canada has published the first comprehensive atlas of Arctic geology - everything from continental plates to rock types that signal where to hunt for gold, diamonds, gas and oil. The atlas contains $1-billion worth of data from polar countries, and carries enormous implications for contentious Arctic sovereignty claims - based partly on formations under the ocean - and for mining and earthquake forecasting. The map is available electronically and in a poster from Natural Resources Canada, showing the world north of the Arctic Circle.

Already, mining companies are eager for a look, said Marc St-Onge, a Geological Survey of Canada senior scientist. Canada, Russia, the United States, Denmark, Norway, Finland and Sweden all contributed data. The $1-billion figure represents years of field work by these countries combined : icebreakers, helicopter flights, seismic profiles, and geologists trekking on foot. It shows not only the surface, but also deeper layers in 3D "data cubes." He noted that with the economic slowdown, the mining industry has time to digest what the atlas shows, without pressure to rush out and drill right away.

- The irony of all this has already been noted a couple of years ago and it goes like this :

1. Humans burn fossil fuels to release the buried solar energy stored therein
2. Atmospheric carbon dioxide levels rise and the natural "greenhouse effect" is amplified
3. The oceans warm and ice melts
4. Melting ice opens up new prospective oil & gas provinces for exploration & production
5. Humans burn more fossil fuels ... and back to (2)

The above passage really does point out the absurdity of the situation. But there is nothing particularly funny about it if you also consider the potential global sea level rise, with 7 meters (23 feet) due to Greenland melting and, it has also been said, up to 60 meters (197 feet) if Antarctica were to also melt.

We need to break this cycle of burning fossil fuels. We need to implement solar energy, we need to implement wind energy, and at the same time we also should not rule out nuclear energy - whatever alternative energy sources that are workable and that are deployable. The alternative is for the countries of the world to start fighting resource wars - and there are those who argue that these resource wars have started already. There could be increasingly nasty conflicts over increasingly scarce resources. The Great Arctic Endgame is just one of them.

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