Part III: Antarctica and Academe - Scott Polar Research Institute

confined to the immediate vicinity of the impact, not spread by fire or flood as in lower
latitudes. The greatest impact on the few lakes is by organic waste produced by seal and
penguin colonies. Antarctic terrestrial communities are not in fact as fragile as those in
many other regions - recovery is slow but sure.
Secondly, the potential for environmental impact by science should be viewed in a
broader perspective than it has been. What is in fact meant by "significant" impact? The
Antarctic, with a land area of 14 million km 2 is one tenth of the Earth's land surface; it is
a vast region. If the average population density of the rest of the world obtained there,
Antarctica would have a permanent population of some 550 million people; even the icefree
coastal (therefore accessible) areas, say 0.5% of the continent, would hold some 3
million people on this basis. The actual population of scientists and their support is
2000-3000 (the equivalent of a single village) but not year-round, nor is it likely to
increase. Where there is a permanent scientific station, while the impact may be
relatively large it is extremely localized. Even airborne pollution is very limited; for
example ten years after the building and occupation of one fairly large station,
monitoring showed accumulation of heavy metals in lichens - but only to 250 metres
away, even downwind. There are published examples of marine pollution sustained
over long periods where there were shore whaling stations located in small coves,
processing whales and receiving fuel oil, for up to sixty years, followed by active
scientific stations. Measured hydrocarbon levels fall off rapidly (to open ocean levels)
outside these small coves and environmental impact is not detectable outside them.
I contend that the "footprint" of a scientific station, in terms of significant pollution, is on
average probably no more than 2 km2. It is impossible to portray these stations
objectively on a map of the Antarctic because realistically, instead of a number of large
black dots, they should be microscopic. There are about 50 occupied scientific stations at
any one time, and so, according to this argument, round about 100 km2 of the Antarctic -
out of a total area of 14 million km2 - is "significantly" impacted, and 99.999% remains
virtually unaffected by human impacts originating there! (From the barrage of
misinformation the public could be forgiven for believing that the balance lies in the
reverse direction). Is the moral principle alone sufficiently important to weigh against
the value to the world of Antarctic science much of which has an essential global role?
Remember that but for Antarctic Science humankind would still be in blissful ignorance
of the thinning of the ozone layer! The truth is that the case for widespread "significant"
impact rests mainly on one very large installation and the unaesthetic appearance of
photographs of scrap heaps from earlier times - though that is no excuse for not tidying
them up and for changing practices, which is being done, at great cost.
My argument is strengthened by the fact that the major known impacts on the Antarctic
are from outside the region. A few examples suffice: CFC's introduced into the
atmosphere outside the Antarctic led to the "ozone hole"; in Antarctic snow and ice
heavy metals originating elsewhere are widespread and there are radio-active layers
from atomic bomb tests; future effects of global warming, due to human influences
outside the Antarctic, are predicted to have severe effects on ice shelf break up, pack ice
extent and fast ice persistence; wandering albatross populations show a sustained
decline of 1% a year and a recent study concluded that at least 44,000 albatrosses of this
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