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Courtesy Steve Johnson (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/)

Our global society and environment are in a transition, offering both new opportunities and new risks. Therefore, it’s important to be aware of the pitfalls and minimize them to get the opportunities. One set of risks is the changing environmental features that we used as foundations for infrastructure such as permafrost.

Brown, J., O.J. Ferrians, Jr., J.A. Heginbottom, and E.S. Melnikov. 1998, revised February 2001. Circum-arctic map of permafrost and ground ice conditions. Boulder, CO: National Snow and Ice Data Center/World Data Center for Glaciology . Public Domain.

Permafrost is ground with a temperature that remains at or below the freezing point of water 0 °C (32 °F) for two or more years. The Arctic region is experience heating three times as great as anywhere else in the world and the permafrost is thawing in some places at a faster rate than predicted. This is especially concerning as scientists consider thawing permafrost a potential tipping point – permafrost can contain greenhouse gases and will emit greenhouse gases when thawed, further driving climate warning.

Credit: Mikhail Kanevskiy, University of Alaska Fairbanks, Institute of Northern Engineering. Public domain.

On a more immediate level, it also presents a financial risk for the inhabitants of countries with permafrost like Canada, the US and Russia. One scientist studying permafrost describes it as a glue holding together the landscape. If the glue disappears (i.e. permafrost thaws), the landscape collapses. Infrastructure built upon permafrost like roads and buildings then becomes damaged, unstable and may even collapse.

Courtesy of Vladimir Romanovsky

This may seem like a very remote issue to some – even those living in countries with permafrost. I live in Canada far south of the permafrost – so I won’t see any immediate physical impact but I will certainly feel an impact on my wallet because addressing this issue will require the resources of national governments. Governments will probably collect these resources by diverting funds from other services, increasing debt or raising taxes – all impacting its residents’ bottom-line. Residents, in turn, will have to find alternatives to government services and/or pay more taxes which increases there costs.

Courtesy of Brandt Meixell, USGS ( https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/deed.en)

So, how does one adapt? For someone living on permafrost, that would be assessing the cost of your community adapting its infrastructure and weighing that against other options like moving communities. For someone who doesn’t live near permafrost (like me), it is creating room in the budget for these future climate-related expenses such as reduced government services or increased taxes.

Thawing permafrost is part of a larger set of issues caused by our changing environment. So it’s not only to important to have a plan for permafrost, but the broad set of risks posed by our changing environment. Your better future will thank you for it.