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Written testiinony for the hearing of the Senate Select Conunittee on Intelligence on 

 Radioactive and other Environmental Threats to the Arctic resulting from past Soviet 

 activities, Saturday, August 15, 1992, Fairbanks, Alaska, Thomas C. Royer 



An Action Plan for Arctic Pollution Studies 



Past pollution of the Arctic by the Former Soviet Union and the continuing 

 contamination from the existing sites and practices in Russia pose potentially serious threats 

 to the Arctic environments and its inhabitants as discussed in the oral testimony of IS 

 August 1992. The University of Alaska has expertise that can be brought to bear on this 

 problem and the faculty of the University of Alaska have a direct interest in protecting the 

 well-being of their families and neighbors; they are willing to respond with vigor to this 

 problem. 



The problem is an interdisciplinary and international one. It cannot be solved by 

 one agency or country. It requires a very long duration commitment. It also requires the 

 utilization of resources in what is considered by many as a remote region of the world, 

 though not remote to those of us who live here. The use of existing organizations, 

 cooperative agreements and facilities to address this problem would provide the most rapid 

 and least expensive approach to this complex problem. 



As mentioned in oral testimony of this hearing, the problem can be broken down 

 into four tasks, 1) identification of sources of pollution, 2) monitoring for that pollution at a 

 network of sites, 3) investigation of pathways for that pollution and 4) mitigation of the 

 hazard. The potential sources include radionuclides, heavy metals, pesticides, 

 hydrocarbons, and PCBs. How do we proceed? 



We need both a long-term plan and immediate action. Immediate action should take 

 advantage of existing programs in the Arctic nations. For example, air monitoring sites 

 should be added to existing networks. Sampling opportunities in the Arctic marine 

 environment are available in the upcoming months and they should be utilized. Within the 

 next several weeks, at least two research vessels will be in the Chukchi Sea in both the 

 Russian and US EEZ and could carry out some limited, initial sampling. These studies 

 involve both University of Alaska Fairbanks and Russian scientists. Similar opportunities 

 might exist in other areas such as wildlife ecology and public health that can be identified as 

 helping with the problem. There currently exists a cooperative agreement on the Beringia 

 Heritage Park that could be used to sample terrestrial systems on either side of the Bering 

 Sea. 



A long-term plan for Arctic Pollution Studies should be developed by an international 

 group of science and engineering experts. This interdisciplinary group should develop a 

 long-term action plan for the four tasks soon, beginning with an identification of existing 

 data and information on Arctic pollution that expands on the information provided in these 

 Senate Hearings. I propose that the University of Alaska host such a meeting and 

 coordinate it with interested universities and other organizations including federal and state 

 agencies. After a plan is established, requests for specific proposals can be made and the 

 work begun, 



A critical facet of this work will be the cooperation of Russian and other circum- 

 Arctic scientists. While the faculty at the University of Alaska Fairbanks already have 

 many collaborative agreements with Russian colleagues, it is important that ties between 

 Arctic researchers be strengthened and ties established where they do not exist. The new 

 International Arctic Science Committee (lASC) can play a major role here. A University of 

 Alaska Fairbanks faculty member presently chairs the LASC Working Group on Global 

 Change, which is concerned with environmental changes in the Arctic. Also, AMAP, the 

 international Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Program is now devising a strategy for 

 monitoring Arctic pollution, and University of Alaska Fairbanks faculty members are 

 helping to write the US contribution to this strategy. Both of these activities will be 

 brought into our proposed long-term planning. 



