Quantifying Emerging Local Anthropogenic Emissions in the Arctic Region: The ACCESS Aircraft Campaign Experiment

International audience; Arctic sea ice has decreased dramatically in the past few decades and the Arctic is increasingly open to transit shipping and natural resource extraction. However, large knowledge gaps exist regarding composition and impacts of emissions associated with these activities. Arctic hydrocarbon extraction is currently under development due to the large oil/gas reserves in the region. Transit shipping through the Arctic as an alternative to the traditional shipping routes is currently underway. These activities are expected to increase emissions of air pollutants and climate forcers (e.g. aerosols, ozone) in the Arctic troposphere significantly in the future. We present the first measurements of these activities off the coast of Norway taken in summer 2012 as part of the European Arctic Climate Change, Economy, and Society (ACCESS) project. The objectives include quantifying the impact anthropogenic activities will have on regional air pollution and understanding the connections to Arctic climate. Trace gas and aerosol concentrations in pollution plumes were measured, including emissions from different ship types and several offshore extraction facilities. Emissions originating from industrial activities (smelting) on the Kola Peninsula were also sampled. In addition, pollution plumes originating from Siberian biomass burning were probed in order to put the emerging local pollution within a broader context. In near future these measurements will be combined with model simulations to quantify the influence of local anthropogenic activities on Arctic composition. Here we present the scientific objectives of the ACCESS aircraft experiment, the meteorological conditions during the campaign, and highlight first scientific results from the experiment.