The Aral Sea repeatedly appeared and disappeared over the last century but has now steadily decreased as the dust increased, resulting in desertification. There is still water in the north of the Aral Sea but the ‘desert’ lakebed in the middle has more dust and sandstorms than anywhere else in the world. Researchers used two…
Category: environment
Catching raindrops in Primorye
Scientists at the Russian Academy of Sciences have developed mathematical models to predict flooding effects and assist with an action plan. To develop and test their models, they used flooding data from flooding in Primorye in 2001. They included the flooding area, water level, temperature and velocity. They also included human and animal populations in…
Biting back at humans with climate change
A human disease called dirofilariasis caused by parasitic mosquitoes has been affected by the warmer climate in Russia, expanding north and east, currently 58° N (Kondrashin et al., 2022) in both European and Asian Russia. Researchers developed a map using data from the Russian Meteorological office between 1937 and 2016. The data shows long term average…
Eco efficiency adds up in Russian regions
Researchers found eco efficiency grew between 1998 and 2017 except some northern and Siberian regions with lower populations, less technology and investmental potential. They noticed GDP growth with eco efficiency provides a sustainable development model. They used data from RosStat (Russia’s national statistics service). They calculated efficiency using data envelopment analysis (DEA). To assess the…
Growing in and out of their shells in Kamchatka
The recent Benthic survey shows recovery for echinoderms and shelled molluscs in Vilyuchinskaya Bay, April 2022, following the 2020 toxic single-celled algae destroying the marine environment in Avacha Bay. Kamchatka researchers in the Far Eastern Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, KSTU and divers from Kamchatka RGS completed “Monitoring of qualitative and quantitative indicators…
How to stop drilling holes through indigenous rights in the Russian Arctic
Liobov Sulayandziga discusses the issues between indigenous people of the Russian Arctic and extractive industries. She looks at the authentic communities in four Arctic regions: Komi Republic, Sakhalin, Sakha Republic and Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous Area She concludes that indigenous opinions are often ignored in areas where resource extraction is prioritized. The communities receive significant opposition from…
Idols and rabbits in the Urals – designing Arctic ecotourism
Researchers from Ural State University of Architecture and Art proposed an innovative approach for developing tourism in Russian Arctic destinations where holidaymakers commonly avoid travelling. Tough climate, remoteness and non-existing hospitality services make it a challenge to tempt any tourist. Attracted by wilderness, endangered fauna, melting icebergs and glaciers, vanishing indigenous cultures, endangered mega-fauna has…
Nothing goes to waste: sustainable practices of re-use among indigenous groups in the Russian North
Do the main inventions in current environmental sustainability practices always come from the metropolitan research centres? Could they also be of ‘non-Western’ origin? To answer and challenge these questions, Siragusa and Arzyutov explored waste practices among two indigenous communities in the Russian North – Nenets and Veps as part of ethnographic fieldwork since 2009. They highlight…
Human fatprints in the Arctic snow
Anthropogenic pollution of the Arctic atmosphere is of great interest due to the vulnerability of the Arctic ecosystems, as well as the processes of global transport and industries under cold climate conditions. Researchers from Lomonosov State University (Moscow) and Lomonosov Northern (Arctic) Federal University brought the first results on snow pollution in the least explored…
Distilling hard and soft water strategies in climate adaption policies
Despite Russia’s rich freshwater resources, it faces significant water problems, which arise from the country’s adaptation policy with low priority to climate action and less advanced risk management. Safonov from NRU HSE, Moscow outlines the key characteristic of water-related problems in the world’s biggest country. Firstly, Russia is one of the world’s leaders in its…
Russian Climate Research 