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Yearly Archives: 2024 − News & Stories


A litt­le Christ­mas pre­sent: new Spits­ber­gen pages

P.S. TLDR? Too long, don’t feel like rea­ding, rather get straight to the point? At the bot­tom of the post are the links to the new pages: Akseløya, Mid­ter­huk­ham­na and the old mines on the north side of Advent­fjord.

The last few weeks have once again been jam-packed, but it was worth it, working on the new edi­ti­on of the Spits­ber­gen gui­de­book. More on this in a few weeks from now.

Polar night, Adventdalen

Polar night atmo­sphe­re in Advent­da­len.
The pic­tu­re shows the illu­mi­na­ted cor­ner sta­ti­on of the old coal-fired cable car at End­a­len.

At the same time, I have been working on a cou­ple of pages dedi­ca­ted to cer­tain are­as and indi­vi­du­al loca­ti­ons on Spits­ber­gen. After all, that’s whe­re you can tra­vel online, get­ting to fan­ta­stic places with just a mous­eclick which other­wi­se are dif­fi­cult to reach, if at all.

Longyearbyen, Nordlicht

Hint of a nor­t­hern light over Lon­gye­ar­by­en.

The­se include, among others, four pages that tog­e­ther illus­tra­te the lar­gest more or less con­ti­guous monu­ment of indus­tri­al histo­ry in Spits­ber­gen, name­ly the mining land­scape from the ear­ly 20th cen­tu­ry on the north side of Advent­fjord:

  • Advent City was the first ever attempt on Spits­ber­gen to mine coal indus­tri­al­ly.
  • Hior­th­hamn fol­lo­wed a few years later and is one of Svalbard’s most remar­kab­le cul­tu­ral monu­ments from the pio­nee­ring days of coal mining with its shore­li­ne com­plex.
  • Sne­heim is the old mine belon­ging to Hior­th­hamn. At an alti­tu­de of 582 met­res on Hiorth­fjel­let, incre­di­ble!
  • The old mess and accom­mo­da­ti­on area “Ørne­re­det” is part of the Sne­heim mine, the old mine belon­ging to Hior­th­hamn.

Also new are the pages about Rus­selt­ved­tod­den (ever heard of that?) at the sou­thern end of Akseløya (ah of cour­se … the beau­tiful Akseløya in Bell­sund) and Mid­ter­huk­ham­na. And the­re are brand new pages dedi­ca­ted to Sas­senfjord respec­tively Tem­pel­fjord. Oh yes, don’t for­get a quick trip to Agardhbuk­ta on the east coast 🙂

Longyearbyen, Mond

The moon abo­ve the old cable car cent­re in Lon­gye­ar­by­en.

Cli­ma­te chan­ge in Svalbard’s fjords and the Arc­tic Oce­an

A few weeks ago, I wro­te about Record mel­ting of Svalbard’s gla­ciers in 2024, on this site, focus­sing on con­se­quen­ces of cli­ma­te chan­ge on land.

But of cour­se the chan­ges are not limi­t­ed to the land; the sea is also affec­ted. Or, per­haps more accu­ra­te­ly, it plays a major, dri­ving role.

The Gulf Stream

In the North Atlan­tic, much is known to depend on the Gulf Stream. With its com­pa­ra­tively warm water mas­ses, it brings enorm­ous amounts of heat from the south and thus ensu­res the rela­tively mild cli­ma­te in the hig­hest lati­tu­des such as 78 degrees north, whe­re the Isfjord today remains lar­ge­ly ice-free all year round, while some fjords in nor­t­hern­most Green­land or Cana­da (Elles­me­re Island) only beco­me ice-free brief­ly in sum­mer or not at all.

Even small chan­ges in the Gulf Stream have a mas­si­ve impact on the regio­nal cli­ma­te in the north-east Atlan­tic. If the Gulf Stream brings a litt­le more warm water or if the water is a litt­le war­mer, the North Atlan­tic will beco­me con­sider­a­b­ly war­mer. If the sup­p­ly of warm water decrea­ses or no lon­ger rea­ches as far north, a regio­nal coo­ling could also occur that could affect the who­le of north-west Euro­pe. In the long term, this sce­na­rio can­not be ruled out as part of cli­ma­te chan­ge, but the oppo­si­te is curr­ent­ly the case.

Kongsfjord

Jør­gen Ber­ge from the Uni­ver­si­ty of Trom­sø has been kee­ping a clo­se eye on Kongsfjord for more than 20 years. As the rese­arch sett­le­ment of Ny-Åle­sund is loca­ted in Kongsfjord, this fjord has been stu­di­ed clo­se­ly for a long time, with deca­des of data available on all kinds of details. In addi­ti­on, the fjord is loca­ted on the part of the west coast that is most stron­gly influen­ced by the Gulf Stream, so it can ser­ve as an ear­ly war­ning sys­tem for chan­ges in the­se curr­ents and their local effects.

Kongsfjord

Kongsfjord near Ny-Åle­sund: an ocea­no­gra­phic and mari­ne bio­lo­gy rese­arch labo­ra­to­ry.

Ber­ge told Barents­ob­ser­ver about his work and obser­va­tions. The result anti­ci­pa­ted: a ‘radi­cal chan­ge in the mari­ne eco­sys­tem.’

Accor­ding to Ber­ge, the water mas­ses in the Kongsfjord are warm­ing by 0.1 degrees per year across the enti­re water column, i.e. by no less than 2 degrees in just 20 years. Two degrees is quite enough to dra­sti­cal­ly chan­ge the ocea­no­gra­phic-eco­lo­gi­cal cha­rac­ter of a sea area – and the warm­ing does not stop. The cha­rac­ter of the Kongsfjord has chan­ged from ‘arc­tic’ to ‘Atlan­tic’ during this time. In ocea­no­gra­phic terms, this initi­al­ly means that the water is war­mer and sal­tier.

The eco­sys­tem: plank­ton and sea­birds

Of cour­se, this is not wit­hout con­se­quen­ces for the eco­sys­tem. High-arc­tic, fat-rich plank­ton such as the cope­pod Cala­nus gla­cia­lis is incre­asing­ly being dis­pla­ced by its sub­arc­tic and less fat-rich rela­ti­ves Cala­nus finn­mar­chi­cus and Cala­nus hyper­bor­eus, which has con­se­quen­ces for sea­birds that feed on plank­ton. The high Arc­tic Litt­le auks in par­ti­cu­lar, which used to be – and still are, as of now – very num­e­rous, pre­fer to feed on the ener­gy-rich Cala­nus gla­cia­lis. If they have to rely more and more on their less ener­gy-rich rela­ti­ves, their diet will beco­me incre­asing­ly pro­ble­ma­tic.

Little auks

Litt­le auks on the west coast of Spits­ber­gen.

Recent histo­ry shows that the bree­ding popu­la­ti­ons of sea­birds are shrin­king almost ever­y­whe­re in the North Atlan­tic. The litt­le auks still seem to be doing quite well, but it is very dif­fi­cult to count the­se very small birds that breed invi­si­bly under rocks. The case is clear for guil­l­emots, puf­fins and gulls, whe­re some colo­nies in nor­t­hern Nor­way have prac­ti­cal­ly col­lap­sed sin­ce the 1980s. Dis­ap­peared.

Fjord ice: rin­ged seals and har­bour seals

Ano­ther aspect is that the Kongsfjord has hard­ly fro­zen over for around 15 years. Rin­ged seals, once the most num­e­rous seals in the fjords of Spits­ber­gen, need the fjord ice in spring to give birth to their young and to rest. The har­bour seal, which is also known from the sou­thern North Sea, is now much more com­mon on the west coast of Sval­bard than the rin­ged seal, which is very simi­lar in appearance. Seals have been natu­ral­ly occur­ring in Sval­bard for thou­sands of years and this obser­va­ti­on may be coin­ci­den­tal, but it fits in with the sci­en­ti­fi­cal­ly con­firm­ed deve­lo­p­ment of the fjords from a high­ly arc­tic eco­sys­tem to an Atlan­tic one.

Ringed seal, harbour seal

High Arc­tic rin­ged seal (left), sub­arc­tic har­bour seal.
Both live on the west coast of Spits­ber­gen.

Fish, mus­sels and tem­pe­ra­tu­re records

Ber­ge also speaks of a chan­ge in the spe­ci­es com­po­si­ti­on of fish and mus­sels. Spe­ci­es such as her­ring and cape­lin, which one would not expect to find in high Arc­tic fjords, are spre­a­ding, as are mus­sels.

Miesmuschel

More and more com­mon in Sval­bard: blue mus­sels.

Glo­bal warm­ing is more noti­ceable at the poles than at lower lati­tu­des; it is esti­ma­ted that the Arc­tic is warm­ing by a fac­tor of three to four more than other regi­ons. If one hopes that cli­ma­te chan­ge can somehow still be limi­t­ed to a warm­ing of 1.5-2 degrees, then this figu­re is the glo­bal avera­ge. For the Arc­tic, you can mul­ti­ply that by three or four.

In recent years, record tem­pe­ra­tures have been regu­lar­ly mea­su­red in Sval­bard, most recent­ly on 11 August at 20.3 degrees, the hig­hest value ever mea­su­red on an August day near Lon­gye­ar­by­en.

Even the pre­vious­ly high Arc­tic fjords in the north-east of Sval­bard will not remain unaf­fec­ted by this deve­lo­p­ment. This is con­firm­ed both by a regu­lar look at the ice map and by per­so­nal expe­ri­ence in the fjords of Nord­aus­t­land and in Hin­lo­pen Strait, whe­re the pre­vious­ly wide­spread water tem­pe­ra­tures of around 0 degrees are now rather rare and small-sca­le, espe­ci­al­ly in the sou­thern Hin­lo­pen Strait and on the sou­thern side of Nord­aus­t­land, whe­re the cold East Spits­ber­gen Cur­rent from the Arc­tic Basin is still exer­ting its influence. In the nor­t­hern Hin­lo­pen Strait and in the fjords in the west and north of Nord­aus­t­land and up to Sjuøya­ne, water tem­pe­ra­tures of 6-8 degrees are incre­asing­ly com­mon, indi­ca­ting the incre­asing influence of mild Atlan­tic water (Gulf Stream).

Nordaustland

Rare­ly ice-free in the past, now regu­lar­ly in sum­mer:
Fjords on the north coast of Nord­aus­t­land.

The Arc­tic Oce­an: from white to blue

The sea ice of the Arc­tic Oce­an is both a vic­tim and a dri­ver of this deve­lo­p­ment. This is one of tho­se feed­back effects in the glo­bal cli­ma­te sys­tem whe­re the effect rein­forces the cau­se. In this case, an area of water that has beco­me ice-free due to warm­ing no lon­ger reflects the sun’s rays, but absorbs them and con­verts them into heat, which in turn melts even more ice and even lar­ger are­as of water absorb the sun’s rays … and so it goes on.

Accor­ding to a stu­dy recent­ly published in Natu­re Com­mu­ni­ca­ti­ons, the Arc­tic Oce­an could beco­me ice-free on a dai­ly basis by around 2030. This stu­dy is the first to look at the deve­lo­p­ment on a dai­ly rather than a month­ly basis. The Arc­tic Oce­an could the­r­e­fo­re be ice-free on a dai­ly basis in a few years’ time if warm win­ters with litt­le ice for­ma­ti­on are fol­lo­wed by warm ear­ly sum­mers with high ice loss.

Arctic Ocean

The Arc­tic Oce­an of the future: incre­asing­ly blue ins­tead of white.

On the other hand, the stu­dy also descri­bes sce­na­ri­os accor­ding to which an ice-free Arc­tic Oce­an will not be obser­ved by the year 2100. Both pos­si­bi­li­ties are rather extre­me sce­na­ri­os; the real deve­lo­p­ment may lie some­whe­re in bet­ween. Or not, the extre­me sce­na­ri­os are also pos­si­ble accor­ding to the sci­en­ti­fic models.

As Jør­gen Ber­ge told Barents­ob­ser­ver: ‘It is likely that the cen­tral Arc­tic Oce­an will evol­ve from a white (ice-cover­ed) oce­an to a blue (open water) oce­an. What that means, we don’t know.’

Calen­dar “Spits­ber­gen & Green­land 2025”: the sto­ries behind the pho­tos

A while ago, I star­ted tel­ling the sto­ries of the pic­tures in the new pho­to book ‘Spits­ber­gen – Cold Beau­ty’, and I wan­ted to con­ti­nue that. Now it is about the new calen­dar, but the idea is the same: the sto­ries behind the pho­tos, as I’m final­ly get­ting round to picking it up again.

The 2025 calen­dar is a dou­ble calen­dar, Spits­ber­gen and Green­land are pre­sen­ted with 12 pic­tures each. Here we have Novem­ber and Decem­ber, so four pic­tures and four sto­ries in total.

Calen­der “Spits­ber­gen & Green­land 2025”: Novem­ber

Autumn in the Arc­tic – during this time of year, we are hoping for beau­tiful light. Low sun during day­ti­me and end­less sun­sets. Of cour­se, the sun doesn’t shi­ne at all in Sval­bard in Novem­ber, as the polar night beg­ins at the end of Octo­ber. The Spits­ber­gen pic­tu­re for the Novem­ber page was taken on a beau­tiful day at the end of August 2022, on the first ever cir­cum­na­vi­ga­ti­on of Spits­ber­gen with sai­ling ship Mean­der. The wea­ther was real­ly on our side, and then you can go to cra­zy places whe­re you wouldn’t nor­mal­ly go. Becau­se they are very expo­sed, becau­se the waters clo­se to the shore are unchar­ted and shal­low.

This is exact­ly the case in the exten­si­ve Dis­ko­bukt on Edgeøya. Here, every wave quick­ly turns into a brea­k­er even befo­re it rea­ches the shore, and at low tide the pro­pel­ler whirls in the mud well befo­re you get any­whe­re near the coast. It is sen­si­ble to stay away from such places in ever­y­day life. But not every day is ever­y­day life, and we are not always sen­si­ble, are we 😄 other­wi­se whe­re would we end up … cer­tain­ly not in this part of Dis­ko­buk­ta! (This is not about the rela­tively well known kit­ti­wa­ke colo­ny in the nor­t­hern part of Dis­ko­buk­ta.) Whe­re we were ashore in the evening of this unfor­gettable day and went for a litt­le hike to and up a low hill. I had seen this hill so many times from a distance as we sai­led past and always thought that one day I would have to go the­re … and this was just the right oppor­tu­ni­ty! It just has to hap­pen, you can’t force things like that.

Dis­ko­buk­ta on Edgeøya (not the one in west Green­land) is aptly descri­bed as ‘vast’ or ‘wide open’. Bar­ren, high arc­tic, a vast, dark­ly colou­red allu­vi­al plain. Num­e­rous wha­le bones add varie­ty to the other­wi­se mono­to­no­us land­scape impres­si­on, and the gre­at light of a beau­tiful evening at the end of August at around 78 degrees north did its part.

Calendar Spitsbergen, Greenland 2025: Diskobukta, Edgeøya

The Novem­ber-Spits­ber­gen-image shows Dis­ko­buk­ta on Edgeøya.

I had been the­re years befo­re. On that occa­si­on: hori­zon­tal snow – and a polar bear on the shore. That was gre­at too. But that evening at the end of August, when we were able to go ashore … unfor­gettable! That’s the stuff my Spits­ber­gen dreams are made of. It was so beau­tiful that I rea­li­sed on the spot that one of the pic­tures would be in the calen­dar as soon as pos­si­ble. ‘Calen­dar poten­ti­al’ is the hig­hest pho­to­gra­phic stan­dard here 🙂

The other sto­ries are told rela­tively quick­ly. In Score­s­by­sund in East Green­land, the musk ox is rough­ly what the polar bear is to Spits­ber­gen: tou­rists usual­ly want to see them.

Now they usual­ly stand some­whe­re far away on a moun­tain slo­pe. It takes a bit of luck to see them up clo­se. And too clo­se is also poten­ti­al­ly unhe­alt­hy, of cour­se, espe­ci­al­ly when you are hiking.

One fine day with ear­ly win­ter mood in Sep­tem­ber in Rypefjord, deep in Score­s­by­sund, ever­y­thing was just right: the musk oxen were quite clo­se to the shore and we could see them per­fect­ly well from the boat – the love­ly Ópal from Ice­land. And very hel­pful to secu­re not only some nice views, but actual­ly good pho­tos: I had my 600 mil­li­met­re lens with me, the real­ly big one that usual­ly stays in Spits­ber­gen and lives on the ship rather than being drag­ged around on land. Just for the polar bears. Or in Green­land for the musk oxen. The effort was worth it here.

Calender Spitsbergen, Greenland 2025: Musk oxen

The Novem­ber-pic­tu­re for Green­land: Musk oxen in Rypefjord.

Calen­der “Spits­ber­gen & Green­land 2025”: Decem­ber

Of cour­se, I wouldn’t miss the nor­t­hern lights at the end of the year. Decem­ber is the deepest polar night, and of cour­se, you just can’t get to the most remo­te cor­ners of Spits­ber­gen at this time of year. But why should you, you can see the nor­t­hern lights won­derful­ly in Advent­da­len, not far from Lon­gye­ar­by­en.

Calender Spitsbergen, Greenland 2025: northern light

The Decem­ber-image, Spits­ber­gen: Nor­t­hern light abo­ve Advent­da­len.

Lar­ge parts of Green­land, inclu­ding Score­s­by­sund, are actual­ly even bet­ter for obser­ving the nor­t­hern lights than Sval­bard, whe­re you are alre­a­dy north of the hot auro­ra zone, the Auro­ra Oval. Score­s­by­sund is the right place to be, as the­re is a lot of action when it only gets dark at night. And due to the more sou­t­her­ly loca­ti­on, this is the case ear­lier in the year than in Sval­bard, Sep­tem­ber is a pret­ty relia­ble month. In this pic­tu­re we see the nor­t­hern lights over Bjør­neøer­ne, with the magni­fi­cent Øfjord and the striking Grundt­vigs­kir­ke moun­tain in the back­ground.

Calendar Spitsbergen, Greenland 2025: northern light

The Decem­ber-pic­tu­re, Green­land: nor­t­hern light over Bjør­neøer­ne.

The dou­ble calen­dar ‘Spits­ber­gen & Green­land 2025’ is available in the Spitzbergen.de web­shop in two sizes (A3 and A5), as well as many other gre­at things – not just books – of cour­se.

Advent sea­son in Lon­gye­ar­by­en

Now, Lon­gye­ar­by­en is loca­ted in Advent­fjord, isn’t it 🤪😵‍💫 this is actual­ly not only one of my infa­mous puns, but actual­ly a not so rare misun­derstan­ding. The name Advent­fjord has not­hing to do with the Advent sea­son, but with an Eng­lish wha­ling ship, the Adven­ture, which was the­re in the 17th cen­tu­ry.

But that’s not what this is all about, it’s about the start of the Advent sea­son in Lon­gye­ar­by­en. The­re is also a Christ­mas mar­ket here, or rather two, even. Howe­ver, they are a litt­le dif­fe­rent to what most of us may be used to. On two weekends, in mid-Novem­ber and last weekend, the hard-working and crea­ti­ve artists, craft­speo­p­le and ever­yo­ne in bet­ween set up their stalls, first in the cul­tu­ral cent­re (Kul­tur­hu­set) in the town cent­re and on the first weekend of Advent in the artists’ cent­re (kunst­ner­sen­trum) in Nyby­en hig­her up in the val­ley, whe­re the gal­lery used to be some years ago. Unfort­u­na­te­ly no roas­ted almonds and no mull­ed wine, but lots of gre­at han­di­crafts made in Lon­gye­ar­by­en, inclu­ding Eva Grøn­dal from the local pho­to­grapher dynasty of the same name (first pic­tu­re) and Wolf­gang Hüb­ner-Zach from the car­pen­try work­shop Alt i 3 (that’s whe­re the beau­tiful kit­chen boards and drift­wood pic­tu­re frames come from 😉). And lots of other gre­at things. Lena’s decep­tively real cho­co­la­te fos­sils, awe­so­me! To name just one more exam­p­le.

Christ­mas mar­ket in Nyby­en

Click on thumb­nail to open an enlar­ged ver­si­on of the spe­ci­fic pho­to.

And then, of cour­se, the­re is the tra­di­tio­nal torch­light pro­ces­si­on on the after­noon of the first Sun­day in Advent – it is dark, even the street lights are swit­ched off in the area during the event – from the Huset to Santa’s let­ter­box below the old pit 2b, the ‘jule­n­is­se­gruve’ (Santa’s pit). Father Christ­mas is working hard up the­re now, so this old coal mine, aban­do­ned sin­ce 1964, is now lit up again until Christ­mas. And down by the road is the let­ter­box whe­re the child­ren (inclu­ding the older ones, if they want to) post their let­ters to Father Christ­mas with all their wis­hes.

The rou­te con­ti­nues to the cent­re, whe­re the Christ­mas tree is lit. Of cour­se, the­re are warm words, cheerful sin­ging and good cheer and, last but not least, Father Christ­mas arri­ves with his assistants and dis­tri­bu­tes a small advan­ce to the many child­ren.

The Christ­mas tree is lit

Click on thumb­nail to open an enlar­ged ver­si­on of the spe­ci­fic pho­to.

This marks the start of the Advent sea­son in Lon­gye­ar­by­en, and ever­y­whe­re else too, of cour­se. I wish ever­yo­ne a hap­py and joyful Advent sea­son!

Record mel­ting of Svalbard’s gla­ciers in 2024

It will hard­ly sur­pri­se anyo­ne, con­side­ring the warm sum­mer with new tem­pe­ra­tu­re records, such as the war­mest tem­pe­ra­tu­re ever mea­su­red in Sval­bard in August: the arc­tic gla­ciers have suf­fe­r­ed mas­si­ve­ly this year. Espe­ci­al­ly in Sval­bard, whe­re cli­ma­te chan­ge is hap­pe­ning seven (!) times fas­ter than the glo­bal avera­ge, as gla­cio­lo­gist Emma Wad­ham from the Uni­ver­si­ty of Trom­sø told the Barents Obser­ver. Just on 23 July 2024, a record-warm day, the gla­ciers lost 55 mil­li­me­t­res of water equi­va­lent or five times the nor­mal value, accor­ding to cli­ma­to­lo­gist Xavier Fett­weis from the Uni­ver­si­ty of Liè­ge, who ana­ly­sed satel­li­te images. And that was just one day in a week-long peri­od in which tem­pe­ra­tures were on avera­ge around 4 degrees abo­ve the long-term avera­ge for this peri­od.

Meltwater, glacier surface

Melt­wa­ter on a gla­cier sur­face.

The trend towards mel­ting is par­ti­cu­lar­ly pro­no­un­ced in Sval­bard, but it is pre­sent throug­hout the Arc­tic. The loss of ice on land in turn has feed­back effects on the cli­ma­te: land absorbs more solar radia­ti­on than ice and snow and the­r­e­fo­re warms up even fas­ter; to a les­ser ext­ent, this also appli­es to expo­sed ice com­pared to snow.

Melting ice cap, Storøya

Edge of a small ice cap on Storøya in nor­the­ast Sval­bard. Num­e­rous small melt­wa­ter chan­nels are visi­ble on the sur­face of the ice cap. Wet firn and expo­sed ice absorb more solar radia­ti­on than dry, white snow, which leads to increased mel­ting. The ice-free land that is now expo­sed next to the ice cap is also bet­ter able to con­vert solar radia­ti­on into heat.

The impact on the mari­ne eco­sys­tem is yet ano­ther issue: incre­asing amounts of sedi­ment-laden melt­wa­ter are flowing into the pre­vious­ly most­ly clear water of the fjords and coas­tal waters. Due to its sedi­ment load, the melt­wa­ter is mur­ky and opaque, allo­wing litt­le light to pass through. This in turn has an impact on algae growth, which is depen­dent on light for pho­to­syn­the­sis.

Meltwater, glacier

Melt­wa­ter with sedi­ment load at Mona­co­b­reen in Lief­defjord.

But the chan­ges of the mari­ne eco­sys­tem of the Arc­tic are ano­ther sto­ry. More about that later.

New “Sval­bard­mel­ding”: Sval­bard-stra­tegy for the next years

On Thurs­day (Novem­ber 21) the Nor­we­gi­an Par­lia­ment in Oslo, the Stort­ing, has pas­sed the new Sval­bard­mel­ding ange­nom­men. The Sval­bard­mel­ding is a govern­ment stra­tegy paper that out­lines the Sval­bard poli­tics for the next 5-10 years. It includes thus no con­cre­te legal mea­su­res but rather a set of inten­ti­ons and ide­as which have to be dis­cus­sed and tur­ned into laws in the future.

Let’s take a step back. Nor­we­gi­an Sval­bard poli­tics is based on the fol­lo­wing five prin­ci­ples:

  • A con­sis­tent, con­stant main­ten­an­ce of Nor­we­gi­an sove­reig­n­ty.
  • Com­pli­ance with the Sval­bard Trea­ty and moni­to­ring its imple­men­ta­ti­on.
  • Main­tai­ning calm and sta­bi­li­ty.
  • Pro­tec­tion of the region’s natu­re.
  • Main­tainan­ce of a Nor­we­gi­an popu­la­ti­on.
Norwegian flags, Longyearbyen

Nor­we­gi­an flags in Lon­gye­ar­by­en (on the Nor­we­gi­an natio­nal day on 17 May): Lon­gye­ar­by­en and all of Sval­bard are and will remain Nor­we­gi­an. But the govern­ment would pre­fer to have a hig­her pro­por­ti­on of Nor­we­gi­ans among­st Longyearbyen’s popu­la­ti­on. Sys­sel­mes­ter Lars Fau­se (front right) is the hig­hest repre­sen­ta­ti­ve of the Nor­we­gi­an govern­ment on site.

And what’s in it?

Quite a lot, the docu­ment has more than 80 pages. You can down­load it on the government’s web­site.

And the govern­ment has alre­a­dy imple­men­ted seve­ral major legal pro­jects in the recent past, inclu­ding a reform of the local elec­to­ral law that cost many for­eign voters their local voting rights. The new rules for tou­rists that come into force on 01 Janu­ary, 2025 are ano­ther important new set of legis­la­ti­on. Ener­gy and housing are other important topics that have been work­ed on for years alre­a­dy on various levels, see below.

Some important points of the new Sval­bard­mel­ding:

Men­tal health

The­re are peo­p­le with men­tal health pro­blems all over the world and Sval­bard is of cour­se no excep­ti­on. Howe­ver, tho­se who are con­fron­ted with acu­te men­tal health pro­blems in Lon­gye­ar­by­en have very limi­t­ed access to pro­fes­sio­nal help. This may have cost two peo­p­le their lives in the recent past: the­re have been two sui­ci­des in Lon­gye­ar­by­en in 2023.

It is main­ly thanks to the com­mit­ment of Longyearbyen’s poli­ti­cal youth that the govern­ment wants to impro­ve this situa­ti­on, but accor­ding to them, applau­de is not due befo­re a psy­cho­lo­gist is actual­ly instal­led in Lon­gye­ar­by­en, accor­ding to NRK.

Air­freight

This is not about same day deli­very to the final con­su­mer. But a sup­p­ly of goods of all kinds, inclu­ding fresh pro­du­ce accor­ding to modern stan­dards, should be available in Lon­gye­ar­by­en all year round. The­re had been some dis­cus­sion and uncer­tain­ty sur­roun­ding the Nor­we­gi­an Post’s freight flights to Lon­gye­ar­by­en. Now the govern­ment is pro­vi­ding money to main­tain freight flight logi­stics, which of cour­se invol­ve more than just app­les and bana­nas. Howe­ver, it remains to be seen how this will be orga­nis­ed in the long term.

Empty shelves, Svalbardbutikken, Longyearbyen

Emp­ty shel­ves in Sval­bard­bu­tik­ken (Coop Sval­bard) in Lon­gye­ar­by­en:
not unhe­ard of, but unde­si­red.

Low taxes

Sval­bard is and shall con­ti­nue to be a low-tax area. The back­ground to this lies in the Sval­bard Trea­ty; in short, Nor­way as a sta­te should not bene­fit from taxes and duties. The­r­e­fo­re, the­re is no VAT on Sval­bard and other taxes and duties are also often lower than on the main­land. This should gene­ral­ly stay as it is, but adjus­t­ments are pos­si­ble.

Housing and popu­la­ti­on

Things are likely to get much more exci­ting for many here. The govern­ment wants to free­ze the size of Lon­gye­ar­by­en at the level befo­re the dead­ly ava­lan­che on 19 Decem­ber 2015, and Lon­gye­ar­by­en should not grow bey­ond that. And the govern­ment wants the Nor­we­gi­an share of the popu­la­ti­on to increase.

House building, Longyearbyen

House buil­ding in Lon­gye­ar­by­en. The impres­si­on that the town is gro­wing is wrong:
it is about repla­cing what has been lost sin­ce 2015.

Accor­ding to the Nor­we­gi­an Cen­tral Sta­tis­ti­cal Office (SSB), 2595 peo­p­le curr­ent­ly live in Lon­gye­ar­by­en and Ny-Åle­sund, inclu­ding 1621 Nor­we­gi­ans, i.e. around 63%. The lat­ter is not enough for the govern­ment. In fact, the pro­por­ti­on of Nor­we­gi­ans in the popu­la­ti­on has been fal­ling for years, which is part­ly due to the clo­sure of Nor­we­gi­an coal mines in Sveagru­va and Lon­gye­ar­by­en: In the­se well-paid and pre­vious­ly secu­re indus­tri­al jobs, a high pro­por­ti­on of the work­force was Nor­we­gi­an. The stra­tegy for­mu­la­ted in ear­lier Sval­bard stra­tegy papers of repla­cing mining with hig­her edu­ca­ti­on, rese­arch and tou­rism has pro­ved to be coun­ter­pro­duc­ti­ve from the government’s point of view, as the jobs in the­se are­as are much more inter­na­tio­nal than tho­se in mining. The govern­ment wants to take coun­ter­me­a­su­res here (com­ment: the rules that come into force on 1 Janu­ary 2025 should also be seen in this light; the poli­ti­cal dis­ap­point­ment over the rela­tively low Nor­we­gi­an share of the jobs crea­ted in tou­rism is likely to be at least as important as envi­ron­men­tal pro­tec­tion, which is pro­ba­b­ly more of a pre­text here). End of com­ment).

Housing poli­cy, which has long been a hot topic in Lon­gye­ar­by­en, which is cha­rac­te­ri­sed by a housing shorta­ge, has been a tool used by the govern­ment for a while now to increase the Nor­we­gi­an share of the total popu­la­ti­on: Even though the over­all sup­p­ly of housing is not expec­ted to exceed the 2015 level, the res­truc­tu­ring that ine­vi­ta­b­ly occur­red after the ava­lan­ches in 2015 and 2017 (over 100 flats were clas­si­fied as at risk of ava­lan­ches and accor­din­gly demo­lished) also pro­vi­des an oppor­tu­ni­ty to reor­ga­ni­se owner­ship. The pri­va­te housing mar­ket is being redu­ced and the pro­por­ti­on of sta­te-owned housing is gro­wing in favour of employees of lar­ge, direct­ly or indi­rect­ly state/public actors, whe­re the pro­por­ti­on of Nor­we­gi­an workers is hig­her than in the ser­vice sec­tor, for exam­p­le. The­se actors include Lokals­ty­re (muni­ci­pal admi­nis­tra­ti­on), Sys­sel­mes­ter, UNIS, Fol­kehøgs­ko­le (edu­ca­ti­on) and others.

In addi­ti­on, living in Lon­gye­ar­by­en should remain attrac­ti­ve, espe­ci­al­ly for the Nor­we­gi­an popu­la­ti­on. And the­re is litt­le doubt that the­re is need for action here, as the avera­ge length of stay in Lon­gye­ar­by­en, which is alre­a­dy cha­rac­te­ri­sed by a high level of fluc­tua­ti­on, is fal­ling.

Ener­gy

And what good is the nicest flat if the­re is no power from the socket and the hea­ting stays cold? It’s not that bad, but the sce­na­rio can­not be ruled out in the small town of Lon­gye­ar­by­en, who­se ener­gy sup­p­ly is cha­rac­te­ri­sed by the fact that it is not part of a supra-regio­nal grid. The sub­ject of ener­gy has long been a hot topic of dis­cus­sion in Lon­gye­ar­by­en. On the one hand, it is about the sharp rise in pri­ces for elec­tri­ci­ty and dis­trict hea­ting, but also about secu­ri­ty of sup­p­ly and whe­re ener­gy should come from in the long term. The days of coal as an ener­gy source in Lon­gye­ar­by­en are over and the cur­rent die­sel power plant fails to ful­fil all requi­re­ments in terms of secu­ri­ty of sup­p­ly, eco­no­mic effi­ci­en­cy and cli­ma­te neu­tra­li­ty. Today’s rea­li­ty is a far cry from the ear­lier idea of being a role model on an inter­na­tio­nal level; at the moment, peo­p­le are hap­py if the hea­ting is on during the cold months and the elec­tri­ci­ty is at least half­way afforda­ble, even if the govern­ment has to help out with money (sub­si­di­sed elec­tri­ci­ty pri­ces) and the mili­ta­ry with addi­tio­nal mobi­le gene­ra­tors.

Wha­te­ver the ener­gy sup­p­ly of the future looks like in Lon­gye­ar­by­en: The sta­te, repre­sen­ted local­ly by the mining com­pa­ny Store Nor­ske Spits­ber­gen Kul­kom­pa­ni, will play an incre­asing­ly important role.

Visi­tor fee

The govern­ment wants tou­rists to con­tri­bu­te a hig­her pro­por­ti­on of public inco­me via a visi­tor con­tri­bu­ti­on. This con­tri­bu­ti­on would amount to up to 5%, which would be added to hotel stays, for exam­p­le; ship pas­sen­gers could be char­ged a flat rate of 150 kro­ner, for exam­p­le. Such a sys­tem alre­a­dy exists on the Nor­we­gi­an main­land, whe­re the reve­nue goes enti­re­ly to the respec­ti­ve muni­ci­pa­li­ties. In Sval­bard, the sta­te wants to reser­ve the right to a por­ti­on of the reve­nue.

Sin­ce 2007, Sval­bard has had an ‘envi­ron­men­tal fee’ (mil­jø­ge­byr) of 150 kro­ner, which is included in flight tickets and paid by ships brin­ging pas­sen­gers to Sval­bard. This envi­ron­men­tal fee is admi­nis­te­red by the Sval­bard Mil­jø­vern­fond, to which anyo­ne in Lon­gye­ar­by­en can app­ly for finan­cial sup­port for pro­jects with an envi­ron­men­tal aspect. The envi­ron­men­tal fee is not part of the cur­rent dis­cus­sion, the visi­tor con­tri­bu­ti­on will come on top of it.

Until this hap­pens, the­re is cer­tain­ly need for fur­ther dis­cus­sion, for exam­p­le with regard to who bene­fits from the inco­me and what it can be used for.

From Skjer­vøy to Ham­nes

We went up to a view­point in Skjer­vøy in the late after­noon. Even the rain stop­ped and the view over Skjer­vøy town and har­bour was love­ly!

Next day we star­ted for a final round of wha­le­wat­ching in Kvæn­an­gen – not wit­hout some suc­cess 🙂 – and then set cour­se for Ham­nes, one of few places in the wide area that was not des­troy­ed by Ger­man tro­ops in 1944/45 and hence has some of its his­to­ri­cal charme pre­ser­ved.

We went for a litt­le walk in Ham­nes and then enjoy­ed Captain’s Din­ner on board. Piet and the ser­vice crew had real­ly gone “all in”, making a won­derful (and very tasty) evening pos­si­ble for ever­y­bo­dy!

And as Cap­tain Dou­we descri­bed the trip, sum­ma­ri­sed in my own short words: “the worst wea­ther, the best wha­les”. Yes, the­re is some truth in that …

Pho­to gal­lery Skjer­vøy, Kvæn­an­gen and Ham­nes – 17th Novem­ber 2024

Click on thumb­nail to open an enlar­ged ver­si­on of the spe­ci­fic pho­to.

Kvæn­an­gen: wha­les, wha­les …

Wai­ting the wea­ther out in Mann­da­len tur­ned out to be a good thing. Well, Mann­da­len was in its­elf more than just worth a visit any­way, but now we have Kvæn­an­gen in reason­ab­ly calm con­di­ti­ons. A bit of swell, but almost no wind.

What can I say? It didn’t take more than half an hour until we saw the first orcas. Not much later fol­lo­wed some Fin wha­les. And then hump­back wha­les. Many of them. Stun­ning. What a day! Just have a look at the pic­tures. It went on for hours, whe­re­ver we went.

In the evening we went along in Rein­fjord. „Evening“, howe­ver, is a rela­ti­ve term here now. Sun­set is at 13:08 hrs …

Pho­to gal­lery Kvæn­an­gen (1) – 15th Novem­ber 2024

Click on thumb­nail to open an enlar­ged ver­si­on of the spe­ci­fic pho­to.

And we con­tin­ued with the wha­les on Satur­day. Wha­les are the focus of this voya­ge, and I would say we are doing well … the wea­ther is not of the grea­test sort and some more light would do, but wel­co­me to north Nor­way in mid Novem­ber 🐳 😀

Pho­to gal­lery Kvæn­an­gen (2) – 16th Novem­ber 2024

Click on thumb­nail to open an enlar­ged ver­si­on of the spe­ci­fic pho­to.

Mann­da­len, Mann­da­len

And again the­re is a strong low pres­su­re on the way to nor­t­hern Nor­way. To avo­id strong winds and big waves, we retrea­ted deep into Lyn­gen­fjord, to Mann­da­len. An inte­res­t­ing place, mee­ting place of cul­tures and eth­nic groups: Kvens, Sami and eth­nic Nor­we­gi­ans have lived here tog­e­ther for cen­tu­ries, often as a fri­end­ly neigh­bour­hood, some­ti­mes less so. The­re is a very inte­res­t­ing cul­tu­ral centre/museum in Mann­da­len dedi­ca­ted to the Samí peo­p­le, “Sen­ter for nor­dis­ke folk”. Of cour­se we went the­re.

Later we fil­led the dark part of the day with lec­tures and some on board cine­ma.

Pho­to gal­lery Mann­da­len (1) – 13th Novem­ber 2024

Click on thumb­nail to open an enlar­ged ver­si­on of the spe­ci­fic pho­to.

A strong low pres­su­re like the cur­rent one needs two days to move trough, so we spent yet ano­ther day in Mann­da­len with snow fal­ling the who­le day. We stret­ched our legs in the mor­ning with some day­light and con­tin­ued with our lec­tu­re series in the after­noon.

Pho­to gal­lery Mann­da­len (2) – 14th Novem­ber 2024

Click on thumb­nail to open an enlar­ged ver­si­on of the spe­ci­fic pho­to.

Trom­sø

Trom­sø! The­re is always some­thing to dis­co­ver, some­thing that you haven’t seen befo­re. The most inte­res­t­ing book­shop in town, for exam­p­le, well hid­den in Sjø­ga­ta 20. Recom­men­ded!

Tromsø bookshop

“Trom­sø fri­mer­ke og mynt” in Sjø­ga­ta 20: Tromsø’s most exci­ting book­shop.

So, here we go again! One more time, as far as I am con­cer­ned. One more time “Arc­tic under sail”. With good ol’ Anti­gua, loo­king for nor­t­hern lights and wha­les.

Nor­t­hern lights we found direct­ly on the first evening 🙂 and as for the wha­les, we will have to wait a litt­le bit. The wea­ther is sim­ply incre­di­ble. One storm after the other. Bet­ter to hide some­whe­re in the fjords for a while befo­re we head towards Kvæn­an­gen. But no worries, we will get the­re.

Pho­to gal­lery Trom­sø – 12th Novem­ber 2024

Click on thumb­nail to open an enlar­ged ver­si­on of the spe­ci­fic pho­to.

Ham­nes, Lyn­gengfjord … and back to Trom­sø

As I men­tio­ned befo­re, the last night was long. Or short, depen­ding on how you look at it. Nor­t­hern lights were the thing, the­re had been quite a show on the sky. Ama­zing!

After a litt­le walk in and near Ham­nes with gre­at views of the stun­ning Lyn­gen­alps we set sails in Lyn­gen­fjord. Sai­ling the­re – and I mean real sai­ling – was a fan­ta­stic was to round this voya­ge off!

Pho­to gal­lery Ham­nes & Lyn­gen­fjord – 10th Novem­ber 2024

Click on thumb­nail to open an enlar­ged ver­si­on of the spe­ci­fic pho­to.

Then we went back to Trom­sø, and this is the last blog ent­ry of this voya­ge. It was inde­ed a spe­cial one, with a lot of wea­ther that can aptly be descri­bed as awful. Yet, it was a gre­at trip, we saw a lot and the spi­rits were good. Thanks to all of you who were part of it!

From Skjer­vøy to Ham­nes

During the mor­ning we were still in Skjer­vøy and went on a litt­le tour up to one of the moun­ta­ins near the town. The­re we had a nice view over the bay and sur­roun­dings.

Pho­to gal­lery Skjer­vøy – 09th Novem­ber 2024

Click on thumb­nail to open an enlar­ged ver­si­on of the spe­ci­fic pho­to.

In the ear­ly after­noon the wind wea­k­en­ed and we set off towards Ham­nes, a litt­le fishing vil­la­ge on the island Uløy. Ano­ther kind of wind picked up but this time it was the solar wind and soon we could enjoy the nor­t­hern lights. Awe­so­me after days only with clouds, storm and rain. The sky was not real­ly clear and clouds came and went but this made the sce­n­ery even more magi­cal.

If you want to read more about nor­t­hern lights, the­re is a lot of infor­ma­ti­on on my web­site here.

It tur­ned out to be a long evening … 😀

Pho­to gal­lery Ham­nes – 09th Novem­ber 2024

Click on thumb­nail to open an enlar­ged ver­si­on of the spe­ci­fic pho­to.

Tem­pe­ra­tu­re records and storm in north Nor­way

Never befo­re have tem­pe­ra­tures as high as today’s been mea­su­red in north Nor­way: sta­ti­ons of the Nor­we­gi­an meteo­ro­lo­gi­cal ser­vice bet­ween Ves­terå­len and Finn­mark recor­ded up to 16 degrees today (8 Novem­ber), as NRK reports.

A hea­vy storm is raging over the who­le area with winds up to force 11, and the­re are reports about dama­ge.

Yes­ter­day it had not yet been so cra­zy, so we sai­led out into Kvæn­an­gen, in beau­tiful style under sails, and saw some wha­les here and some more the­re. But the wind just kept incre­asing and I guess the­re might well have been more than just a few on board who were quite hap­py when the ship was along­side in Skjer­vøy again in the later after­noon.

Today we stay­ed in port. Good thing, con­side­ring the con­di­ti­ons with how­ling gusts which can lite­ral­ly blow one’s socks off. Wal­king out­side is very unp­lea­sant, with sand and small stones being blown into your face. The­re is the occa­sio­nal hole in the clouds, but no nor­t­hern lights so far and now it is rai­ning again.

But we are having a good time. Now I under­stand why I put quite a lot of time into pre­pa­ring some new pre­sen­ta­ti­ons 🙂 and this mor­ning, when it was just a litt­le bit less cra­zy, we went to one of the hills of Skjer­vøy.

Pho­to gal­lery Kvæn­an­gen & Skjer­vøy – 06th/07th Novem­ber 2024

Click on thumb­nail to open an enlar­ged ver­si­on of the spe­ci­fic pho­to.

Skjer­vøy, Kvæn­an­gen: Orcas, orcas …

We had spent the night in Skjer­vøy, the litt­le metro­po­lis (well, almost 2000 inha­bi­tants) of Kvæn­an­gen. The port whe­re the famous Fram rea­ched civi­li­sa­ti­on again after the legen­da­ry ice drift across the Arc­tic Oce­an in 1893-96.

We don’t tra­vel on that level 🙂 but nevert­hel­ess it was adven­tur­ous here and today, with wind and wea­ther and ple­nty of orcas and other wha­les!

Pho­toa gal­lery Skjer­vøy & Kvæn­an­gen – 05th/06th Novem­ber 2024

Click on thumb­nail to open an enlar­ged ver­si­on of the spe­ci­fic pho­to.

From Trom­sø to Len­an­gen and Kvæn­an­gen

And off we went. On the first evening we went to Len­an­gen, a very small port (“port” is a big word …) on the west side of the Lyn­gen Alps. We didn’t spend too much time the­re, though; we were on the move again alre­a­dy during break­fast time – and found our first Orcas soon after depar­tu­re. Ama­zing!

Luck remain­ed on our side with a love­ly sight­ing of Fin wha­les as soon as we had rea­ched the Kvæn­an­gen area.

Pho­to gal­lery Trom­sø, Len­gan­gen & Kvæn­an­gen – 04th/05th Novem­ber 2024

Click on thumb­nail to open an enlar­ged ver­si­on of the spe­ci­fic pho­to.

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