ARCTIC: Record-low Arctic Sea Ice & more – 11th Mar 2025

Góðan daginn from Keswick Village! This is the Rorshok Arctic Update from the 11th of March twenty twenty-five. A quick summary of what’s going down North of the Arctic Circle!

There are troubling ice developments in the Arctic, according to new data from the EU climate monitoring agency, Copernicus, published on Wednesday the 5th. The Arctic's sea ice extent has fallen significantly below average, contributing to a record low in global sea ice coverage since satellite monitoring began in nineteen seventy-nine.

The situation is particularly concerning as Alaska and eastern Canada experienced unusually warm temperatures during February. These elevated temperatures are part of a broader pattern affecting the Arctic region, which is warming around four times faster than the global average. This decline in Arctic sea ice has wide-ranging implications, from disrupting local ecosystems and indigenous communities to potentially influencing weather patterns across the Northern Hemisphere.

While ice shrinks, the number of ships in the Arctic increases. According to a report by the shipping news agency gCaptain, published on Monday, the 3rd, Russia's Arctic port of Murmansk has experienced a dramatic tenfold surge in container traffic in the last year.

In twenty twenty-three only a single Chinese vessel made the Arctic journey across Russia, but this increased to ten in twenty twenty-four. Chinese shipping giant COSCO is leading the charge, deploying specialized ice-class vessels along these Arctic passages.

The port authorities at Murmansk have predicted that this number will double to twenty Chinese container ships traveling over the Russian Arctic in twenty twenty-five, showing that the Arctic is now an important shipping route for the largest economies in the world.

Asia is getting heavily involved across the Arctic. US President Donald Trump gave a speech on Tuesday the 4th where he said that Japan, South Korea and other countries want to partner with the United States in developing a gigantic natural gas pipeline in Alaska, each investing trillions of dollars into the Alaskan economy. The US has desired a natural gas export facility in Alaska for many years, but the cost of building such a pipeline has prevented any development from beginning. With Japan and South Korea currently reliant on Russia for gas imports, they are now looking toward Alaska as a source of energy.

Still in Alaska, in a report published by the news agency The Arctic Sounder, on Monday the 3rd, over 1,000 US federal employees in the state are being laid off as part of the Trump administration’s ambition to reduce the size of the government workforce. Alaska has a particularly high proportion of federal workers, with almost five percent of workers hired by the federal government, much higher than the national average of two percent.

With many of these workers employed by agencies that protect the Arctic, such as the National Park Service and Climate agency, this decision will negatively impact both the people and the environment of the American Arctic.

Trump’s effect on the Arctic has been spreading to Greenland. Following months of declarations that the US will be trying to purchase Greenland, on Tuesday the 4th, Trump gave a speech where he declared that the US would acquire Greenland “one way or the other.”

With Greenland going to the polls on Tuesday the 11th in a high-stakes election, Naaja Nathanielsen, Greenland’s minister for natural resources, called for people to vote for a party that takes the American threats to Greenland seriously and will combat any attempts to purchase, coerce or even invade their country.

Reuters has written an article covering the election and the consequences of US involvement in Greenland, to see it yourself, take a look at the link in the show notes.

The Greenlandic government might have a lot on its plate, since it’s also being sued. The Greenlandic newspaper, Sermitsiaq, reported on Friday the 7th, that Polar Seafood, one of the country's largest seafood companies, is taking legal action against the government over quota allocations. The dispute centers on the Greenlandic Government's recent decision to reduce Polar Seafood's fishing quotas for halibut by a third.

Miki Brøns, the Polar Seafood CEO, argues there is no legal basis for reducing their quota and hopes that the government reverts its decision before the case goes to the national court.

Next up, on Thursday the 6th, Justin Trudeau, the Canadian Prime Minister, announced a massive investment of over $25 billion US dollars into childcare programs across the country, with hundreds of millions being allocated to Canada’s Arctic territories. In his announcement, Trudeau, who is set to resign in the coming days, noted that he hopes he leaves behind a legacy of supporting Canadian families, spanning from the large cities to the far northern Indigenous communities.

With that act, the curtain has closed on Justin Trudeau’s time as Canadian PM. On Monday the 10th, the ruling Liberal Party announced the results of its leadership election to decide who will replace Trudeau. The winner and Canada’s 24th Prime Minister will be Mark Carney, who was born in Fort Smith in the Canadian Arctic. Carney will be sworn into office in the coming days where he will be met with a trade war initiated by Donald Trump and a federal election in October.

The Canadian government is spending even more money on Arctic defense. On Thursday the 6th, Bill Blair, the National Defense Minister, said that the federal government is vastly increasing the amount of money it’s spending to build a network of Arctic military hubs, from about 150 million US dollars, to almost 1.9 billion.

The government first announced the project last year at the lower budget, but the recent increase in military tensions in the Arctic has led the government to realize the need for serious investment in northern defense. Three advanced military bases will be built in Iqaluit, Yellowknife and Inuvik, each will have airstrips, logistics facilities and equipment, and are intended to support military aircraft operations.

Defending the Arctic is one of NATO’s priorities, with northern Norway hosting a massive military exercise to practice countering military threats in the North. According to a NATO press release published on Monday the 3rd, the Joint Viking twenty twenty-five exercise is taking over 10,000 soldiers from nine countries across NATO to practice military operations in the Finnmark region of Norway, which is by the Russian border. The operation will also include civil services such as police, health services, and fire and rescue, with Norway preparing to respond in case of an emergency in the far north.

Military action is already taking a heavy toll in the Arctic. According to a report by the Norwegian news outlet The Barents Observer from Tuesday the 4th, the ongoing conflict in Ukraine is devastating reindeer herding communities across northern Russia, with a generation of herders being lost to military conscription and the war. In the list of soldiers killed in Ukraine published by the Russian military, it can be seen that men from northern Indigenous communities are being drafted and killed in the war disproportionately when compared to Russians from wealthier regions.

The loss of these young herders represents a potentially irreversible disruption to a way of life that has sustained Arctic Indigenous communities for generations.

The Indigenous people of Northern Norway are preparing for their biggest celebration of the year. On Friday the 7th, the National broadcaster NRK reported about the upcoming Sami Grand Prix, taking place on the 12th of April. Held in Kautokeino, the Grand Prix is an annual music competition that's been a cornerstone of Sámi cultural celebration since nineteen ninety, and it is considered critical to celebrating, preserving and modernizing the Sámi musical tradition of yoik singing.

The competition will be broadcast across Scandinavian TV channels, with the public voting from twelve finalists from across the Sami nation to decide who is the best singer of twenty twenty-five.

Aaand that’s it for this week! Thank you for joining us!

If you have any feedback, send us an email at info@rorshok.com. We want to make our updates better for you!

Adjo