Circumpolar
Map
of Resources at Risk from Oil Spills in the Arctic
Introduction | Areas
at Risk | Thematic
Maps | What's
new
Areas at risk
Introduction
Methodology
Map catalogue
Area
views
Methodology
Each
of the 8 Arctic nations provided data on biological resources within their
country’s Arctic sea area (national data sets). International importance
was determined first by applying a series of filtering criteria at the
national level and further based on the fact that species was identified by
two or more Arctic countries national data contributions. Included in
the national data sets are a selected list of the important subsistence or
traditional use biological resources of international importance that are at
risk from oil activities. This data set represents 35 species of
international arctic importance. The 35 species selected includes 17 birds,
7 fish and 11 mammals (see table).
The table also shows which nation selected each given species and the total
number of countries in which the species was selected. Maps showing
the seasonal distributions of these resources are shown under the Thematic
Maps menu.
Analysis
of how selected biological resources overlapped with oil exploration or
production areas, major oils storage depots, pipelines or shipping routes
was determined by placing a 0.5 degree grid over the entire EPPR Arctic
area. Species identified for each grid block that contained oil activities
were codified and presented as colored grid maps for each season. A 50
km buffer zone was created around storage facilities ashore. also see table on the
statistical distribution of species overlaps with oil activities).
These circumpolar maps can be found under the “Areas at Risk” menu.
Based
on this analysis, the grid maps identify areas in each season with the
greatest overlap between biological resources and areas with oil activities.
These areas can be inferred as those within the arctic area with the
greatest risk for biological effects should an oil spill occur, due to
spatial and temporal overlap of oil activities and species distributions.
Areas are indicated with red (extremely important), orange and yellow
(important) dots. For
each area, a short list of resources is provided.
Please note that these maps do not provide information on the specific risk oil activities pose to biological resources. This shows the relative numbers of selected, internationally important species found in areas with oil activities.