Modeling of long-range transport of contaminants from potential sources in the Arctic Ocean by water and sea ice

Abstract

The most rapid spreading of the pollutants and largest contaminated areas result from possible sources located near the Lena and Mackenzie river mouths. There are two regions, the northern and eastern coastal zone of Greenland and the Laptev Sea, that are contaminated in nearly all variants of location of the possible sources in the coastal zone of the Arctic and Nordic seas. The calculated trajectories of ice drift from areas of potential sources of pollution allow us to evaluate the character of pollutant transport and the areas of redistribution. From that we can conclude that sea ice from most potential sources of contaminant can reach the open Polar Basin and the FS. Contaminated sea ice from potential sources in the Kara and Laptev seas can reach FS within 2-4 years and from the East Siberian, Chukchi and Beaufort seas within 6-11 years. Analysis of the inter-annual variability of sea ice TT from different sites to FS has shown a significant positive trend in the last century. The results of the simulation can also give useful information for the selection of the most representative areas for monitoring contaminants in the Arctic Ocean. Based the structure of passive tracer spreading we obtained and our simulated trajectories of ice drift from different potential sources in the Arctic Ocean we conclude that the most important regions for monitoring of contaminants are FS and Laptev Sea. © 2007 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.