Photo Credit: Наталья Коллегова
Scientific Frontline: "At a Glance" Summary
- Main Discovery: Current international regulatory frameworks for monitoring Arctic underwater noise are insufficient as they rely on narrow low-frequency "shipping bands" that miss modern, higher-frequency noise sources like snowmobiles and small vessels.
- Methodology: Researchers analyzed over a decade of acoustic measurements from a community observatory in Cambridge Bay, Nunavut, correlating soundscapes with seasonal ice dynamics to evaluate noise pollution beyond standard satellite tracking.
- Key Data: The study utilized 10 years of continuous data and highlights that the Arctic is warming three times faster than the global average, necessitating region-specific rather than generic European open-water noise models.
- Significance: Inadequate monitoring poses severe risks to marine wildlife that rely on sound for navigation and communication, while also threatening the subsistence hunting practices of Indigenous communities by making prey harder to locate.
- Future Application: International bodies must revise environmental policy frameworks to monitor a wider range of sound frequencies and incorporate seasonal ice cover variables into noise regulation thresholds.
- Branch of Science: Underwater Acoustics and Environmental Physics
- Additional Detail: The research demonstrates that "satellite-invisible" human activities, such as small boat traffic, generate distinct acoustic signatures that significantly alter the soundscape but remain undetected by current tracking systems.
The Arctic is experiencing a steady rise in human-generated underwater noise as melting ice and increasing activity open the region to greater vessel traffic, with major implications for wildlife and local communities. New research from the University of Bath, drawing on data collected over more than a decade, sets out a clear and effective approach to monitoring underwater noise in Arctic waters.
Manmade underwater noise can disrupt Arctic wildlife that relies on sound to navigate, communicate, find food and avoid predators, pushing species such as whales and seals away from key habitats. It can also impact the subsistence hunting and fishing of Indigenous and local communities, as disturbed animals become harder to locate and seasonal patterns grow less predictable.
In the modern Arctic, underwater noise comes not only from large ships but also from snowmobiles, aircraft and small boats that do not appear in satellite tracking systems. These sources produce sound signatures at frequencies far above the regulatory bands currently used by international bodies.
Findings from the new Bath study, published in the Nature portfolio journal npj Acoustics, have significant implications for environmental policy frameworks such as the European Marine Strategy Framework Directive. Currently, this directive relies on narrow low frequency ‘shipping bands’ to assess underwater noise pollution.
The study’s authors argue that these bands no longer reflect the reality of today’s Arctic soundscape, failing to capture many contemporary noise sources, the growing diversity of vessels entering the region and the broader range of frequencies generated by modern shipping in a rapidly changing Arctic.
Because the current bands no longer reflect the Arctic’s changing acoustic environment, the researchers are urging the international organizations and authorities responsible for setting, updating and enforcing underwater noise regulations to revise the thresholds used to assess noise levels in Arctic waters.
The Bath study, which looks at 10 years of measurements from Arctic Canada, also shows that sound levels vary dramatically with ice cover, indicating that regulations designed for open European waters cannot be applied effectively to polar seas.
Dr Philippe Blondel, lead author from the Department of Physics at Bath and an expert in underwater acoustics, said: “The Arctic is entering a new era as climate change accelerates three times faster than the global average.
“As the ice melts and previously inaccessible waters open up, there will be more shipping routes, more aircraft, more small vessels used for tourism and resource exploration, more near shore industrial activity, including mining and drilling, and other geostrategic pressures.
“These changes are increasing the intensity and variety of underwater sounds, which can travel hundreds of kilometers through cold northern waters. All these sources contribute noise that affects local ecosystems, wildlife and the subsistence activities of Indigenous communities.”
Dr Blondel said total silence in Arctic seas was neither necessary nor what his team was advocating. “Some sounds, like the small fishing vessels used by locals, can have negligible impacts. Other manmade sounds are small compared to the loud background noise of ice melting or fracturing, or they do not affect the hearing of local animal species, meaning they too are acceptable. This is why we need to monitor sound in a range of frequencies along with the different impacts these sounds have depending on the season and ice cover.”
He added: “Our long-term study shows that underwater sound is a sensitive and reliable way to detect human activities that leave no satellite trace, and it provides the evidence needed to adapt noise regulations to real Arctic conditions, varying with seasons and with ice cover. We benefited from the long-term measurements made by Ocean Networks Canada at their community observatory in Cambridge Bay (Ekaluktutiak) in Nunavut.
“As interest in the Arctic intensifies, effective management will depend on monitoring frequencies that have so far been overlooked and on taking seasonal ice dynamics into account. Regulators need evidence from the Arctic itself, rather than relying on models developed for lower latitudes.”
Published in journal: npj Acoustics
Title: Marine soundscapes of the Arctic and human impacts: going beyond the “shipping bands”
Authors: Philippe Blondel, Rhys Belcher, and Dylan Cooper
Source/Credit: University of Bath
Reference Number: env012626_02