Alaska

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.

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.

Arctic communities face many challenges as they grow and develop in the context of a rapidly changing environment. These challenges include coastal erosion, permafrost thaw, and ecosystem change. Arctic cities need to prepare for critical decisions in the future, which traditional scientific approaches alone are unable to address adequately. Instead, an interdisciplinary, community-based approach is necessary. Utqiagvik, the northernmost urban center in Alaska, is facing many of these common challenges and provides a model for other Arctic cities.

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.

Few transformations are as dramatic or as complex as those occurring now in the Arctic. There are rapid changes in climate and the environment, in international treaties and regulations, in national security, and claims for territory. At the same time, Arctic communities and Indigenous Peoples are looking to find their place in a changing global economy. This convergence of changes and aspirations is leading to questions about what kinds of infrastructure are needed, where it should be located, and how this may impact Arctic people and environment.

The well-being of Alaskan Indigenous communities depends on access to safe drinking water. However, water pollution has remained a reality for many of these communities due to naturally occurring and anthropogenic pollutants. As the climate warms, environmental changes will likely exacerbate water contamination problems by releasing entombed microorganisms, ancient organic carbon, nutrients, and metals through thawing of permafrost and melting of glaciers.

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.