The results of the Clean Arctic project

Rosneft and the Russian Arctic National Park have summed up the results of the comprehensive Clean Arctic project to study the impact of Soviet-era economic activities on Arctic ecosystems, polit.ru writes.
Comprehensive program for studying the external impact on the Arctic ecosystem in Russia is being implemented for the first time. One of the key tasks of scientists from leading scientific institutes was to assess the scale and analysis of pollution of the territory of the protected archipelago during the USSR.
Pockets of soil and soil contamination remained at the storage sites of fuels and lubricants, which were imported to the region in large volumes to ensure the operation of scientific, meteorological bases and military facilities.
For three years, employees of the Russian Arctic National Park and the Institute of Geography of the Russian Academy of Sciences have been taking soil samples on the islands of the Franz Josef Land archipelago, and shooting contaminated sites from drones. During the tests, microorganisms were found capable of decomposing petroleum products at low temperature, which can be used in the creation of biological products for complex soil purification in the Arctic.
Based on the results of the work carried out, the spatial and temporal dynamics of pollution were identified, the mechanisms of pollution migration were determined. Scientists have come to the conclusion about the low rate of natural self-purification of soils as a result of washing them with meltwater due to small slopes of the surface of the coastal zone and low filtration properties of soils. Natural leaching of the soil leads to the redistribution of petroleum products within the coastal zone.
During the project, scientists managed to determine the environmentally optimal method of eliminating the consequences of oil pollution in the Arctic deserts.

Alex Shishlo for Rough&Polished