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MILJØFORSK-Miljøforskning for en grønn samfunnsomstilling

Cultural Heritage Sites in Coastal Areas. Monitor, Manage and Preserve Sites and Landscapes under Climate Change and Development Pressure

Alternative title: Kulturminner i kystsonen. Overvåking, forvaltning og bevaring av lokaliteter, miljøer og landskap under press fra klimaendring og utbygging

Awarded: NOK 9.0 mill.

The CULTCOAST project researches and works with developing methods to prioritize, limit damage, preserve and manage cultural heritage sites, environments and landscapes in Arctic coastal areas in a changing climate. The aim is to find the best methods to monitor, manage and preserve these highly valued environmental goods that are exposed to threats from climate change and development pressure. Furthermore, we will develop mitigation and adaptation measures and management strategies related particularly to coastal cultural heritage sites, environments and landscapes. Climate is changing, with increasing temperatures, precipitation changes, decreasing permafrost, more frequent and severe storms, sea level rise, sea ice reduction, floods, avalanches and changing vegetation. Warming in the Arctic is more than twice as rapid as the global average. Melting snow and ice results in darker surfaces and thus increased absorption of solar energy. Arctic areas suffer more from combined threats and have previously been well protected by permafrost and sea ice. This increases the risk of coastal erosion, and thus many heritage sites enter the risk zone and may be lost without any chances to document them and preserve the information. Heritage sites there are also exposed to increasing stress from tourism and development. CULTCOAST examines these effects with an interdisciplinary approach combining archaeology, building protection, geography, quaternary geology and climate science. Throughout the entire project period, active communication has been carried out by all project partners at research conferences, at project workshops, project reference group meetings, and in direct communication with local, regional and national heritage management authorities. So far, 63 communication actions towards users, in addition to five scientific publications come directly from the project. To that can be added some associated papers and a series of media reports, both in printed and virtual media. Several of the project partners were interviewed by the BBC journalist Nick Beake in Svalbard August 2022; these interviews were published in the Our World series on BBC, in podcasts, radio transmissions and on the BBC website in October 2022, leading up to the COP27 in Egypt. The PhD candidate makes great progress and contributes very actively to the project. CULTCOAST is cooperating with the EU financed project CAPARDUS, capardus.nersc.no | Capacity-building in Arctic Standardisation Development, about involving more actors in monitoring work. The information will be used to develop improved methods to evaluate and prioritize sites. Several joint meetings have been held, both virtual ones and a physical workshop in Svalbard which included a field trip to Hiorthhamn. CULTCOAST has also established cooperation with two other research projects on Svalbard cultural heritage financed by the RCN; ArcticAlpineDecay (led by NIBIO) and PCCH-Arctic (led by SINTEF). The projects have had a series of virtual meetings, and a joint workshop and public meeting in Longyearbyen in September 2022. Particular focus has been on the cableway station at Hiorthhamn which is highly threatened by coastal erosion, and on the cableway bucks in and around Longyearbyen. Fieldwork on Svalbard was carried out August 2019, with supplementary investigations and installation of monitoring equipment in 2020, plus supplementary investigations both in 2021 and 2022. Fieldwork at Andøya was carried out in June 2021, and this included installation of monitoring equipment. The probes measure soil humidity, soil temperature and conductivity at nine different levels over a depth of one metre. These measurements are taken four times a day at six-hour intervals. The measurement results may be studied through the CautusWeb website portal, and data is shared with other researchers, the Governor of Svalbard and the Directorate of Cultural Heritage. The Arctic areas act as a sensor and an early warning-system for the rest of the world, and changes in these areas are expected to also occur further south. Therefore, the results from this research project will have transfer value for heritage management on both national and international levels.

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Cultural heritage (CH) and cultural environments are highly valued environmental goods, but these values are under serious threat from multiple sources. Climate is changing now at an even higher rate than expected in some of the worst-case climate scenarios, with increasing temperatures, changes in precipitation, decreasing permafrost, more frequent and severe storms, sea level rise, reduction of sea ice, floods, avalanches and changing vegetation (Climate Research Unit, 2018). These changes increase the risks of geo-hazards, e.g. erosion caused by wind, waves and rivers that threaten particularly coastal CH sites, environments and landscapes. The northern areas are particularly sensitive, because they suffer more from combined threats and have previously been well protected by the aid of permafrost and sea ice. The Arctic acts as a bellwether for the rest of the globe – impacts there are likely to be felt further south in the future. Our proposed project focuses on the individual and combined impacts of climate change induced geo-hazards and pressure from tourism and development in northern Norway, using the Arctic and sub-Arctic sites as basis for future modelling that will have global use. Based on existing methodologies for mapping and documentation, strategies for mitigation and conservation will be developed to protect these sites in the decades towards the year 2100. We intend to map, monitor and gather input from selected case sites below and above ground on Svalbard and Andøya to develop improved knowledge-based methods for evaluating and prioritizing sites. We’ll further develop mitigation measures and management strategies related particularly to coastal CH sites, environments and landscapes threatened by geo-hazards, in close cooperation with national and international expertise. Our interdisciplinary approach of combining archaeology, architecture, geography, quaternary geology and climate science has not previously been considered or implemented.

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MILJØFORSK-Miljøforskning for en grønn samfunnsomstilling