NNA Planning (Track 2)

Navigating the New Arctic (NNA) is one of NSF's 10 Big Ideas. NNA projects address convergence scientific challenges in the rapidly changing Arctic. This Arctic research is needed to inform the economy, security and resilience of the Nation, the larger region and the globe. NNA empowers new research partnerships from local to international scales, diversifies the next generation of Arctic researchers, enhances efforts in formal and informal education, and integrates the co-production of knowledge where appropriate.

Navigating the New Arctic (NNA) is one of NSF's 10 Big Ideas. NNA projects address convergence scientific challenges in the rapidly changing Arctic. This Arctic research is needed to inform the economy, security and resilience of the Nation, the larger region and the globe. NNA empowers new research partnerships from local to international scales, diversifies the next generation of Arctic researchers, enhances efforts in formal and informal education, and integrates the co-production of knowledge where appropriate.

Groundwater is a key drinking water source in Alaska. However, groundwater in Alaska is commonly contaminated with naturally occurring metals including iron, manganese, and arsenic. When these contaminants are present in drinking water, they pose a serious health threat. Water treatment systems in many rural communities are not always able to remove these contaminants. This situation endangers the well-being of the community, diminishes trust in the treatment system, and reduces use of the treated water.

Arctic telecommunications has emerged as a key tool in responding to the unprecedented changes being experienced in the region, from environmental shifts to globalization. Unfortunately, small rural and Indigenous communities are seldom included in discussions of telecommunications, leaving them underserved and incapable of leveraging technology advances to ensure their own resilience. This project is developing a model that small Arctic communities can use to design and implement community technology infrastructure to support their unique needs.

Even when it exists, formal water infrastructure in rural Alaska often fails to provide an adequate level of service to Alaskan households and communities. Operating water infrastructure in the Arctic is particularly difficult due to the unique coupling between the engineered systems and the unusually extreme challenges from social and natural systems.

Alaskan communities and their built environment are affected by permafrost thaw, coastal and river erosion, flooding, and other natural processes altered or accelerated by environmental changes. Arctic coastal communities in particular face compound threats from riverbank erosion, permafrost thaw, and increasing coastal storm impacts. As data collection campaigns in the Arctic are costly and often limited to periods of the year when weather affords access to sites of interest, significant gaps in data and information can result.

Significant progress has been made to improve the accuracy both of short-term weather forecasts and longer-term climate, sea-ice, and other environmental forecasts. Nevertheless, there remains a forecasting gap on the scale from two weeks to a few months, especially in the Arctic. This subseasonal-to-seasonal (S2S) scale is important for planning subsistence hunting, commercial fishing, hazard response and risk mitigation, and other activities.

Navigating the New Arctic (NNA) is one of NSF's 10 Big Ideas. NNA projects address convergence scientific challenges in the rapidly changing Arctic. The Arctic research is needed to inform the economy, security and resilience of the Nation, the larger region and the globe. NNA empowers new research partnerships from local to international scales, diversifies the next generation of Arctic researchers, enhances efforts in formal and informal education, and integrates the co-production of knowledge where appropriate.

Navigating the New Arctic (NNA) is one of NSF's 10 Big Ideas. NNA projects address convergence scientific challenges in the rapidly changing Arctic. The Arctic research is needed to inform the economy, security and resilience of the Nation, the larger region and the globe. NNA empowers new research partnerships from local to international scales, diversifies the next generation of Arctic researchers, enhances efforts in formal and informal education, and integrates the co-production of knowledge where appropriate.

Navigating the New Arctic (NNA) is one of NSF's 10 Big Ideas. NNA projects address convergence scientific challenges in the rapidly changing Arctic. The Arctic research is needed to inform the economy, security and resilience of the Nation, the larger region and the globe. NNA empowers new research partnerships from local to international scales, diversifies the next generation of Arctic researchers, enhances efforts in formal and informal education, and integrates the co-production of knowledge where appropriate.