2016 Assembly Speakers
Doaa Abdel-Motaal
Author
Doaa Abdel-Motaal is an environment and climate change expert. She is the former chief of staff of the United Nations Fund for Agricultural Development, Rome, Italy, and former deputy chief of staff of the World Trade Organization, Geneva, Switzerland. She travelled to the Antarctic and the Arctic in 2015-2016 to research her book, Antarctica, The Battle for the Seventh Continent.
Adamie Delisle Alaku
Vice President, Renewable Resources
Makivik Corporation
Adamie Delisle-Alaku was educated in his hometown of Salluit and pursued higher education in Sciences in Montreal. After his studies, he worked at the Raglan mine for 10 years, as the human resources coordinator and as a foreman. Adamie joined Makivik Corporation in the capacity of Executive Assistant. He developed an understanding of wildlife issues and challenges related to renewable resources facing the Inuit of Nunavik. He has showed great devotion in ensuring that Nunavimmiut were heard and represented at a Regional, National and International level. He is a member of the Hunting Fishing Trapping Coordinating Committee and co-chair of the Ungava Peninsula Caribou Aboriginal Roundtable.
Bo N. Andersen
Director General
Norwegian Space Center
Director General of the Norwegian Space Center. Co-chair of Arctic Council Taskforce on Telecommunications Infrastructure in the Arctic (TFTIA).
Nils Andreassen
Executive Director
Institute of the North
Andreassen has a degree in Peace and Development from the University of Bradford in England and his background in rural and international development, Alaska and Arctic policy issues fit well within the Institute’s mission to inform public policy as it relates to natural resource development, and specifically to result in improved living and economic conditions for northern residents. The Institute has a legacy working on Arctic infrastructure priorities and policies that serve to strengthen and connect northern communities.
Edward C. Anthes-Washburn
Executive Director
Port of New Bedford
Edward C. Anthes-Washburn serves as the Executive Director of the Port of New Bedford, the US’s highest-valued fishing port. Since 2010, Ed has focused on business development, strategic planning and environmental issues and operations for the HDC. He received a B.S. in Urban Studies from Cornell University and a M.S. in Public Affairs from the University of Massachusetts- Boston. Ed lives in New Bedford with his wife, Pamela, and dog, Garth.
Patrick Arnold
Founder
New England Ocean Cluster
Patrick Arnold established Soli DG Inc. in 2007 to provide operations, marketing, and management consulting for ports throughout North America. Since 2009, Soli DG has worked under the Maine Port Authority to manage cargo operations at the International Marine Terminal in Portland. Patrick also helped to facilitate Eimskip’s relocation from Virginia to Portland, Maine, resulting in unprecedented development on Portland’s working waterfront and connection to the North Atlantic. In 2014, Patrick partnered with Thor Sigfusson,
Agnieszka Ason
Adjunct Professor
Technical University of Berlin
Agnieszka Ason is an energy disputes lawyer affiliated with the Institute for Energy and Regulatory Law and currently teaching energy arbitration at Technical University in Berlin. Agnieszka is passionate about the Arctic and she had previously delivered presentations on various Arctic-related energy and governance issues, most recently in Oxford, UK (2015, UK Energy Law & Policy Association Conference), Malmo, Sweden (2015, World Maritime University) and Toyama, Japan (2015, Arctic Science Summit Week).
Alyson Azzara
Senior Maritime Advisor
U.S. Committee on the Marine Transportation System
Ragnheiður Elín Árnadóttir
Minister of Industry and Commerce,
Iceland
Ragnheiður Elín Árnadóttir became the Minister of Industry and Commerce in May 2013. A Member of Parliament for the Independence Party since 2007 and Chairman of the Parliamentary group from 2010-12.
Ms. Árnadóttir served as the Political Advisor to the Minister of Finance (1998-2005), the Minister for Foreign Affairs (2005-2006) and the Prime Minister (2006-2007). She worked for the Trade Council of Iceland from 1995-1998, both in New York and in Reykjavík. She graduated from the University of Iceland in 1991 with a BA-degree in Political Science, and an MSFS-degree (Master of Science in Foreign Service) from Georgetown University in Washington D.C in 1994
Sandra Maria Rodrigues Balão
Assistant Professor
Technical University of Lisbon
Sandra Maria Rodrigues Balão holds a master's degree and a Ph.D. from the Higher Institute for Social and Political Sciences at the University of Lisbon.
Her main areas of interest are globalization and military strategic studies; the international system; multilevel power politics; foreign policy; geopolitics; global studies; elite theory; and governance, democracy and state studies. She has focused her area study interests on the Arctic (security challenges in a broad sense), with a focus on the European Union's strategy for the Arctic region, as well as the United States and NATO areas.
Dr. Balão teaches undergraduate, graduate and advanced political science, strategy and international relations studies courses. She is an integrated researcher at the Center for Administration and Public Policies (CAPP), where she coordinates the stream of politics and government issues, and is also a cooperative researcher at the Eastern Issues Institute (IO).
She has presented papers at international conferences and is a peer reviewer of scientific journals such as IPSR, Empedocles, Proelium, Nação e Defesa and Geopolítica, among others. Some of her scientific research outputs have been published.
She has successfully completed several courses from the Portuguese National Defense Institute (National Defense Ministry) and is a Portuguese National Defense Auditor.
James Balog
Director
Earth Vision Institute
For 35 years, photographer James Balog has broken new conceptual and artistic ground on one of the most important issues of our era: human modification of our planet’s natural systems. He and his Extreme Ice Survey team are featured in the 2012 internationally acclaimed, Emmy award-winning documentary "Chasing Ice" and in the 2009 PBS/NOVA special, "Extreme Ice". He is the author of "ICE: Portraits of Vanishing Glaciers" and seven other books. His photos have been extensively published in major magazines, including "National Geographic", and exhibited at museums and galleries worldwide.
Nigel Bankes
Professor of Law
University of Calgary
Dr. Nigel Bankes is a Professor of Law at the University of Calgary where holds the chair in natural resources law. He also has an adjunct appointment at the University of Tromsø, Norway with the KG Jebsen Centre for the Law of the Sea. His principal research interests are in the areas of indigenous peoples law, water law, oil and gas and energy law, and international environmental law. He is an active contributor to the Faculty’s blog, Ablawg.ca and to the JCLOS Blog where he writes on these research areas as well as law of the sea issue
Tom Barry
Executive Secretary
Conservation of Arctic Flora and Fauna (CAFF)
Tom Barry is the Executive Secretary of the Conservation of Arctic Flora and Fauna (CAFF), the biodiversity working group of the Arctic Council. Tom has a broad range of experience at national and international levels dealing with strategic planning and organizational development, and works with a diverse range of Arctic stakeholders. Tom is heavily involved in the Arctic Biodiversity Assessment (ABA), which created a baseline for use in global and regional assessments of biodiversity and provides a basis to guide future Arctic Council work. Tom is also closely involved in the implementation of the Circumpolar Biodiversity Monitoring Program (CBMP).
Arctic Circle Assembly 2015
Breakout Session Speaker:
Marine Protected Areas
Organized by: the Arctic Council’s Protection of the Arctic Marine Environment (PAME) and Conservation of Arctic Flora and Fauna (CAFF) Working Groups, and the WWF Global Arctic Programme
Breakout Session Speaker:
Actions for Arctic Biodiversity 2013-2021: Implementing the Recommendations of the Arctic Biodiversity Assessment
Organized by: the Arctic Council’s Working Group on the Conservation of Arctic Flora and Fauna (CAFF)
Arctic Circle Assembly 2014
Plenary Speaker:
Report XI: Arctic Biodiversity
Breakout Session Speaker:
Mainstreaming Arctic Sustainability
Organized by: The Conservation of Arctic Flora and Fauna (CAFF) and the Protection of the Arctic Marine Environment (PAME), working groups of the Arctic Council.
Breakout Session Speaker:
The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity TEEB - Valuing the Invaluable Arctic
Organized by: the World Wildlife Fund (WWF Arctic) and the Conservation of Arctic Flora and Fauna International Secretariat (CAFF)
Arctic Circle Assembly 2013
Breakout Session Speaker:
Arctic Biodiversity Conservation
Organized by: Conservation of Arctic Flora and Fauna (CAFF), the biodiversity working group of the Arctic Council
Mia Bennett
PhD Candidate
Department of Geography, UCLA
Mia Bennett is a PhD candidate in the Department of Geography at UCLA and founder and manager of the Cryopolitics blog. Her research examines the pathways and processes of Arctic natural resource and infrastructure development using methods from political geography and remote sensing, focusing on projects in the Russian Far East and the Northwest Territories, Canada. Bennett received an MPhil in Polar Studies from the University of Cambridge and speaks Russian, French, and Swedish.
Paul Arthur Berkman
Professor of Practice in Science Diplomacy, Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, Tufts University; Coordinator of Arctic Options
Prof. Paul Arthur Berkman joined the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University as Professor of Practice in Science Diplomacy in 2015 and became Director of the Arctic Futures Initiative through the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis in 2016. He also is
Arctic Circle Assembly 2016
Plenary Session Speaker:
Status of Earth Observations in the Arctic: Systems and Infrastructure
Arctic Circle Singapore Forum 2015
Panelist:
Public-Private Partnership and the Arctic Investment Protocol
Arctic Circle Assembly 2015
Pre-event Speaker:
Arctic High Seas Forum
Organized by Arctic Options and Reykjavík University
Plenary Session Panelist:
Strengthening Arctic Marine Governance
Organized by: The WWF Global Arctic Programme
Breakout Session Speaker:
Arctic High Seas: Building Common Interests in the Arctic Ocean.
Organized by: Arctic Options
Title: Balancing National Interests and Common
Arctic Circle Assembly 2014
Plenary Session Speaker:
Report III: The High Seas
Breakout Session Speaker:
At the Edge: the Future of Arctic Coastlines
Organized by: The Arctic NGO Forum
Anna Berlina
Research Fellow
Nordregio
Anna Berlina is currently working as Research Fellow at Nordregio – Nordic Centre for Spatial Development. Previously Anna Berlina has worked as project assistant for the Council of the Baltic Sea Secretariat in Stockholm. In her work, Berlina has specialised in issues involving Artic communities and business strategies, social innovation, regional development in the Nordic countries as well as green growth and bioeconomy. Berlina has conducted her Master in Science for Sustainable Development in Linköping University. She has also completed a Bachelor Degree in Environmental Technology, University of Tartu, Estonia.
Arctic Circle Assembly 2016
Breakout Session Speaker:
Sustainable Regional Development in the Nordic Arctic
Organized by: Nordregio
Rasmus Gjedssø Bertelsen
Professor
University of Tromsø – Norway’s Arctic University
Rasmus Gjedssø Bertelsen is Professor of Northern Studies and the inaugural Barents Chair in Politics at University of
Laurent Bertino
Research Director
Nansen Environmental and Remote Sensing Center (NERSC)
Dr. Laurent Bertino holds a PhD in sequential data assimilation methods. He has reformulated them based on the concepts of geostatistics and opened new theoretical developments. He has since then applied the Ensemble Kalman Filter to the primitive equations HYCOM model and has been responsible for the development and operations of the TOPAZ ice-ocean forecasting system since January 2003. LB is leading the Arctic element of the Copernicus Marine Environment Monitoring Service, co-leading a Nordic Center of Excellence on ensemble-based methods for environmental monitoring and prediction, awarded by NordForsk. Laurent Bertino is managing the FP7 SWARP project “Ships and waves reaching polar regions”. He has also managed industry-driven modelling studies in the South China Sea, in the Gulf of Mexico and in the Barents and Kara Seas. He is also regularly invited at the Institute of Atmospheric Physics of the Chinese Academy of Science, P.R. China
Yves Bégin
Vice-rector, Research and Academic Affairs
Institut national de la recherche scientifique, Québec
Brynhildur Bjarnadóttir
Assistant Professor
University of Akureyri, Iceland
Brynhildur Bjarnadóttir is an Assistant Professor at the University of Akureyri, Iceland. Her background is within natural sciences and further into biology/ecophysiology. She has been doing researches on the effect of vegetation on climate change and the interaction between the atmosphere and the biosphere. Further her research are within the field of outdoor teaching, sustainability and local studies. Brynhildur has a B.sc degree in biology from the University of Iceland and a Ph.D degree in ecophysiology from the University of Lund in Sweden.
Arctic Circle Assembly 2016
Breakout Session Speaker:
Towards a Carbon-neautral Approach in the Arctic
Organized by: University of Akureyri, Akureyri Clean Tech, and the Conservation of Arctic Flora and Fauna (CAFF) Working Group of the Arctic Council
Title: Changing Climate in the Arctic. Why is the Arctic Circle not Carbon Neutral?
Halldór Björnsson
Head of Atmospheric Research Group
Icelandic Met Office
Halldór Björnsson is head of the Atmospheric Research Group at the Icelandic Meteorological Office. His research has covered climate data analysis, climate variability and Arctic climate change, sea ice, ocean and atmospheric
Lill Rastad Bjørst
Research Coordinator
AAU Arctic
Lill Rastad Bjørst is
Dorottya Bognar
PhD Candidate
UiT – The Arctic University of Norway, Tromsø
Dorottya Bognar is a PhD Candidate at the Arctic University of Norway in Tromsø and a guest researcher at the Fridtjof Nansen Institute, Lysaker, Norway. She has a masters degree in Law of the Sea from the University of Tromsø, Norway and a masters degree in Peace and Conflict Transformation from the same university. She has a bachelor degree in International Relations from the University of Szeged, Hungary.
Wijnand Boonstra
Research Fellow
Stockholm Resilience Center
Dr. Wijnand Boonstra is a Research fellow focusing on Regime shifts Baltic sea at the Stockholm Resilience Centre. He holds a PhD from Wageningen University in Rural Sociology. Dr. Boonstra is particularly interested understanding how individual use of ecosystems aggregates to form so-called regimes of ecosystem use. Describing and explaining the complex set of social and ecological conditions and their interaction at micro and macro scales that cause these regimes to shift, is a key research objective.
Odd Jarl Borch
Professor
Nord University Business School
Odd Jarl Borch is Professor in Strategy and Management at Nord University Business School. He holds a graduate degree in Economics and Business Administration (siviløkonom) from NHH – Norwegian School of Economics and a Ph.D. in Managerial Economics from Umeå University and has been a postdoctoral researcher at Indiana University. Borch’s research focuses on business and societal development within a range and sectors and industries, fisheries, aquaculture, food industry, maritime business as well as safety and preparedness. He currently leads several international R&D projects focusing on preparedness and emergency management.
Michael Bravo
University Senior Lecturer and Fellow
Downing College, Scott Polar Research Institute
Michael Bravo has an interdisciplinary background with a humanities Ph.D. (Cantab 1992) in the history and philosophy of science, building on a technical background with a B.Eng. (Carleton 1985) in satellite communications engineering. Bravo has written extensively on the role of scientific research in the exploration and development of the Arctic, exploring issues in historical epistemology including the philosophy of experiment, measurement in fieldwork, the nature of precision and calibration, science and technology in translation, and the historical emergence of new ontologies. Michael Bravo is Head of the Circumpolar History and Public Policy Research Group at the Scott Polar Research Institute, as well being a member of the Geography Department's Society and Environment Research Group.
Martin Breum
Journalist, Commentator & Author
Martin Breum is journalist and author. He contributes regular Arctic analysis to the media in Denmark and Greenland; his other Arctic coverage appeared in National Geographic, Internationald Herald Tribune, Caijing (China) and other media. Martin recently produced (with J. Gottschau) a series of tv-documentaries on the common history of Denmark, Greenland and the Faroe Islands.
Lawson Brigham
Distinguished Professor of Geography & Arctic Policy
University of Alaska Fairbanks
Dr. Lawson W. Brigham is Distinguished Fellow and Faculty Member at the International Arctic Research Center, University of Alaska Fairbanks. He is also a Fellow at the U.S. Coast Guard Academy’s Center for Arctic Study and Policy. Captain Brigham was a career Coast Guard officer and commanded four cutters including the icebreaker Polar Sea on Arctic & Antarctic expeditions. During 2004-09 he was chair of the Arctic Council’s Arctic Marine Shipping Assessment. His research interests have focused on the Russian maritime Arctic, environmental change, polar marine transportation, and polar geopolitics. He received his
Ronald Broglio
Associate Professor
Arizona State University
Ron Broglio is an associate professor at the Arizona State University. His research focuses on how philosophy and aesthetics can help us rethink the relationship between humans and the environment. In Beasts of Burden: Biopolitics, Labor and Animal Life in British Romanticism, he examines the birth and limits of state power into life of citizens and animals alike. His work Surface Encounters: Thinking with Animals and Art develops a language for animal studies through examination of contemporary art and phenomenology. His book Technologies of the Picturesque: British Art, Poetry, and Instruments 1750-1830 develops the phenomenological engagement between bodies and technology in the British landscape aesthetic.
Erik Buch
Chair
EuroGOOS
Erik Buch, chair of EuroGOOS. Master of Science, Physical Oceanography, 1978; Ph.D in Physical Oceanography, 1983; Bachelor of Commerce, Management, 1990 and Project Management, 1994. Senior scientist at Greenland Fisheries Research Institute, 1982; Head of Fisheries Department, same institute, 1985. Vice-Director, same institute, 1986. Head of Oceanographic Department, Royal Danish Administration of Navigation and Hydrography, 1990. Director of Division for Operational Oceanography, DMI 1998 (renamed to Centre for Ocean and Ice in 2006). Danish representative in EuroGOOS since 1995. Member of EuroGOOS Board 1999-2003 and since 2008; chair since 2013. Chairman of EuroGOOS Baltic Task Team (BOOS) 1998-2009. Danish IOC delegate since 2007. Initiator, coordinator or WP-leader of a number of research projects with relation to marine climate and operational oceanography. Great experience in oceanographic data collection, analysis and presentation.
Henry Burgess
Head
NERC Arctic Office
Henry Burgess is the Head of the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) Arctic Office, hosted by the British Antarctic Survey. The Office supports UK research in the High North; provides advice to policy
Emma Butcher
Doctoral Candidate
University of Hull
Emma Butcher is doctoral candidate in English Literature at the University of Hull, funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council. Her research focuses on children, war and military landscapes in historical literature. She has previously written for the THE, BBC History Magazine and the Guardian and recently appeared on BBC2.
Suzanne Cassolato
Research Engineer
CanmetENERGY Alternative Energy Lab, Natural Resources Canada
Suzanne Cassolato is currently working as a Research Engineer at the CanmetENERGY-Ottawa, a clean energy research organization, within the Department of Natural Resources. Suzanne has over 20 years of experience in the field of energy conservation. She has worked on projects with Defence Research and Development Canada and the Department of National Defence to deliver military and environmental objectives aimed to reduce diesel dependency on military camps, both nationally and abroad. More recently, Suzanne has been supporting Canada’s remote and northern communities to reduce their dependency on fossil fuel by translating innovative technologies into integrated field-ready applications.
Martha Cerny
curator
Museum Cerny Inuit Collection, Bern-Switzerland
Martha Cerny (Canadian/Swiss) is
Miyase Christensen
Researcher
Stockholm University and KTH Royal Institute of Technology
Dr. Miyase Christensen is a leading scholar on globalization and media studies. She is professor of Media and Communication Studies at Stockholm University and Guest Professor at the Division of History of Science, Technology and the Environment at KTH Royal Institute of Technology. Christensen’s research is interdisciplinary in nature and comprises thematic areas such as social theory perspectives on globalization processes and social change; identity, culture and mediation; and, politics of popular communication. She is part of international research networks that focus on various aspects of mediatization, politics and social change processes. Christensen is the editor-in-chief of Popular Communication: International Journal of Media and Culture and has authored/co-authored numerous international publications, including Cosmopolitanism and the Media: Cartographies of Change (2015, Palgrave Macmillan); Media, Surveillance and Identity (2014, Peter Lang); Media and the Politics of Arctic Climate Change: When the Ice Breaks (2013, Palgrave Macmillan); and Online Territories: Globalization, Mediated Practice and Social Space (2011, NY: Peter Lang). Christensen’s current project portfolio includes Arctic Governance and the Question of Fit in a Globalized World (Formas), Cosmopolitanism from the Margins: Mediations of Expressivity, Social Space and Cultural Citizenship(Swedish Research Council); “Kinetic Élites: The Mediatization of Social Belonging and Close Relationships among Mobile Class Fractions” (Swedish Research Council); “The Social Journalist: News Work and News Organizations in an Era of Networked Sociality” (funded by the Swedish Research Council FAS).
Pamela Y. Collins
Director
Office for Research on Disparities and Global Mental Health, National Institute for Mental Health, United States
Dr. Pamela Collins is Associate Director for Special Populations at the US National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) where she directs the Office for Research on Disparities & Global Mental Health and the Office of Rural Mental Health Research. She brings 20 years of experience in global mental health and minority mental health research and science policy. Dr. Collins and her staff are the technical leads for Reducing the Incidence of Suicide among Indigenous Groups: Strengths United through Networks (RISING SUN), a mental health initiative under the US chairmanship of the Arctic Council. She is the co-chair of the Scientific Advisory Board for the initiative along with researchers from Canada, Denmark, and Norway.
Michael T. Corgan
Associate Professor
University of Boston
Professor Corgan is an Associate Professor of International Relations at the Pardee School of
Barry A. Costa-Pierce
Chair and Director
the Department of Marine Sciences, Marine Science Center, University of New England
Dr. Costa-Pierce is the Doherty Professor of Marine Sciences at UNE. He is a marine ecologist with research interests in “ocean food systems”: how fisheries, aquaculture, and seafood value chains throughout the world interact locally with marine ecosystems and people. In
The Honourable Philippe Couillard
Premier
Québec
Philippe Couillard became the 31st Premier of Québec on April 14, 2014. Over past two years, he showed and proven, both in Canada and abroad, that with partnerships and collaborative efforts, it is possible to simultaneously develop the economy and effectively fight climate change.
Québec is a Nordic territory that is contributing to the international effort to preserve the North and ensure its sustainable development, notably through its participation in international Arctic forums such as the Arctic Circle, the Arctic Council and the Nordic Council of Ministers. Premier Couillard has been a member of the Honorary Board of the Arctic Circle since 2015.
In 2015, he invited all the premiers of Canada’s provinces and territories to Québec City to discuss the effects of climate change on health, security, infrastructure, ecosystems and, of course, the North. He also assembled representatives from Nordic countries, the world of academia, and Nordic communities, including representatives from the First Nations, as well as business people and companies for an International Symposium on Northern Development.
Lastly, the Government of Québec set up the Institut nordique du Québec (INQ) to support and fund northern research and development. The goal of one of the largest sustainable development projects—the Plan Nord—is to sustainably develop a vast territory of some 1.2 million square kilometres north of the 49th parallel in a manner that respects the people who live there. Québec is committed to putting its extensive expertise in sustainable northern development to good use by working in collaboration with all its partners to ensure the technical, scientific, economic, social and cultural progress of the North.
Roger Cox
Lead Lawyer for the Urgenda Foundation
Canadian Centre for International Governance Innovation (CIGI)
Roger Cox is a CIGI senior fellow with the International Law Research Program. An expert in climate change law, he is partner at the Dutch law firm Paulussen Advocaten and was the lead lawyer for the Urgenda Foundation, which won a controversial decision in June 2015 when The Hague District Court ordered the Dutch government to cut greenhouse gas emissions by at least 25 percent by 2020.
Yvon Csonka
Professor of Anthropology
Ilisimatusarfik – University of Greenland
After fifteen years of ethnographic and archaeological research in Nunavut and in Chukotka, Yvon Csonka was nominated to a professorship in anthropology at Ilisimatusarfik, the University of Greenland, which he held from 2001 to 2009. He was educated at the University of Neuchâtel (Switzerland, MA) the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales (Paris, DEA) and Laval University (Québec, PhD). He is a founding member, and served a term as president, of the International Arctic Social Sciences Association (IASSA). He is currently head of thematic analyses and surveys at the Swiss Federal Statistical Office.
Björn Dahlbäck
Director General
Swedish Polar Research Secretariat
Björn Dahlbäck is Director-General of the Swedish Polar Research Secretariat. As a government agency, the Swedish Polar Research Secretariat is mandated to coordinate and promote Swedish polar research. With a PhD in marine microbiology Björn Dahlbäck has had different manager positions in research-intensive industry such as petrochemical and pharmaceutical.
After a period as senior consultant in organization and leadership development, Dahlbäck returned to academia as a research leader at the University of Gothenburg before taking up his present position at the Secretariat.
Arctic Circle Assembly 2016
Breakout Session Speaker:
The Future of Arctic Shipping Under IPCC Climate Scenarios
Organized by: EU-PolarNet and ICE-ARC
Title: Conclusions and recommendations for necessary actions from an EU-PolarNet perspective.
Brigt Dale
Senior Researcher
Nordland Research Institute, Norway
Brigt Dale (PhD, political Science, Msc visual anthropology) is a Senior Researcher at Nordland Research Institute, Norway,working out of an office in the Lofoten Islands. He focusses on theoreticaldevelopment and research on the relation between politics, security, power,knowledge construction and resource management, in particular in relation to large scale industrial development and small scale communities. Dale´sempirical research interests includes petroleum development, tourism, aquaculture, mining and cultural heritage. He is the co-editor of the forthcoming Springer ontology “The Will to Drill: Mining and Arctic Communities” and is project leader for the ARCTICCHALLENGE project, focusing on how petroleum development poses a challenge to Arctic communities.
Oddgeir Danielsen
Director
Northern Dimension Partnership on Transport and Logistics
Oddgeir Danielsen is the director of the secretariat of the Northern Dimension Partnership on Transport and Logistics located in Helsinki, Finland. Danielsen has gained experience within the field of transport and logistics by working in the business sector for many years on both practical and administrative levels, including holding the position as port director in the North Norwegian Port of Kirkenes.
Danielsen has for many years been involved in a broad variety of Russian-Norwegian and multinational cooperation projects. He holds an MSc degree in Civil Engineering, majoring in Numerical Simulations of Ice Forces onto Offshore Structures.
Brynhildur Davíðsdóttir
Professor of Environment and Natural Resources
University of Iceland
Dr. Davíðsdóttir is a Professor of Environment and Natural Resources at University of Iceland. She also is the director of University of Iceland Arctic Initiative. Dr. Davíðsdóttir has extensive teaching, research and consulting experience in interdisciplinary issues as they relate to ecological economics, blue/green growth, ecosystem, services, sustainable energy development, sustainability indicators, climate change mitigation and adaptation and modeling energy related technological transitions. Dr. Davíðsdóttir sits on the board of the International Society for Ecological Economic, the Climate change research foundation, and is on the board of several companies in Iceland. She also works with the Icelandic government on various issues that relate to the environment and natural resources such as climate change related issues.
Julie Decker
Director, CEO
Anchorage Museum
Julie Decker is Director/CEO of the Anchorage Museum. She has also served as Chief Curator for the Anchorage Museum and has organized and curated numerous major exhibitions and authored numerous publications on the art and architecture of the North.
Stephen Van Dine
Assistant Deputy Minister
Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada
Stephen was appointed Assistant Deputy Minister of the Northern Affairs Organization on January 21, 2015. Prior to this, he was Director General, Northern Strategic Policy Branch. Stephen grew up in the Northwest Territories and began his career as a community planner with the City of Yellowknife and later with the Government of the Northwest Territories, Department of Municipal and Community Affairs. In 1997, he began working at AANDC, in the Yellowknife Regional Office. Stephen later transferred to headquarters and worked on a variety of northern policy, legislative and regulatory initiatives with territorial governments, Aboriginal organizations, other federal departments and the private sector laying the
Erica M. Dingman
Fellow
World Policy Institute
Erica Dingman is a Fellow at World Policy Institute where she continues to develop WPI’s Arctic program. In 2014 she launched the Arctic in Context initiative, which mixes digital technology with in-person events. The initiatives web-based platform provides a global audience with an accessible overview of region-wide issues using timelines, videos, and analysis. Her articles have appeared in various publications including CNN, Al Jazeera, Arctic Yearbook and Diplomatic Courier. She is a member of the University of Washington’s Arctic Center Steering Committee and holds a Master’s in International Affairs from The New School.
Dalee Sambo Dorough
Associate Professor, Iñupiat Lawyer and Member of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues
University of Alaska and UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues
Specializing in public international law, international human rights law, international relations, Indigenous human rights standards, Dr. Dalee Sambo Dorough (Inuit-Alaska) holds a Ph.D. from the University of British Columbia, Faculty of Law (2002) and a Master of Arts in Law & Diplomacy from The Fletcher School at Tufts University (1991). She is an Associate Professor of Political Science at University of Alaska Anchorage and an Expert Member and former Chairperson of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues. Active for decades at the United Nations, International Labor Organization, and other international fora, on behalf of the Inuit Circumpolar Council, she devoted a substantial amount of time to the drafting of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
Mary Durfee
Associate Professor of International Relations
Michican Tech University
Mary Durfee is Associate Professor of Government at Michigan Technological University. She is a specialist on the Great Lakes of North America and on international relations theory. She is a past Fulbright and Annenberg Scholar and has co-authored an international relations theory book with James N. Rosenau, Thinking Theory Thoroughly. She has a long-standing interest in the Antarctic and has developed one for the Arctic.
Anthony Edwardsen
President & CEO
Ukpeaġvik Iñupiat Corporation (UIC)
Mr. Anthony Edwardsen, a UIC shareholder, lifelong Barrow, Alaska resident and whaling captain, has served on the UIC board of directors since 1998 and is currently the president and CEO of the company. He has held various positions within the organization including, UIC Foundation board member, Alaska Commercial Co. / UIC Management board, UIC Construction vice president, and Barrow operations manager for UIC Development. He is also a member of the Barrow Volunteer Search and Rescue, Barrow Whaling Captains Association, and Alaska Eskimo Whaling Commission. As of 2014, Mr. Edwardsen was appointed to a chairmanship on the board of directors for Arctic Iñupiat Offshore LLC.
Anne Marie Eikeset
CEES
University of Oslo
Dr. Anne Marie Eikeset is a Researcher at the Centre for Ecological and Evolutionary Synthesis Oslo University and a member of the member of the Levin Lab at Princeton. She received her PhD from Oslo University. Her research focuses on the interface between ecology, evolution and economics where she studies how natural resources, as common pool resources embedded in social-ecological systems, adapt to exploitation and climate change. Currently she is the PI of a Nordforsk funded international research project called Green Growth based on Marine Resources: Ecological and Socio-Economic Constraints
Arctic Circle Assembly 2016
Breakout Session Speaker;
Blue Growth in the Arctic
Organized by: The University of Iceland, Oslo University and Stockholm Resilience Center
What is blue growth?
Ásta Einarsdóttir
Senior Legal Expert
Icelandic Ministry of Industries and Innovation
Ásta Einarsdóttir works as Senior Legal Expert at the Icelandic Ministry of Industries and Innovation. Ásta is the Chair of the North Atlantic Marine Mammal Commission (NAMMCO) Council and the Commissioner of Iceland for NAMMCO. Ásta has been working with different international agreements and attending the International Whaling Commission (IWC), the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) and other international meetings on behalf of Iceland. Ásta has a cand. jur. degree from the University of Iceland and holds an LL.M in European Law from Lund’s University (Sweden).
Meinhard Eliasen
Energy Advisor
the Faroese Energy Authority
Meinhard Eliasen currently works as an Energy Adviser at the Faroese Energy Authority, and has been part of the Faroese work on the North Atlantic Energy Network project. He has many years of experience from a wide range of sectors, such as shipbuilding, IT, oil & gas drilling, risk & safety management and energy planning. Eliasen obtained his BSc in Production engineering from DTU in 1981 and an MSc in Shipbuilding and Ocean Technology from the same institution two years later.
Monica Ell-Kanayuk
Deputy Premier
Government of Nunavut
The Honourable Monica Ell-Kanayuk was re-elected in the general election held on October 28, 2013, to represent the new constituency of Iqaluit-Manirajak in the 4th Legislative Assembly of Nunavut. Ms. Ell-Kanayuk was elected to serve on the Executive Council during the November 15, 2013, proceedings of the Nunavut Leadership Forum. Ms. Ell-Kanayuk was formally sworn into office on November 19, 2013. Ms. Ell-Kanayuk previously sat in the 3rd Legislative Assembly, following a by-election for the riding of Iqaluit West held on September 12, 2011. Ms. Ell-Kanayuk served as Minister of Family Services, Minister responsible for Homelessness, Minister responsible for the Qulliq Energy Corporation and Minister responsible for the Status of Women. Prior to her election to the Legislative Assembly, Mr. Ell-Kanayuk served as Director of Programming for the Inuit Broadcasting Corporation and spent 18 years in media. Mrs. EllKanayuk is a former Director of Economic Development at Nunavut Tunngavik Incorporated. She has also served as President of the Nunavut Economic Forum, President of the Baffin Chamber of Commerce, Vice-President of the Atuqtuarvik Corporation and Vice-President of Pauktuutit, the national organization representing Inuit women. Ms. Ell-Kanayuk lives in Iqaluit with her spouse, Eeneasie Kanayuk. They have five children, as well as several grandchildren. Mrs. Ell-Kanayuk has had a lifelong passion for clothing design and sewing. In 1996, her former business, Arctic Creations, received the “Business of the Year” award from the Nunavut Chamber of Commerce.
Torbjørn Eltoft
Professor
University of Tromsø
Torbjørn Eltoft is a Professor in electrical engineering and remote sensing at the Department of Physics and Technology, UiT-the Arctic University of Norway, and he holds a position as Adjunct Professor at the Northern Research Institute (Norut), Tromsø. He is currently leading CIRFA, a Centre for Research-based Innovation hosted by UiT. His research interests include multi-dimensional signal and image analysis with application in radar remote sensing, statistical models, neural networks, and machine learning.
Sigurd Enge
Manager, Shipping, Marine and Arcic
Bellona Foundation
Sigurd Enge is one of the most experienced advisers at Bellona, as he joined the foundation in 1988. He works as adviser on marine safety and oil spill protection. He is the skipper of M/S Kallinika and he is Head of the Bellona Environmental Patrol. Sigurd has a unique experience working on a broad variety of subjects during his 25 years with the foundation, including fisheries, oil and fish farming. Sigurd has for many years worked on matters related specifically to the Arctic.
Sverre Engeness
Commodore
Norwegian Coast guard
Engeness was born in Bergen. In August 2009 he was promoted to Commodore and in March 2014 he hoisted his command as Commander Norwegian Coast guard.
Sverre Engeness joined the Navy in 1982 graduating from the Naval Academy in 1986. Until 1996 submarines were his preoccupation the last years as Commander Submarine Command Course returning in 2004 as commander of the Norwegian Submarine Service. He has experience from national and Allied headquarters, Ministry of Defense and the Defense staff. From 2009 he was Deputy Commander in the Cyber Defense Command running the Cyber Services and operations division until 2014.
Anne Mette Erlandsson Christiansen
Renewable Energy Program Director
WWF Sweden
Anne Mette Erlandsson Christiansen provides leadership for the development, implementation and funding of the financial flows and responsible development components of WWF's Arctic work. Anne Mette has previously worked in business as a consultant helping companies, civil society organizations and public institutions find ways to engage stakeholders and manage sustainability. Anne Mette lived and worked in Greenland where she has been the driving force in several sustainability and social responsibility projects
Arctic Circle Assembly 2016
Breakout Session Speaker:
Renewable Energy Development in the Arctic: Circumpolar Projects that Advance Knowledge Sharing
Organized by the Institute of the North
Title: Supporting Renewable Energy Development in Alaska, Greenland, Canada and Russia: A Project of WWF
Matthias Finger
Professor, Co-Director
Institute of Technology and Public Policy at Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale Lausanne (EPFL), Switzerland
Matthias Finger is known for his expertise in matters of regulation and governance of network industries. He holds a Ph.D. in Political Science and a Ph.D. in Adult Education from the University of Geneva and has been an Assistant Professor at Syracuse University (New York), an Associate Professor at Columbia University (New York) and a Full Professor of Management of Public Enterprises at the Swiss Federal Institute of Public Administration. Since 2002, he holds the Swiss Post Chair in Management of Network Industries at Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale in Lausanne (EPFL), Switzerland. Since 2010 he also directs the Florence School of Regulation’s Transport Area at the European University Institute in Florence, Italy. Since 2014 he directs the Institute of Technology and Public Policy at EPFL. Prof. Finger is the editor-in-chief of the Journal Competition and Regulation in Network Industries (Sage), a member of the editorial board of Utilities Policy and a member of the Swiss electricity regulatory authority (ElCom). His most recent global project focuses on the governance of large urban systems in collaboration with six global cities and partner Universities, along with selected global firms.
Craig Fleener
Senior Advisor, Arctic Policy and Climate Change
Office of the Governor, Alaska
Craig Fleener is Gwichyaa Zhee Gwich’in from Fort Yukon, Alaska. His experience includes wildlife and fisheries, subsistence, food security, Alaska Native issues, climate research, arctic policy, and military service in the U.S. Marine Corps, U.S. Air Force and Alaska Air National Guard. Craig is a wildlife biologist with a specialty in moose management and human dimensions of wildlife and fisheries. He has a BSc degree in Natural Resources Management and an MSc degree in Strategic Intelligence. He served as a Permanent Participant on the Arctic Council, on the Alaska Board of Game, was Director of the Division of Subsistence and Deputy Commissioner of Wildlife, Subsistence, and Habitat for Alaska.
Arctic Circle Assembly 2016
Breakout Session Speaker:
From Alaska to Lapland – Local Voices Strengthening Arctic Council Chairmanships
Organized by: The Institute of the North and the Arctic Centre
Title: Advocating for Alaskan Priorities.
Stefan Flückiger
Head of the Sectoral Foreign Policies Division
the Directorate of Political Affairs of Switzerland
Stefan Flückiger coordinates Arctic policies and interests within the Swiss Government. He heads the Global Issues Division of the Federal Department of Foreign Affairs. Ambassador Flückiger has served in various positions within the department, including as Swiss Chief of Mission to the OECD. As a graduate from Zurich and Yale Universities, he has also worked at the World Bank and the Swiss Think Tank Avenir Suisse.
Anu Fredrikson
Director
Arctic Economic Council
Anu Fredrikson is the Director of the Arctic Economic Council Secretariat located in Tromsø, Norway. Ms. Fredrikson has previously worked with foreign and security policy, issues related to energy and economy, climate and development policies as well as the Arctic. Prior to joining the AEC, Ms. Fredrikson worked as an Advisor in Political Affairs and Arctic Policy at the Embassy of Finland in Oslo. Ms. Fredrikson is originally from Oulu, Finland. She has a Master’s degree in International Relations from the University of Tampere in Finland and holds a Certificat
Arctic Circle Assembly 2016
Breakout Session Speaker:
Regions as Arctic developers – sustainable development through multilateral cooperation
Organized by: Troms County Council, Norway
Title: Sustainable Business Development.
Sigurður Ingi Friðleifsson
Manager
the Energy Agency of Iceland
Sigurður Friðleifsson is the manager of Orkusetur, The energy Agency Iceland. The main role of the agency is to increase awareness about energy efficiency in households and industry. Creation and introduction of education material about different energy issues also fall under the main agenda of the agency. Sigurður has a B.sc degree in biology from the University of Iceland and a MS.s degree in environmental science from the University of Lund in Sweden.
Maaten Furlong
Head
Marine Autonomous & Robotic Systems Group, National Oceanography Centre
Maaten Furlong joined NOC in 2005 as an AUV development engineer and has been involved in many aspects of research, development and operation of the Autosub AUV fleet. In 2013 he became the head of the MARS group where he now oversees the operations and development of the AUV, subsea glider, unmanned surface vehicle, and ROV fleet. He is actively involved in improving the operational efficiency of the fleet, and has won Innovate UK funding to develop the next generation of marine autonomous system for commercial and scienific use.
Corina Gamma
Film director and producer
Director and Producer Corina Gamma is a documentary filmmaker and accomplished fine-art photographer. Between 2009 and 2011 she traveled three times to Greenland and spent a total of over four months photographing and developing the documentary Gatekeepers of the Arctic. Corina Gamma applies her experience in fine-art photography towards her documentaries, creating films that are artistic, yet of social-political significance. Corina Gamma is Swiss-born and studied fine art in Switzerland and the United States. She earned a Masters in Fine Arts from the Claremont Graduate University in California. Currently, she teaches fine art photography at University level.
Johan Gille
Senior Consultant
ECORYS
Johan Gille is a senior consultant at ECORYS and has 16 years of experience in policy studies covering marine and land-based freight transport, seaports developments and maritime affairs. He was deputy team leader for the Blue Growth study, a scenario study on oceans and seas for DG MARE and did a number of follow-up studies. Johan led an Ecorys self-funded investigation into the economic value Artic ice melt and he was part of the Strategic Environmental Assessment for the Arctic study for DG Environment. In the ICE-ARC project, Johan and his team have studied the impacts on shipping.
Ólafur Ragnar Grímsson
Chairman
Arctic Circle
Ólafur Ragnar Grímsson served as President of the Republic of Iceland from 1996 to 2016. President Grímsson earned his BA degree in economics and political science at the University of Manchester, England, in 1965 where he also completed his PhD thesis in political science five years later. He subsequently became the first professor of political science at the University of Iceland. He took a seat in Althingi, the legislative assembly, in 1978 and served as Iceland’s Minister of Finance from 1988 to 1991.
During his Presidency he emphasized sustainable management of natural resources to control climate change, advocating the use of geothermal energy as a renewable, economically viable, and reliable resource. Since the end of his presidential mandate, he has continued serving as Chairman of the Arctic Circle.
President Grimsson has been active as a spokesman for clean energy solutions, and in 2014 Cornell University in the United States awarded him a special recognition for his contributions in this field.
President Grímsson has actively promoted desertification control, which is also an important issue with respect to climate changes, and in 2009 he was honoured by The Ohio State University for his efforts in this area
President Grimsson has been a spokesman of increased, peaceful, international cooperation both in the Arctic and the Himalayas. With this in mind he initiated, together with others, the Arctic Circle which held its first Assembly in Iceland in 2013 with over 1,200 participants from more than 40 countries. The Arctic Circle Assembly convened a second and third time in 2014 and 2015 with even more participants.
President Grímsson has lectured at universities in many different countries, including Beijing University and Fudan University in China, and Harvard, Columbia, Cornell, Brown, and The Ohio State University in the US. Among the topics he has presented is the interaction of democracy and financial markets, which was a highly current issue for Iceland after the breakdown of the three leading private banks in Iceland in 2008.
President Grimsson has for a long time had good connections with countries in Asia, including India and China, and Presidents of both these countries have visited Iceland. Among many international awards he has received is the 2007 Jawaharlal Nehru Award for International Understanding.
President Grimsson is married to Dorrit Moussaieff. He has two daughters from his marriage to Gudrun Katrin Thorbergsdottir who passed away in 1998.
Stephanie Grocke
Postdoctoral Researcher, Geology,
Smithsonian Institution
Stephanie Grocke is a postdoctoral researcher in Geology who specializes in the study of volcanoes. After acquiring a PhD from Oregon State University, Stephanie conducted a 2-year postdoctoral fellowship at the Smithsonian Institution, National Museum of Natural History in volcanology. She has embarked on multiple field excursions to study volcanoes in South and Central America to better understand the processes that drive explosive volcanic eruptions. As a Fulbright-NSF Arctic Research Scholar, Stephanie will produce a 100-year record of gas emissions from explosive volcanic activity in Iceland. This record will enable better volcano hazard mitigation and increase awareness around Icelandic volcanoes.
Eyjólfur Guðmundsson
Rector
University of Akureyri, Iceland
Eyjólfur Guðmundsson is the Rector of the University of Akureyri, Iceland. His theoretical background is in economics with special emphasis on applying economics to problems in management of fisheries, or fisheries economics. He also focused on applied research with regard to macro- and microeconomic issues as well as econometrics. For seven years he was chef of economics at the game making company CCP. Eyjólfur has a B.sc degree in economy from the University of Iceland and a Ph.D. in economy from Rhode Island University, USA. Before working for CCP, Eyjólfur was Dean of business and science department at the University of Akureyri.
Ari Trausti Guðmundsson
Geophysicist
Ari Trausti was educated at the Universities of Oslo and Iceland, studying mainly geophysics and geology. He has published over 20 books on nature, environmental issues, travelling and mountaineering in Iceland. He is also a published poet and author of novels, and was a TV weatherman for over a decade.
Truls Gulowsen
Head of Greenpeace
Norway
Truls Gulowsen is the head of Greenpeace Norway and sits on the board of Association Article § 112, a civil society coalition in Norway seeking legal advice on whether new oil exploration in the Barents sea could be a violation of the Norwegian constitution and international agreements.
Aleqa Hammond
MEP
the Danish Parliament
As former party leader (2003-2014) for the Siumut party of Greenland, minister for foreign and financial affairs as well as chairman of Greenland’s Government, Aleqa Hammond has had significant experience from politics in Greenland. She is now a member of the Danish Parliament. Ms. Hammond also has extensive experience from work in the tourism sector as
Anne Merrild
Professor of Social Science, Arctic Oil and Gas Studies and Director of the Arctic Oil and Gas Research Centre, Ilisimatusarfik
Anne Merrild Hansen is Professor of Social Science, Arctic Oil and Gas Studies at Ilisimatusarfik, Associate Professor in Environmental Assessment and the Arctic at Aalborg University, Denmark. She was a Fulbright Arctic Initiative scholar 2015-2016 with University of Alaska, Fairbanks. She is also a member of the regional ‘Adaptation Actions for a Changing Arctic’ team on
Melissa Harris
Project Manager
International Institute for Sustainable Development
Melissa Harris has more than eight years of experience in the field of environmental policy. Her recent work at IISD includes projects on sustainable housing, climate change mitigation, renewable energy, and other key Arctic issues. She works regularly with various levels of government, academia, and business stakeholders in the Canadian North. Melissa is also IISD’s focal point to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. Prior to joining IISD, Melissa worked at the Richard Ivey School of Business, specializing in public and private sector engagement and environmental policy analysis. She has a Masters in Political Science from Western University.
Tim Heleniak
Senior Research Fellow
Nordregio
Timothy Heleniak is a Senior Research Fellow at Nordregio where he does research on migration and regional development in the Nordic countries and the Arctic. He has written extensively on migration, population change, and regional development in Russia, the other countries of the Soviet Union, and the Artic. He was the lead author of the chapter “Arctic Populations and Migration in the recent Arctic Human Development Report. ”Prior to coming to Nordregio he worked at the U.S. Census Bureau, the World Bank, UNICEF, and George Washington University. He was previously Editor of the journal, Polar Geography.
John Henshaw
Executive Director
Maine Port Authority
John Henshaw is Executive Director of the Maine Port Authority. In this capacity he invests in, develops and maintains port and intermodal infrastructure to the economic benefit of the state and its businesses. The Maine Port Authority operates the International Marine Terminal in the Port of Portland, Maine.
He is President of the North Atlantic Ports Association, an association of ports reaching from Norfolk, Virginia to the Canadian Maritimes. He holds a Master of Arts in Law and Diplomacy degree from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University and a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst.
Victoria Herrmann
Director
the Arctic Institute’s Center for Circumpolar Studies
Victoria Herrmann is currently a Gates Cambridge Scholar and PhD student at the Scott Polar Research Institute where she’ll be researching how images and aesthetic codes construct values, identities, and ideas of power in the Arctic. She recently completed a Fulbright in Canada, during which she got her Masters in International Affairs at Carleton University and researched Arctic indigenous participation at climate negotiates. In 2014 she worked with the Borders in Globalization project and took part in The Ecologic Institute’s Arctic Summer College. She has previously done work with the Carnegie Endowment and internships with the Smithsonian, the Met, the State Department, and the UN.
John Higginbotham
Head
Arctic Program, Centre for International Governance Innovation
John Higginbotham is head of the Arctic Program at the Center for International Governance Innovation and a senior resident Fellow at Carleton University in Canada. He has held senior positions in Global Affairs Canada in Headquarters, China, Hong Kong and Washington DC as well as in Transport Canada. He has special interests in Arctic economic and social development given the melting Arctic Ocean, the effectiveness of Canadian Arctic policies, in governance issues in the region and within Canada and in Arctic marine issues in an increasingly open and commercial setting.
Erica Hill
Associate Professor
University of Alaska Southeast
Erica Hill is Associate Professor of Anthropology at the University of Alaska Southeast. She is an archaeologist working on the comparative prehistory of human adaptations in the Arctic. She is especially interested in human–animal relations and animal geography. Recent edited volumes include The Archaeology of Ancestors (2016) and Iñupiaq Ethnohistory (2013). She is currently a Fulbright–NSF Arctic Research Scholar at the University of Iceland.
Gwen Holdmann
Director
Alaska Center for Energy and Power
Gwen Holdmann is the Director of the Alaska Center for Energy and Power (ACEP), which is an applied energy research program based at the University of Alaska Fairbanks focusing on both fossil and renewable/alternative energy technologies.
Prior to joining the University of Alaska, Gwen served as the Vice President of New Development at Chena Hot Springs Resort near Fairbanks. While at Chena, Gwen oversaw the construction of the first geothermal power plant in the state. Gwen has been the recipient of several awards throughout her career, including an R&D 100 award, Project of the Year from Power Engineering Magazine, the Alaska Top 40 Under 40 Award.
Robert Howe
Managing Director,
Bremenports GmbH & Co. KG
Dipl.-Ing. Robert Howe, Managing Director Bremenports GmbH & Co. KG
Robert Howe was born in 1962. He graduated with a master of science in civil engineering from TU Braunschweig (the Brunswick Institute of Technology) in Germany in 1992.
Mr. Howe started his career with Philip Holzmann AG, a German
Mr. Howe joined Bremenports Ltd., the publicly-owned ports management company of the state of Bremen, as Managing Director in 2012.
Rob Huebert
Associate Professor
Department of Political Science, University of Calgary
Rob Huebert (Ph.D.) is an associate professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Calgary. He also served as the associate director of the Centre for Military and Strategic Studies. In November 2010, he was appointed as a member to the Canadian Polar Commission (now renamed Canada Polar Knowledge). He is also a research fellow with the Canadian Global Affairs Institute and sits on the board of the Van Horne Institute. Dr. Huebert has taught at Memorial University, Dalhousie University, and the University of Manitoba. His area of research interests include: international relations, strategic studies, the Law of the Sea, maritime affairs, Canadian foreign and defence policy, and circumpolar relations. He publishes on the issue of Canadian Arctic Security, Maritime Security, and Canadian Defence. His work has appeared in International Journal; Canadian Foreign Policy; Isuma- Canadian Journal of Policy Research and Canadian Military Journal. He was co-editor of Commercial Satellite Imagery and United Nations Peacekeeping and Breaking Ice: Canadian Integrated Ocean Management in the Canadian North. His most recent book written with Whitney Lackenbauer and Franklyn Griffiths is Canada and the Changing Arctic: Sovereignty, Security, and Stewardship. He also comments on Canadian security and Arctic issues in both the Canadian and international media.
Anne Husebekk
Rector
UiT
Anne Husebekk is physician (MD, specialist in immunology and transfusion medicine) and professor in immunology at Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Tromsø The Arctic University of Norway (UiT).
From August
Arctic Circle Assembly 2016
Breakout Session Speaker:
Regions as Arctic developers – sustainable development through multilateral cooperation
Organized by: Troms County Council, Norway
The Arctic University of Norway: Knowledge and Cooperation as Drivers for Development.
Tor Husjord
CEO
Maritimt Forum North, Norway
Mr. Tor Husjord is the head of the SARiNOR project, which has prepared a roadmap with concrete proposals for the industry and authorities that will help raise the level of understanding of the challenges faced in the event of a search and rescue operation in the High North. This roadmap can also be used to identify the needs for future research and technology projects. SARiNOR plans to help coordinate demonstration projects of potential technical and organizational solutions for warning, coordination and execution of search and rescue operations.
Bogi Bech Jensen
Honorary Professor
University of Faroe Islands
Prof. Bogi Bech Jensen is President of Glasir – Tórshavn College, Faroe Islands. He holds a Ph.D. degree in Electrical Engineering from Newcastle University and studied management at Harvard Business School, USA. He has held positions as Teaching & Learning Leader at Newcastle University, UK; Head of Research Group at the Technical University of Denmark; and Professor of Energy Engineering at the University of the Faroe Islands. Prof. Jensen has worked with several multinational energy companies, he has published more than 80 peer-reviewed articles and held lectures at MIT and numerous energy conferences including IEEE and EWEA.
Amalie Jessen
head of Department
the Greenlandic Ministry of Fisheries, Hunting and Agriculture
Amalie Jessen is head of Department at the Greenlandic Ministry of Fisheries, Hunting and Agriculture. Amalie is Vice-Chair of NAMMCO and the Greenland Commissioner for NAMMCO, the Joint Commission on Narwhal and Beluga and the Joint Commission on Polar Bear and Alternate Commissioner to the IWC. Amalie has arranged international seminars on whales and whaling and seals and sealing. She also works with regional and international agreements, such as the Joint Commissions with neighbor countries, CITES, the IUCN General Assemblies and Polar Bear Specialist Group. Amalie Jessen holds a Cand. Techn. Soc. degree from the University of Roskilde, Denmark.
Margareta Johansson
Research Coordinator
INTERACT Coordinator
Dr. Margareta Johansson is based at Lund University in Sweden. Margareta has a broad experience in Arctic research, ranging from glaciology/climatology to Arctic ecology and for the last decade she has been focusing on permafrost in a changing climate in northern Sweden. Margareta was a convening lead author for two chapters (snow and permafrost) of the AMAP SWIPA assessment 2011. She has recently co-lead the terrestrial ecosystem chapter in the Arctic Freshwater Synthesis. Margareta has a great interest in outreach. She is currently the coordinator of an EU Horizon2020 project INTERACT networking 80 research stations in the north (www.eu-interact.org).
Rachael Lorna Johnstone
Professor of Law
University of Akureyri
Rachael Lorna Johnstone is Professor of Law, Arctic
Rachael Lorna Johnstone
Professor of Law
University of Akureyri
Dr, Rachael Lorna Johnstone is Professor of law at the University of Akureyri, Iceland, Professor of Law, Arctic Oil and Gas Studies, at Ilisimatusarfik (the University of Greenland) and Director of the Arctic Oil and Gas Research Centre. Professor Johnstone specialises in Polar law: the governance of the Arctic and the Antarctic under international and domestic law. She is the author of Offshore Oil and Gas Development in the Arctic under International Law: Risk and Responsibility (Brill 2015) and has published widely on the rights of indigenous people; international human rights law; international environmental law; due diligence; state responsibility; and Arctic strategies
Michelle Jonker-Argueta
Legal Counsel
Greenpeace International
Michelle Jonker-Argueta is Legal Counsel at the Greenpeace International Legal Unit based in the Netherlands. She is part of the team advising the Arctic campaign on the legality of the Norwegian 23 rd licensing round. Michelle is a U.S. attorney registered in the New York Bar.
Tanja joona
Senior Researcher
University of Lapland
Tanja Joona is working as a senior researcher at the Arctic Centre of the University of Lapland. Joona’s main research interests focus on comparative legal and political aspects of Sámi society and especially issues dealing with traditional livelihoods, international human rights
Guðni A. Jóhannesson
Director General
Orkustofnun – National Energy Authority of Iceland
Born in Reykjavik 1951. He finished his MSc in Engineering physics in 1976, his PhD thesis on thermal models for buildings in 1981 and was appointed as an associate professor at Lund University in 1982. He was awarded the title of doctor honoris causae from the University of Debrecen in 2008 and the Swedish Concrete Award in 2011. From 1975 he worked as a research assistant at Lund University, from 1982 as a consultant in research and building physics in Reykjavik and from 1990 as a professor in Building Technology at KTH in Stockholm and from 2008 an affiliated professor at KTH. His research has mainly concerned the thermodynamical studies of buildings, innovative building systems and energy conservation in the built environment. Since the beginning of 2008 he is the Director General of the Icelandic National Energy Authority which is responsible for public administration of energy research, energy utilization, regulation and licencing offshore oil and gas exploration. He was a member of the The Hydropower Sustainability Assessment Forum processing the Hydropower Sustainability Assessment Protocol adopted by IHA in November 2010, and is presently the coordinator of Geothermal Eranet.
Aðalheiður Jóhannsdóttir
Professor of Law, Head of the Faculty of Law
University of Iceland
Aðalheiður holds a master´s degree in law from the Faculty of Law, University of Iceland and a doctoral degree (LL.D) from the Faculty of Law, Uppsala University, Sweden. She is a specialist in Environmental and Natural Resources Law (International, European
Arctic Circle Assembly 2016
Breakout Session Speaker:
Arctic Ocean Oil and Gas exploration and Legal Liability
Organized by the University of Iceland and University of Akureyri
Lára Jóhannsdóttir
Assistant Professor, Environment and Natural Resources
University of Iceland
Dr. Lára Jóhannsdóttir is an Assistant Professor in Environment and Natural Resources, at the School of Business, University of Iceland. She is a board member of the Institute for Business Research and a managing editor for Research in applied Business and Economics. She is furthermore a board member of an occupational pension fund and member of audit, and loan committees. She holds a PhD degree in Business and MBA degree in Global Management with honors. Dr. Johannsdottir did work for 14 years within the Icelandic insurance industry, for instance as Quality and Office Manager.
Sigrún Hildur Jónsdóttir
ARK Technology
Sigrún Hildur Jónsdóttir holds a MSc in Comparative Politics from the London School of Economics. Sigrún co-founded ARK Technology, a provider of software solutions for regulatory compliance for the maritime industry and runs its advisory and implementation team. On bases of her interest in environmental issues she co-founded KGS, a software and advisory company that assists companies in minimizing the environmental footprint throughout their value chain.
Leneisja Jungsberg
Research Fellow
Nordregio
Leneisja Jungsberg is Research Fellow at Nordregio. With MSc in Social Science and specializing in
Sung-Ryong Kang
Senior Researcher
National Institute of Ecology(NIE)
Sung-Ryong Kang was born in Korea. He received the Ph.D. degree in Wildlife and Fisheries Sciences from the Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, USA. He is a senior researcher of National Institute of Ecology, Republic of Korea. His main area of research interest is habitat management for endangered migratory waterbirds in wetland ecosystem. Sung-Ryong is a member of the IUCN Species Survival Commission(SSC) 2013-2016, associate editor of Wetlands(i.e., Journal of the Society of Wetland Scientists) journal, and Arctic Migratory Birds Initiative(AMBI) representative of Republic of Korea.
Juha Käpylä
Senior Research Fellow
The Finnish Institute of International Affairs
Dr. Juha Käpylä works as a senior research fellow at the Finnish Institute of International Affairs (FIIA). Prior to joining FIIA in 2013, he has been a visiting scholar in the University of Minnesota, USA, in 2008 and 2009, and worked as a researcher at the University of Tampere, Finland. Käpylä has published expert and academic analyses on the transformation of the Arctic, with a focus on global dynamics and their regional implications. His other scholarly interests include, among others, U.S. geostrategy and humanitarianism in world politics.
Anna Karlsdóttir
Senior Research Fellow
Nordregio
Anna Karlsdottir has a PhD in Social Sciences, Department of Environmental, Social and Spatial
Arctic Circle Assembly 2016
Breakout Session Speaker:
Sustainable Regional Development in the Nordic Arctic
Organized by: Nordregio
Heidemarie Kassens
Senior Research Scientist
GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research
Dr. Heidemarie Kassens is a marine geologist with 25 years of experience in Arctic research. She is head of the working group "Siberian Arctic" at GEOMAR Helmhotz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel as well as the German Director of the Otto Schmidt Laboratory for Polar and Marine Research. She has been the head of many research projects, was chief scientist of 21 Russian-German expeditions to the Arctic Ocean and has published 50 journal articles and three books. To involve young scientists and students in the research, she played a major role in initiating the Otto Schmidt Laboratory at the Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute in St. Petersburg as well as the Russian-German Master Program for Polar and Marine Sciences POMOR. Dr. Kassens is a member of the German National Committee SCAR/IASC, the representative of the German Research Foundation in the European Polar Board, and holds the Vice Chairs of the IASC Marine Working Group and of the Scientific Advisory Board of the German Society of Polar Research. Recently she has become a member of the „Deutsch-Russisches Forum“.
Chow Yean Khow
Professo and Executive Director
Keppel-NUS Corporate Laboratory
Professor CHOW Yean Khow is Professor of Civil Engineering at the National University of Singapore. He is the Director and co-Programme Leader of the Keppel-NUS Corporate Laboratory, Executive Director of the Maritime Institute at NUS, and the Centre for Offshore Research & Engineering (CORE). Professor Chow’s main research interests are in offshore geomechanics, offshore foundation systems and geohazards. He has published extensively, with over 200 technical publications. He is a Registered Professional Engineer (Civil) and Specialist Professional Engineer (Geotechnical).
Mara Kimmel
Senior Fellow
Institute of the North, Alaska
Mara Kimmel has a long career in public policy focused on issues of rights and justice. She is a Senior Fellow at the Institute of the North and has been on faculty at the University of Alaska Anchorage and at Alaska Pacific University. She is the co-founder of the Alaska Institute for Justice - Alaska’s only non-profit agency providing immigration legal and language services and protecting human rights for all Alaskans. She has represented immigrants and refugees fleeing violence and persecution, and has worked with Alaska Native tribes to protect the rights of environmental governance. Mara has a PhD from Central European University in Budapest, Hungary and a J.D. from the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis/St. Paul.
Janelle Knox-Hayes
Associate Professor of Economic Geography and Planning
MIT
Janelle Knox-Hayes is the Lister Brothers Associate Professor of Economic Geography and Planning in the Department of Urban Studies and Planning, MIT. Her research focuses on the ways in which social and environmental systems are governed under changing temporal and spatial scales as a consequence of globalization. Her latest project examines how social values shape sustainable development in the Artic. She is an author and co-author of 15 journal articles, and two books with Oxford University Press: Saving for Retirement, and The Culture of Markets: The Political Economy of Climate Governance. She is also the book review editor of the Journal of Economic Geography, and editor for the Cambridge Journal of Regions, Economy and Society, as well as the Journal Urban Planning.
Ögmundur Knútsson
Dean
School of Business and Science, University of Akureyri
Ögmundur Knútsson has a Ph.D. degree from the University of Edinburgh. He is the Dean of the School of Business and Science at the University of Akureyri. His main research emphasis is on the fish industry: its value chain, structure, and collaboration in the industry. His research has focused on the marketing aspects of fisheries management systems and comparisons between different fisheries management systems in the world. He has extensive practical experience within the fisheries industry both inside companies as a manager and as a consultant. Ögmundur is responsible for the special program on the “Management of Fisheries” companies for the United Nations University’s Fisheries Training Program.
Dmitry Nikolaevich Kobylkin
Governor
Yamal-Nenets Autonomous District Aleksandr Mazharov
Dmitry Nikolaevich Kobylkin
Governor of the Yamal-Nenets autonomous district, Russian Federation. Born on July 7, 1971 in Astrahan. In 1993 he graduated from the Ufa Oil Institute. From 1993 til 2002 he has been working in geological and oil and gas companies in the Yamal-Nenets autonomous district. In 2003 he graduated from the Ural Academy of Public Administration. In 2005 Dmitry Kobylkin was elected the Head of the Municipal Entity Purovskiy area of the Yamal-Nenets autonomous district. On March 3, 2010 deputies of the Yamal-Nenets Legislative Assembly elected Dmitry Kobylkin as the Governor of the Yamal-Nenets autonomous district. On October 1, 2015 Dmitry Nikolaevich Kobylkin was reelected the Governor of the Yamal-Nenets autonomous district.
Hans Jørgen Koch
CEO
Nordic Council of Ministers
Hans Jørgen Koch is the CEO of Nordic Energy Research, a platform under the auspices of the Nordic Council of Ministers since 2014. He has been a leading voice in the international energy arena since he was appointed Deputy Permanent Secretary, Director General in the department of the Ministry of Energy in Denmark in 1982. From 1994-2002 Koch was the director of The International Energy Agency (IEA/OECD) in Paris. Koch has chaired several international conferences and working groups, being a co-founder of the governing bodies of IRENA, as well as having been Denmark’s representative at number of Ministerial and other high-level-committees on energy.
Kerry Koepping
Director/Photographer
Arctic Arts Project
Kerry Koepping is an award winning international photographer and communicator with a passion for the Arctic and the ever-changing environment. He is the Director of the Arctic Arts Project and is a research Affiliate with The Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research (INSTAAR). Kerry’s goal is to foster a visual understanding of the environmental, scientific and sociological processes of change within the Arctic. Through a diverse and profound body of photographic work, The Arctic Arts Project seeks to develop visual knowledge of Arctic scientific studies and to improve society's awareness and understanding of the natural and anthropogenic changes occurring in the Arctic.
Anders Kofoed-Wiuff
Partner
Ea Energy Analyses
Anders Kofoed-Wiuff is a partner in Ea Energy Analyses, where he has worked with energy planning and regulation of the energy sector for more than 10 years. Anders has extensive experience with scenario analyses of future energy systems from several Danish and international projects, among others the Nordic Energy Technology publications. The transformation of the energy system to handle large amounts of wind power in an economically efficient manner has been the turning point in many projects where the focus has been on both technical and regulatory initiatives in both the electricity, heating and transport sectors
Timo Koivurova
Director
Arctic Centre in Finland, University of Lapland
Research professor Timo Koivurova has specialized in various aspects of international law applicable in the Arctic and Antarctic region. In 2002, Koivurova's doctoral dissertation "Environmental impact assessment in the Arctic: a Study of International Legal Norms" was published by Ashgate. Increasingly, his research work addresses the interplay between different levels of environmental law, legal status of indigenous peoples, law of the sea in the Arctic waters, integrated maritime policy in the EU, the role of law in mitigating/adapting to climate change, the function and role of the Arctic Council in view of its future challenges and the possibilities for an Arctic treaty. He has been involved as an expert in several international processes globally and in the Arctic region and has published on the above-mentioned topics extensively.
Valery Konyshev
Professor
Saint Petersburg State University
KONYSHEV, Valery (
Knud Kristiansen
Minister of Housing, Construction and Infrastructure
Naalakkersuisut (Government of Greenland)
Biography of the Minister of Housing, Construction and Infrastructure Knud Kristiansen, Greenland
born in Upernavik 2. Februar 1971. Son of Knud Kristiansen & Louise Kristiansen (born Geisler), married to Justine Svendsen Kristiansen, 3 children. He was in the Police in Greenland from 1997 to 2008. He began his political career in 2001 when he became a member of the Local Council in Upernavik Kommune. Today he is a Member of the Government of Greenland for Housing, Building and Infrastructure and second vice president of the Government of Greenland, Chairman of the political Party Atassut, Member of Inatsisartut (the Parliament of Greenland) and Member of the Government in Greenland.
He is the Founder / Co-Founder of different associations in Upernavik
Susanne Kühn
PhD Student
Wageningen University Marine Research
Mrs Kühn has worked at the Dutch Institute “Wageningen Marine Research” since 2011, with supervisor Jan Andries van Franeker. She studies the effects of marine debris on seabirds, mainly northern fulmars in the North Sea as well as in (sub)arctic regions such as Iceland and Svalbard. In 2016 Mrs Kühn finished her master in marine and coastal management in Ísafjörður, Iceland, and is currently doing an PhD study within the JPI Oceans PLASTOX project, focussing on food web transfer of marine debris and ecotoxicological implications of the uptake of plastics.
Whitney Lackenbauer
Professor
Department of History, St. Jerome’s University
Whitney Lackenbauer is a Professor in the Department of History and co-director of the Centre on Foreign Policy and Federalism at St. Jerome’s University in the University of Waterloo, Ontario, Canada. He is Honorary Lieutenant-Colonel of 1st Canadian Ranger Patrol Group with sixty patrols spanning Yukon, Northwest Territories, and Nunavut. He is also a Fellow with the Canadian Global Affairs Institute and an adjunct professor at the Frost Centre for Canadian Studies & Indigenous Studies at Trent University. Dr. Lackenbauer specializes in Arctic policy, sovereignty, security, and governance issues; modern Canadian and circumpolar history; and Indigenous-state relations in Canada.
Maria L. Lagutina
Associated Professor, Vice-head of Wold Politics Department
St. Petersburg State University
Academic interests: Global governance and World Political System formation. Eurasian Economic Union and Post-Soviet Integration. International cooperation in the Arctic. Arctic’ interests of non-Arctic states.
Dr. Lagutina is a member of the Russian Geographical Society and the International Studies Association (ISA).
Magni Laksáfoss
Managing Director
VITorka and MP
Magni Laksáfoss is Managing Director of Sp/f VITorka and has worked on wind energy utlilisation in Faroe Islands for 5 years. At the same time, Laksáfoss works at Syntesa, where he is regularly conducting socio-economic analysis on various subjects. His insight in green energy combined with his analytical insight in the national economy gives him a unique perspective on the potentials of green energy in the North Atlantic. He is also a member of the Faroese Parliament.
Suzanne Lalonde
Professor of Law
University of Montreal
Suzanne Lalonde is a professor of International Law and the Law of the Sea at the Law Faculty of the University of Montreal and a research associate with the ArcticNet network of excellence in Canada. She holds a PhD in Public International Law from the University of Cambridge, King’s College obtained in 1997 under the supervision of professor James Crawford. Her current research focuses on core international legal principles, especially those pertaining to sovereignty and the determination of boundaries on land and at sea, with a particular emphasis on the Arctic. She is the Canadian member of the International Law Association Committee currently investigating State practice in relation to straight baselines.
Marc Lanteigne
Senior Research Fellow (Asia)
the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs
Aaja Chemnitz Larsen
Member
the Danish Parliament from Greenland
Aaja Chemnitz Larsen – Member of the Danish Parliament Ms. Chemnitz Larsen has been a member of the Danish Parliament since June 2015 for the Greenlandic Inuit Ataqatigiit party. In 2004, she graduated with a cand.scient.
Kathy Law
Research Director
CNRS/LATMOS
Kathy Law is CNRS Director of Research at the Laboratoire Atmosphères, Milieux, Observations Spatiales (LATMOS) in Paris, France (99 publications (H-index=30). She worked for >35yrs in the field of atmospheric chemistry including chemistry-climate feedbacks, long-range transport of pollution. Since 2005, she focused on transport of pollution to the Arctic (POLARCAT-IPY) and local Arctic pollution (EU ACCESS). She coordinates the French Arctic Initiative project PARCS (Pollution in the Arctic System) addressing pollution impacts on climate, ecosystems and societies. She was co-chair of IGAC, is vice-chair of the IASC AWG, co-chair of international PACES initiative on Arctic pollution and contributed to many international assessments (e.g. AMAP, 2015 on black carbon and ozone).
Eelco Leemans
Founder/ CEO
Leemans Maritime Consultancy
Mr Leemans is currently founder and CEO of Leemans Maritime Consultancy. Previously he was Executive Director of the North Sea Foundation, where he worked on and campaigned for a range of activities, such as the Blue Vision for the North Sea, a reform of EU fisheries policy, a ban on micro plastics in health care products and Cleanup of the Dutch coastline. Mr Leemans is a former seafarer, now specialising in sustainable development of the maritime industry.
Hanna Lempinen
Researcher, PhD Candidate
Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Lapland, Finland
Hanna Lempinen is a researcher, teacher and freelance journalist based in Rovaniemi. Her background is in International Relations (M.Soc.Sci, University of Lapland, 2010) and Science Communication (MA, University of Oulu, 2011). Lempinen‘s current research focuses on social and cultural aspects associated with Arctic energy developments. She is expected to defend her doctoral dissertation in the spring of 2017.
Sarah Leonard
President & Chief Operating Officer
the Alaska Travel Industry Association
Sarah Leonard is the President & Chief Operating Officer (CEO) of the Alaska Travel Industry Association – the state’s leading membership trade association for the travel industry in Alaska. Sarah has an extensive educational and professional background in tourism management with a Master’s of Science (MS) degree in recreation management and tourism from Arizona State University. She earned her Bachelor of Art’s degree from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in Journalism with a special emphasis in public relations. Sarah joined ATIA after serving in senior philanthropy positions for early education and conservation nonprofits in Alaska. Sarah has been involved in promoting Alaska’s wildlife, cultural and natural resources for almost twenty years. Ms. Leonard also was one of the founding leaders in Adventure Green Alaska, an Alaska-based certificate program designed to highlight environmentally friendly tourism practices in response to increased consumer demand. Sarah lives in Anchorage, Alaska with her husband Chris and 12 year old son Jacob.
Olga Letykai
traditional Chukchi singer and dancer
Olga Letykai was born and raised in Enmelen on the Chukchi Peninsula, the eastmost peninsula of the Russian Federation. She attended Gertzena University in St Petersburg. A Chukchi singer and dancer steeped in tradition, she performs the rituals that join humans and nature. Based in Switzerland now, she works with organisations defending minority rights, traditional hunting issues and climate concerns. She has talked to and played to audiences in over 40 countries.
Sven-Olof Lindblad
CEO & President
Lindblad Expeditions
Sven-Olof Lindblad, CEO & President of Lindblad Expeditions, born in Switzerland, traveled extensively with his father, renowned adventure-travel pioneer Lars-Eric Lindblad, who in 1966 led the first non-scientific groups of travelers to Antarctica. In 1979 he launched Special Expeditions, the expedition travel company that became Lindblad Expeditions. In 2004, Lindblad formed a strategic alliance with National Geographic that combines the strengths of two pioneers in global exploration, with the goal of inspiring people to explore and care about the planet.
Lindblad’s personal experience led to a commitment to environmentally responsible travel, which has resulted in numerous travel and environmental awards, including the 2007 Global Tourism Business Award from the World Travel and Tourism Council.
He is an honorary member of the General Assembly of the Charles Darwin Foundation for the Galapagos Islands. He received international recognition for his innovative and successful model of tourism, receiving the “Commandeur de Notre Ordre de Merite Civil et Militaire d’Adolphe de Nassau” from Grand Duke Henri of Luxembourg at the Grand-Ducal Place; and had a newly discovered endemic species of moth in the Galapagos Islands, Undulambia lindbladi, named in honor of his conservation work. He serves on the Board of The Safina Center, the National Geographic Society’s International Council of Advisors, and the Board of Trustees for RARE; is a founding Ocean Elder of the non-profit organization, Ocean Elders, which brings together global leaders to pursue the protection of the ocean’s habitat and wildlife, and serves on the Board of Advisors for Pristine Seas.
Karin Lochte
Director
Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research (AWI)
Prof. Karin Lochte studied marine biology and chemistry at the University Hannover and the School of Ocean Sciences, Bangor, UK, and obtained her PhD from the University of Wales. She held professorships at the Institute for Marine Research (Kiel), Institute for Baltic Sea Research (Rostock). Since 2007 Prof. Lochte leads the Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Center for Polar and Marine Research. She is member of many international and national Committees, such as Scientific Committee of Antarctic Research (Vice Chair), International Arctic Science Committee, European Polar Board, Consortium German Marine Science (Vice Chair), European Climate Research Alliance (chair), EU PolarNet (Coordinator).
Halla Hrund Logadóttir
Louis Bacon Environmental Leadership Fellow
the Harvard Kennedy School of Government
Halla Hrund Logadóttir is a Fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government (HKS), where she has co-founded an Arctic Initiative with the Environment and Natural Resource Program and the Science, Technology, and Public Policy Program. Her research interests are in the Arctic
Halla is the former director of the Iceland School of Energy at Reykjavík University, where she continues to lecture on climate change, energy policy, and the Arctic. Previously, Halla worked on economic development in West Africa, on the "Aid for Trade Initiative" at the OECD in Paris and on international relations at Iceland’s Embassy in Brussels. Halla studied political science,
Natalia Loukacheva
Canada Research Chair in Aboriginal Governance and Law
University of Northern British Columbia
Natalia Loukacheva Ph.D., S.J.D. is Canada Research Chair in ‘Aboriginal Governance and Law’ and Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Northern British Columbia. She is the author of The Arctic Promise: Legal and Political Autonomy of Greenland and Nunavut (UofT Press, 2007); the editor and project leader of the first ever Polar Law Textbook (NCM, TemaNord 538:2010); of the Polar Law Textbook II, (TemaNord 535:2013); and of the Polar Law and Resources book (TemaNord 533:2015). Dr. Loukacheva has been working on Arctic and Polar Law related topics since 1996 and has numerous publications on legal and political issues in the Arctic, Polar law, Indigenous Peoples’ rights and governance in the North.
Oliver Luckett
CEO
Revilo Park
Oliver Luckett is a technology entrepreneuer and currently CEO of ReviloPark, a global culture accelerator. He has served as Head of Innovation at the Walt Disney Company and is the co-founder of video sharing platform Revver. As CEO of theAudience, Luckett worked with clients such as Obama for America, Coachella, Pixar, and American Express. He has helped managed the digital personae of hundreds of celebrities and brands, including Star Wars, The Chainsmokers, Steve Aoki, and Toy Story 3. His first book, "The Social Organism" comes out Nov. 15th from Hachette. He and his partner Scott have recently relocated to Iceland and through their foundation, Best Peace Solutions have supported the arts and nature here including the Hálendið National Park campaign.
Davíð Lúðvíksson
Director - Strategy and Innovation
The Federation of Icelandic Industries
Davíð Lúðvíksson is director of strategy and innovation at The Federation of Icelandic Industries. He holds a MS degree in industrial and business engineering from the Technological University of Denmark. Mr. Lúðvíksson has wide ranging background in technological production, business management and consulting as well as vast experience in the field of research and development and innovation where he has developed and lead numerous collaborative forums and associations. Mr. Lúðvíksson has been called as an advisor on matters relating to tax incentive systems for; R&D projects and investment in innovative enterprises.
Arctic Circle Assembly 2016:
Breakout Session Speaker:
The Arctic Ocean - Icelandic Solutions
Organized by: Hafið, the Icelandic Center of Excellence for Sustainable Use and Conservation of the Ocean
Aqqaluk Lynge
Consultant, Head of the Inuit Human Rights Centre
Inuit Circumpolar Council, Greenland
Aqqaluk Lynge has advocated for the greater autonomy of Greenland while promoting Inuit rights as one people across the Arctic through the Inuit Circumpolar Council (ICC). He has been serving as Chair and President of ICC for 10 years and is currently a board member of ICC Greenland. A member of the Parliament of Greenland for 15 years, he served as Expert Member of the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues 2005-2007. Also a poet and writer, he has published numerous books.
Angus MacNeil
MP, Chair of Select Committee on Energy and Climate Change
House of Commons, United Kingdom
Angus Brendan MacNeil MP was elected MP for Na h-Eileanan an Iar in 2005, and he has a high profile throughout his constituency. During his time in Parliament, he has worked on a variety of issues including mobile phone connectivity and fuel poverty as well as taking a keen interest in the Nordic and South American countries. He has previously served as party spokesperson on transport, constitutional reform and Scotland. He is currently deputy spokesperson on Foreign Affairs for the SNP and in June 2015 elected Chairman of the influential Energy and Climate Change Committee for the 2015-2020 parliament.
Bjarni Már Magnússon
Associate Professor
Reykjavík University School of Law
Dr. Bjarni Már Magnússon is an associate professor at Reykjavík University School of Law. His teaching and research interest lies in public international law. Dr. Magnússon is the author of the monograph: The Continental Shelf beyond 200 Nautical Miles: Delineation, Delimitation and Dispute Settlement (Brill, 2015). He was a visiting fellow at Duke University School of Law as a Fulbright Arctic Initiative Scholar last spring. He is a Chevening alumni.
Arcit Circle Assembly 2016
Breakout Session Speaker:
Fulbright in the Arctic – Meeting Challenges of Sustainability, Human Development and Utilization
Organized by: The Iceland-US Fulbright Commission in cooperation with the United States Department of State‘s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs and the National Science Foundation (NSF)
Title: Fulbright Arctic Initiative Scholar: The United States Entitlement to the Continental Shelf beyond 200 Nautical Miles.
Charlotte Marcinko
Research Scientist
University of Southampton
Dr Marcinko is a multidisciplinary researcher whose work encompasses many aspects of ocean biogeochemistry including the quantitative analysis of biological and physical processes using a range of observational and modelling methods. She has authored several high impact research articles and consultancy reports and has been involved in knowledge exchange initiatives with the Royal Navy, the United Kingdom Hydrographic Office and the Defence Science and Technologies Laboratory. Her recent research has included examining ocean dynamics under Arctic sea-ice using previously unavailable data collected via sensors fixed to Royal Navy submarines.
Arctic Circle Assembly 2016
Breakout Session Speaker:
Sensing the Arctic: Autonomous and Aubmersible Vehicles – Results, Opportunities and Good Governance
Organized by: UK Arctic Office (funded by the Natural Environment Research Council)
Title: Insights into Arctic Oceanography from Submarine Sensors
Jonathan Markowitz
Assistant Professor
School of International Relations, University of Southern California
Jonathan Markowitz is an assistant professor in the School of International Relations at the University of Southern California. Jonathan obtained his PhD at the University of California, San Diego, in June of 2014. His primary work is on power projection, the political implications of climate change and resource competition. His research has been supported by the National Science Foundation and the University of California’s Institute for Global Conflict and Cooperation. He was a pre-doctoral fellow at the the Geopolitics of Energy Project at Harvard University’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs from 2012-2014 and a post-doctoral fellow at the the Dickey Center for International Understanding at Dartmouth College from 2014-2015. His work on power projection has been published by International Interactions.
Páll Matthíasson
MD, CEO
The National University Hospital of Iceland
Dr. Matthiasson is a native of Iceland where he completed his degree in medicine from the University of Iceland. Pall is a certified psychiatrist from the Maudsley Hospital in London and holds a PhD in neuroscience from the Institute of Psychiatry, University of London. He wad director of Mental Health Services at Landspitali - the National University Hospital of Iceland from 2009-13 when he took over as CEO of the hospital. Through his work he has become deeply interested in mental health in remote and arctic regions. Pall has lectured internationally on psychopharmacology, burn-out in health staff, the effects of economic crises on mental health and ways to reduce cooercion in mental health settings.
Aziz Amirali Merchant
Executive Director
Keppel Offshore & Marine Technology Centre
Professor (Adjunct) Aziz Merchant is a leading international ship designer and offshore engineering expert with Master’s degree in Naval Architecture from University College London. He has over 25 years of experience in the offshore industry related to deepwater and arctic. Prof Aziz Merchant is currently the Executive Director of Keppel Offshore & Marine Technology Centre and also an Adjunct Professor at the National University of Singapore. Prof Aziz Merchant has served various Technical Committees and Boards based on his extensive experience and expertise in Offshore Design and Construction. He is a Fellow of the Royal Institution of Naval Architects, Society of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers and Institute of Marine Engineering, Science & Technology.
Arctic Circle Assembly 2016.
Breakout Session Speaker:
Singapore and the Arctic: Partnership Between Academia and Business Through Research & Innovation
Organized by Keppel Offshore & Marine
Title: Building Capability through Innovation: Experiences in Technology Development
Matthew Merighi
Executive Director and Co-Founder
Blue Water Metrics Inc
Matthew Merighi is the Executive Director and Co-Founder of Blue Water Metrics Inc., a U.S.-based non-profit that partners with ocean-going vessels to crowdsource new data on ocean health. He is a graduate of the Fletcher School at Tufts University with a focus on Maritime Studies and International Security. Prior to attending Fletcher, Matthew worked as a civilian Country Director and Executive Officer in the U.S. Air Force’s International Affairs bureau. He is a member of the Center for International Maritime Security and hosts the North America edition of its Sea Control podcast.
Peter Schmidt Mikkelsen
Lead Coordinator
Greenland Institute of Natural Resources, Greenland
Mr. Peter Schmidt Mikkelsen is an author and Greenland specialist affiliated with leading Arctic centers and initiatives within the Kingdom of Denmark and internationally, including ISAAFFIK Arctic Gateway, Arctic Research Centre, Arctic Science Partnership and Greenland Climate Research Centre.
He is a former member of the Danish military SIRIUS dog
Harri Mikkola
Senior Research Fellow
The Finnish Institute of International Affairs
Dr. Harri Mikkola works as a senior research fellow at the Finnish Institute of International Affairs (FIIA). Mikkola has published several expert analyses on the Arctic region's transformation. In addition to the Arctic, his other fields of expertise include defence and security policy, as well as defence market and security of supply issues. Prior joining the FIIA in 2011, Mikkola worked as a researcher at the Finnish Defence Command, at the University of Tampere, Finland, and as a visiting researcher at the University of Minnesota, USA.
Scott Minerd
Global Chief Investment Officer
Guggenheim Partners
Scott Minerd Chairman of Guggenheim Investments and Global Chief Investment Officer
As Chairman of Guggenheim Investments and Global Chief Investment Officer, Mr. Minerd guides the Firm’s investment strategies and leads its research on global macroeconomics. Prior to joining Guggenheim Partners, Mr. Minerd was a managing director for Morgan Stanley and Credit Suisse. He is involved in leadership roles at a number of civically-minded organizations, including Cedars-Sinai Medical Center and the Geffen Playhouse. He received a B.S. from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and completed graduate work at the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business
William R. Moomaw
Professor Emeritus
International Environmental and Resource Policy, Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy
William R. Moomaw is Professor Emeritus of International Environmental Policy at the Fletcher School and Co-Director of the Global Development and Environment Institute at Tufts University. He was founding director of the Fletcher Center for International Environment and Resource Policy. He is a chemist turned policy scientist who translates science into policy relevant terms. He has worked on climate change for the past 28 years, and for the US Congress to reduce ozone depleting substances. He is currently developing strategies and policies that promote restorative development of forests, soils and the Arctic to reverse the growing threats of climate change
Tiana Angelina Moser
Swiss National Councillor
Tiana Angelina Moser is a Member of Parliament. Elected in 2007, she is spokesperson for the Green Liberal Party. Ms Moser is a member of the Political Institutions Committee and the Foreign Affairs Committee of the National Council. She holds an MA in political and environmental science from Zurich University. She has worked as a research fellow at the Swiss Federal Research Institute WSL and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology. Her interests include sustainable development issues.
Gert Mulvad
Doctor of Health Research
Institute of Nursing and Health Science, Ilisimatusarfik (University of Greenland)
Gert Mulvad is a family physician at the Centre for Primary Health Care in Nuuk, Greenland. He has been working in Nuuk since 1986. His research fields
He serves on many committees involved in health care delivery, research and education in Greenland.
Chair of the Greenland Institute of Natural Resources.
Doctor PhD honoris causa 2015 Ilisimatusarfik, University of Greenland,
Internationally he is active in AMAP Human Health working group, Committee for Inuit Circumpolar Health, Vice Chair of the Arctic Health and
Maribeth Murray
Executive Director
Arctic Institute of North America
Maribeth Murray is the Executive Director of the Arctic Institute of North America and a Professor in the Department of Anthropology and Archaeology at the University of Calgary. Her research is focused on the human dimensions of climate
Cecilie Myrseth
Chair
Troms County Government
Cecilie Myrseth is chair of the Troms County Government since 2015. Prior to becoming the regional political leader in her county, Myrseth was the group leader of the Labour Party in the Troms County Parliament for four years.
Myrseth holds several prominent positions in the Labour Party. She is a member of the National Board of the Labour Party as well as being the leader of the party in Troms County. She currently chairs the North Norwegian Council, a political body for the three northernmost counties promoting interregional cooperation.
Myrseth has a cand.psychol. degree from the University of Tromsø.
Susan Natali
Associate Scientist
Woods Hole Research Center
Alberto Naveira
Director
Next Generation Unmanned Systems Science, University of Southampton:
Alberto Naveira Garabato is a Professor in Physical Oceanography at Ocean and Earth Science, University of Southampton, within the National Oceanography Centre Southampton. His research focusses on understanding how the circulation of the high-latitude oceans operates, and how it influences regional and global climate. He has led several international experiments (such as the UK-US Diapycnal and Isopycnal Mixing Experiment in the Southern Ocean, DIMES) addressing aspects of this overarching problem. He is the instigator and Director of NEXUSS (Next Generation Unmanned System Science), a Centre of Doctoral Training in the smart and autonomous observation for the environmental sciences.
Arctic Circle Assembly 2016
Breakout Session Speaker:
Sensing the Arctic: Autonomous and Aubmersible Vehicles – Results, Opportunities and Good Governance
Organized by UK Arctic Office (funded by the Natural Environment Research Council)
Title: Training the next generation of environmental scientists in the use of Smart and Autonomous Observing Systems
Lars Nelson
Vice President of UIC Lands
Ukpeaġvik Iñupiat Corporation
Lars is responsible for the administration of UIC’s lands in accordance with ANCSA, ANILCA, and UIC lands-related policies. His primary duties include providing support to shareholders on lands-related issues, and serve as a steward to UIC’s lands for current and future generations. Lars’ professional experience includes serving as a GIS Senior Analyst and Barrow Municipal Services Division Office Manager for UMIAQ, where he was the primary point of contact with the North Slope Borough’s (NSB) Planning Department for all UMIAQ related NSB permitting and zoning issues.
Susa Niiranen
Stockholm Resilience Center
Susa Niiranen is a postdoctoral researcher at the Stockholm Resilience Centre in Sweden. She has a PhD in marine ecology and is specialized in the study of marine food webs and how they respond to environmental and anthropogenic change. In GreenMAR, her research focus is on the combined effects of climate change and fishing on the Arctic marine systems, and she uses mathematical models as her main research tool. In addition to marine ecology, Dr. Niiranen has a high interest towards studying the social-ecological interactions within the context of marine environments.
Annika E. Nilsson
Senior Research Fellow
Stockholm Environment Institute
Dr Annika E. Nilsson is Senior Research Fellow at Stockholm Environment Institute and Affiliated Faculty in Environmental Politics at KTH Royal Institute of Technology. She is currently a Mistra Arctic Fellow active at the German Marshall Fund of the United States. Her work focuses on the politics of Arctic change, with research on environmental governance and communication at the science-policy interface. Nilsson has a PhD in environmental science and also over 20 years of professional experience as a science writer. She has followed Arctic science and politics since the mid-1990s. Her current research includes the Formas-funded project Arctic Governance and the Question of Fit in a Globalized World, leading a work package on the global context of Arctic change in Mistra Arctic Sustainable Development - New Governance, and being part of the team leading development a new Nordic Centre of Excellence on Resource Extraction and Sustainable Arctic Communities. She is also engaged in two Arctic Council assessments: Arctic Resilience Report, where she leads a chapter on governance, and the Barents region study for Adaptation Action for a Changing Arctic (AACA), where she leads a chapter on future narratives as well a synthesis chapter. Her published writing includes several articles about Arctic politics related to Arctic Council activities and climate change science politics, as well as the edited volume Media and the Politics of Arctic Climate Change (2013, Palgrave Macmillan). In addition to academic publishing, she has written several popular science books and participated as a science writer in several assessments about the Arctic.
Peter Noble
Technology Consultant
Keppel Offshore & Marine Technology Centre:
Peter Noble is naval architect and marine engineer with a wide range of expertise and experience in the marine and offshore industries. He has recently completed a term as President of the Society of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers, Washington DC and is currently serving as a Vice President of the Institute of Marine Engineering, Science and Technology, London, UK.
He undertakes consulting and advisory assignments internationally in the fields of offshore, marine and Arctic technology and engages in lecturing and supporting student and young professional activities on global basis. He is an active member of a number of advisory boards at a several of universities and research institutions.
Ding Nong
Executive Vice President
China Cosco Shipping Corporation
Mr. Ding Nong is the Executive Vice President and Party Committee Member of China COSCO Shipping Corporation Limited. He started his career in Aug 1982. Mr. Ding was the Marine Chief Engineer of Guangzhou Maritime Transport Bureau, Deputy General Manager of Guangzhou Taihua Tanker Company, Deputy President of Guangzhou Shipping (Group) Company (China Shipping Bulk Co., Ltd), General Manager of China Shipping Supplying & Trading Company, General Manager and Party Secretary of China Shipping & Sinopec Suppliers Co., Ltd. He also served as Assistant to the President of China Shipping (Group) Company, President and Deputy Party Secretary of China Shipping International Ship Management Co., Ltd. and Executive Vice President of China Shipping. He has taken his current position since January, 2016. Mr. Ding Nong graduated from Transport & Communication Planning & Administration College of Shanghai Maritime University with a Master’s Degree. He is a senior engineer.
Andreas Nordseth
Director-General
Danish Maritime Authority
Andreas Nordseth began the work as Director-General in the Danish Maritime Authority (DMA) in January 2009. The DMA is a government agency under the Ministry of Business and Growth.
Andreas Nordseth is a 1982 graduate of the Copenhagen Nautical College. After awarding his Shipmaster’s Diploma, Andreas Nordseth went to sea. First as a Deck Officer at the East Asiatic Company, then as a Training Officer at the Danish training ship “DANMARK” and finally as a 2nd Lieutenant of the Reserve in the Royal Danish Navy in 1986.
Subsequently, Andreas Nordseth studied at Danish Technical University, whilst holding the position as assisting maritime lecturer at Copenhagen Nautical College from 1986-1989. After having graduated, Andreas Nordseth continued teaching at Copenhagen Nautical College as a Maritime Lecturer, before joining the Danish Maritime authority in 1991 as a consultant on maritime education and training.
Andreas Nordseth has held various positions in the Danish Maritime Authority throughout the years. In 1997 he became chief examiner for masters and mates and two years later, in 1999, he became head of division for maritime education and training. He continued his work with the maritime educations, when he took up the position as Deputy Director General in 2003.
Andreas Nordseth holds numerous positions. He is chairman of Consultative Shipping Group; a position he has held since 2009. Andreas Nordseth is Governor at the World Maritime University and board member of the Maritime Development Centre of Europe (MDCE), the Danish Maritime Fund, the European Maritime Safety Agency, the Association for Promoting of Danish Shipping and the Advisory Board for Executive MBA in Shipping & Logistics at Copenhagen Business School.
Natalya Novikova
Researcher
Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology, Russian Academy of Sciences
N.I. Novikova, Ph. D. in History of Science. She works as a leading researcher of the Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology, R.A.S. She has carried out field research among Khanty, Mansy, Nenets, Nivkhi, Oroki and Eskimos in Russia; Inuvialuit (Canada) and Sami (Norway). She is an author of more than 150 scientific works on ethnology and legal anthropology of indigenous peoples of the North and interrelations between indigenous peoples and industry in the context of international, national, and customary law. She works as an executive director of Ethnoconsulting, LLC., an organization providing consulting services, expert assessments, and other applied services connected with ethnocultural and ethnoconfessional relations.
Astrid Ogilvie
Senior Scientist
Stefansson Arctic Institute
Astrid Ogilvie is a climate historian and human ecologist. Her overarching career goal is to build bridges between the arts, humanities, and the natural sciences in order to foster interdisciplinary cross-fertilization. Her current research interests focus primarily on climatic and socio-economic changes in Arctic coastal communities and she co-leads the Nordic Centre of Excellence project Arctic Climate Predictions: Pathways to Resilient, Sustainable Societies (ARCPATH). She is the author of some 100 scientific papers and two edited books. She is a Senior Affiliate Scientist at the Stefansson Arctic Institute and a Fellow of INSTAAR at the University of Colorado.
Michele Olivier
Reader
School of Politics, Philosophy and International Relations, University of Hull
Reader at the School of Politics, Philosophy and International Relations at the University of Hull, United Kingdom. She holds the LLB, BA (Hons) (Political Science) and LLM degrees from the University of Pretoria, South Africa. She was admitted as an attorney in South Africa and obtained the MA degree in Political Studies from the Rand Afrikaans University. She held the position of State Law Adviser (International Law) Department of Foreign Affairs, South Africa from 1989 until 1999 when she was appointed first as Senior Lecturer and later professor in the Department of Public Law, University of Pretoria. She received an LLD degree from the University of South Africa in 2002, with a thesis on International human rights law in South African law. She is the author of numerous publications on international law, African integration, international environmental law and the South African Constitution.
Lise Smed Olsen
Minister Plenipotentiary
Greenland Representation
Lise Smed Olsen is currently working as Research Fellow at Nordregio – Nordic Centre for Spatial Development. She is specialised in business development and regional innovation policy, EU Cohesion Policy and bioeconomy. Lise is a member of the Editorial Board of Nordregio News. Previously Smed Olsen has worked as Research Assistant, Department of History, International and Social Studies, Aalborg University. Smed Olsen is a PhD Student at Aalborg University, Department of Culture and Global Studies.
Julia Olson
Executive Director and Chief Legal Counsel
Our Children's Trust
Julia Olson is an attorney, strategist and mother of two who founded Our Children’s Trust, an organisation helping young people bring cases across the USA to challenge the federal and state governments by seeking damages for harm caused by climate change now and in the future.
Lex Oosterbaan
Senior Adviser, Rijkswaterstaat
Ministry of Infrastructure and the Environment in the Netherlands
Mr Oosterbaan is currently Senior Adviser at Rijkswaterstaat, Ministry of Infrastructure and the Environment in the Netherlands. He is also the national coordinator for the implementation of the MSFD Marine litter descriptor, member of the EU MSFD Technical Group Marine litter, co-Chair of OSPAR ICG on Marine litter and Chair of the OSPAR EIHA Committee.
Kjell-Ove Orderud Skare
Leader Strategy and Analysis
Space Norway
Head of Strategy and Analysis in Space Norway and project director for a communications satellite project aimed at providing broadband coverage to the Arctic region. Retired Major General in the Norwegian Armed Forces.
Magnús Ólafsson
Senior Geochemist and Project Manager
ÍSOR, Iceland GeoSurvey
Mr. Magnús Ólafsson has worked at ÍSOR and it´s predecessor since 1981 as Deputy Head of the Geology Department and Director of the Chemical Laboratory at ÍSOR and currently as a Senior Geochemist and Project Manager. He completed a M.Sc. in Geochemistry from Pennsylvania State University in USA in 1980. Magnús is one of ÍSOR’s most experienced geochemical experts in the fields of geothermal exploration and utilization. In 1980’s he took part in the development of a monitoring programme for low temperature geothermal reservoirs utilized for district heating in Iceland. Through the years Magnús has carried out field work in almost all geothermal areas in Iceland and consulted the operators of those utilized for all aspects of geothermal exploration and utilization. Recently Magnús has managed projects involving the successful exploration, drilling and monitoring for Landsvirkjun (the Nation Power Company) at Krafla, Námafjall and Þeistareykir, for RARIK at Hoffell and he has been involved in projects abroad, including Turkey, Slovakia, Hungary and Croatia.
Hugi Ólafsson
Director
Ministry for the Environment and Natural Resources
Hugi Ólafsson is the Director of Office of Climate, Oceans and Water within the Ministry for the Environment and Natural resources in Iceland. Hugi has worked in various positions beside his current one at the Ministry since 1995, including as Information Director, Director of Office of Policy and International Affairs. Hugi has a MSc degree from Columbia University, USA in International Affairs, International Relations and Affairs, as well as background in Geology and Political Science.
Barbora Padrtova
PhD Student
Masaryk University
Barbora Padrtova is research group leader at the Institute of International Relations in Prague which elaborates an analysis of Arctic policy tailored for the purposes of Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Czech Republic. Since 2016 she is also holding a position of Expert on geopolitics and security at the London based think-tank Polar Research and Policy Initiative (PRPI). Previously she served as Programme Director for Transition (2014-2015) and Project Manager (2011-2014) at the Bratislava-based security and defence policy think-tank CENAA. In 2011, she was also working at the Political Section of the Embassy of the Republic of Iraq in Washington, D.C. Her research interest focuses mainly on geopolitics and security in the Arctic region and NATO-Russia relations. She has published numerous academic and policy papers, while she has presented outcomes of her research at several high level international conferences. Barbora Padrtova is a member of the UArctic Thematic Network on Geopolitics and Security (University of the Arctic and Northern Research Forum).
Barbora Padrtova is also a PhD. candidate of International Relations at the Faculty of Social Studies of the Masaryk University in Brno, Czech Republic. She holds a Master’s degree in Security and Strategic Studies from the Faculty of Social Studies of the Masaryk University in Brno. In 2009 she graduated in International Relations and European Studies from the Metropolitan University in Prague. During her studies she also studied International Relations and Political Science at the Universiteit Twente in Netherlands.
Apart from her research and academic activities, she is a keen reader of different kinds of literature, a passionate traveller and an active horse rider.
Glenn G. Page
CEO
SustainaMetrix
Glenn G. Page is the Developmental Evaluator in Residence at the Centre for Environmental Change and Human Resilience (CECHR) at the University of Dundee in Scotland. He brings innovation and systems thinking to complex, messy, cross-scale, wicked challenges of our time. He was the founding Director of Conservation at the National Aquarium in Baltimore, where Vice President Gore officially recognized him as an Environmental Hero. Currently, he is the President/CEO of SustainaMetrix a global consultancy with recent projects with Republic of Ireland, Luc Hoffmann Institute, Stockholm Resilience Center, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, Tufts University, and Scripps Institute of Oceanography. A recent innovation and potential contribution has been the design and testing of a framework for measuring governance response to ecosystem change.
Teemu Palosaari
Post-doctoral Researcher
Tampere Peace Research Institute TAPRI, University of Tampere, Finland
Dr. Teemu Palosaari is a Post-doctoral Research Fellow at Tampere Peace Research Institute TAPRI, University of Tampere. His research interests in the Arctic include environmental security, natural resources and conflict, peaceful change, and climate change ethics. He has previously worked for the United Nations Environment Programme, Finnish Institute of International Affairs, University of Helsinki and Finnish Broadcasting Company YLE.
Anita L. Parlow
Fulbright-MFA Arctic Scholar
The University of Akureyri and National Energy Authority
Anita L. Parlow, Esq, MSt., is a Fulbright Scholar who recently served as consultant and project manager to the Polar Program at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars on Arctic shipping issues. She previously served as advisor to the Harvard–MIT Arctic fisheries project after advising a variety of oil, gas and mining companies on risk assessment and social license issues. Clients included BP–Witt Associates following the Deepwater Horizon spill, TransCanada Keystone XL in its pipeline initiative, and conducted Corporate Social Responsibility and crisis management projects in offshore sub–Saharan Africa, Brazil, Central America and Central Asia. Her Fulbright on offshore oil and gas in the Jan Mayen between Iceland and Norway builds upon that work.
Parlow has authored numerous articles for publications, including the Washington Post, the Alaska Dispatch, and, the North Dakota Law Review. She has spoken at a number of conferences and symposiums, earned an advanced degree in law from Oxford University, and is a member of the Bar of the Supreme Court of the United States.
Arctic Circle Assembly 2016
Breakout Session Speaker:
Fulbright in the Arctic – Meeting Challenges of Sustainability, Human Development and Utilization
Organized by the Iceland-US Fulbright Commission in cooperation with the United States Department of State‘s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs and the National Science Foundation (NSF)
Title: Sustainable & Collaborative Practices in Arctic Offshore Petroleum Development.
James E. Pass
Senior Managing Director
Guggenheim Partners
Mr. Pass joined Guggenheim in 2009 and is responsible for the research,
Frederik Paulsen
Founding Member,
Swiss Polar Institute
Frederik Paulsen is a co-founder of the recently established Swiss Polar Institute, based in Lausanne. His philanthropic activities reflect his long-standing interests in environment and cultural preservation with a particular commitment to the Polar Regions. Dr Paulsen is chairman of the board of Ferring Pharmaceuticals. He studied chemistry at the Christian Albrechts University and business administration at Lund University.
Kristján Hrannar Pálsson
musician and producer
Kristján Hrannar was born in Reykjavík in 1987. Having studied classical and jazz piano at an early age, his interest in electronic music was sparked in 2004.
Kristján's solo career started with a record-deal with the independent label DIMMA. His debut album, Anno 2013, was praised by critics for well-constructed lyrics to a dreamy synth-pop compositions. His sophomore album, Arctic take one, released in 2016, was improvised on the spot with the first take being used, without exception. This method is a sobering reminder that humanity has only one chance to reverse climate change.
Kristján lives in Reykjavík with his wife, two children, and Yamaha cp-70.
Cécile Pelaudeix
Associate Professor and Research Associate
Aarhus University and Sciences Po Grenoble
Cécile Pelaudeix is Associate Professor at the Law Department of Aarhus University and research associate at PACTE, Sciences Po Grenoble. Her research focuses on governance, normative foreign policy, international relations and international law with a focus on the Arctic region, Greenland politics, the EU Arctic policy, China’s foreign policy, ocean and energy resources governance. She is co-editor of the book Governance of Arctic Offshore Oil and Gas, Routledge. She is the work package leader in a research project on Arctic security for the European Defence Agency. She has been teaching at Sciences Po Lyon and Sciences Po Grenoble and has been a member of the French Scientific Committee of the “Chantier
Simon Plass
Project Manager
German Aerospace Center (DLR
Dr.-Ing. Simon Plass is a Research Project Manager at the Institute of Communications and Navigation of the German Aerospace Center (DLR). His functions focus on planning, executing and coordinating the maritime and Arctic activities of the Institute. He received the Dr.-Ing. degree (Ph.D.) in electrical engineering from the University of Ulm, Germany. He is co-editor of several book series in the area of communications and he is also a certified Project Management Professional (PMP)®. Current research interests focus on the area of future digital communications infrastructure for the Arctic.
Greg Poelzer
Executive Chair
ICNGD
Greg Poelzer is a Professor in the School of Environment and Sustainability (University of Saskatchewan) and Founding Director of the International Centre for Northern Governance and Development. He is Lead of the Fulbright Arctic Initiative Energy Group scholar (May 2015 to October 2016) and leads the UArctic Northern Governance Thematic Network. His first book (co-authored), Arctic Front: Defending Canada in the Far North (2008), was awarded the 2009 Donner Prize for excellence and innovation in Canadian public policy writing. His second book (co-authored), From Treaty Peoples to Treaty Nation: A Road Map for All Canadians is shortlisted for the 2016 Donner Prize, Dafoe Prize, J.W. Dafoe Prize, and Saskatchewan Book Award. He has served as an advisor and negotiator on Indigenous relations for the Government of Saskatchewan, the Federation of Saskatchewan Indian Nations, and SaskPower. Greg’s current research focuses on renewable energy, resource economies, and sustainable development in sub-Arctic regions.
Peter Prokosch
Founder and Chairman of the Board
Linking Tourism & Conservation
Until 2014 Peter was the managing director of GRID-Arendal, a Centre collaborating with the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), located in Norway. He served as CEO of WWF-Germany in Frankfurt, following which he developed and led the Arctic Programme of WWF International from Oslo in the 1990s. In the 1970s and 80s Peter played a pioneering role in the conservation development of the International Wadden Sea and became Head of the WWF Wadden Sea project and office in Schleswig-Holstein, Germany. As a researcher at the University of Kiel, Peter studied biology and marine sciences. His PhD thesis focused on the ecology of arctic shore birds. Peter has extensive experience working with the establishment and development of national parks in the Wadden Sea, the Baltic coast of Germany, Svalbard and Iceland as well as in nature reserves in Siberia and other parts of the circumpolar Arctic, often in close cooperation with tourism.
Jouni Pulliainen
Head of the Arctic Research Unit
Finnish Meteorological Institute
Jouni Pulliainen received the M.Sc., the Licentiate in Technology degree and the Doctor of Science in Technology degrees from the Helsinki University of Technology (TKK), Faculty of Electrical Engineering, in 1988, 1991 and 1994, respectively. From 2001 to 2006 he was a professor of space technology at TKK, specializing in remote sensing. He is currently a research professor at the Finnish Meteorological Institute (FMI) and Head of Arctic Research of FMI (FMI-ARC).
Pulliainen’s research interests include modeling and inversion algorithms in remote sensing, remote sensing data assimilation and application development for the needs of climate change studies, hydrology and weather prediction. Recently, his work has focused on the active and passive remote sensing of environmental processes of the cryosphere and boreal forest zone applying EO data (from regional applications to global scale). Dr. Pulliainen has been PI or project manager for dozens of national and international research projects (e.g. ESA and European Union contracts). He has authored over 300 scientific papers and technical reports in the field of remote sensing (over 100 in peer-reviewed international journals). Memberships in scientific committees and organizations include ESA Advisory Committee on Education (2001-2007); ESA CoreH2O Earth Explorer candidate Mission Advisory Group (2007-2013); National Committee of COSPAR (2010 onwards); delegate of Finland to SAON board (2011 onwards); member of ESA Earth Science Advisory Committee, ESAC (2013 onwards).
Volker Rachold
Head,
German Arctic Office, Alfred Wegener Institute,
Dr. Volker Rachold is the Head of the German Arctic Office, which serves as an information and cooperation platform between German stakeholders from science,
Kees Rade
Director of the Inclusive Green Growth Department
the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Mr Kees Rade is Director of the Inclusive Green Growth Department at the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Ambassador for Sustainable Development since 2014. In April 2016, he became the first Arctic Ambassador of the Netherlands. In this position, he represents the voice of the Dutch Arctic policy and will work together with other Arctic stakeholders to implement the Dutch Arctic Strategy 2016-2020. Mr Rade joined the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 1979 and has been Dutch Ambassador to Nicaragua (2001-2005) and Brazil (2009-2014).
Stefan Rahmstorf
Head of Earth System Analysis
Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research;
Stefan Rahmstorf is a German oceanographer and climatologist. He received his Ph.D. in oceanography from Victoria University of Wellington (1990). Since 2000, he has been a Professor of Physics of the Oceans at Potsdam University and is head of Earth System Analysis at PIK. His work there focuses on the role of the oceans in climate change. Dr. Rahmstorf has published over 100 scientific papers (30 of which in the leading Nature and Science journals and PNAS) and co-authored four books. Available in English is Our Threatened Oceans (2009, with Katherine Richardson) and The Climate Crisis (2010, with David Archer).
Bertrand Ramcharan
former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights
Bertrand Ramcharan is formerly Professor at the Geneva Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Chancellor of the University of Guyana, Deputy UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and UN High Commissioner for Human Rights
Marek Ranis
artist
Marek Ranis is a sculptor, installation and video artist, photographer and a painter. He is the author of more than 50 large-scale environmental installations in United States, Poland, Germany, France, Iceland, Holland, Taiwan and Australia. Ranis has received many prestigious grants and has participated in numerous residencies and art symposiums in Europe, United States, North America, Asia, Africa and Australia. Ranis has participated in more than 70 international solo and group exhibitions and his work is part of corporate, private and state collections. He is currently a Professor of Sculpture at the Department of Art and Art History, University of North Carolina at Charlotte.
Timo Rautajoki
President & CEO
Lapland Chamber of Commerce
Mr. Timo Rautajoki is a founder of the Arctic Business Forum and has decades of experience in Barents Euroarctic cooperation. He holds several national and internationa positions of trust in relation to business and economical development. He is chairing the Euroarctic Chamber of Commerce and was awarded with the title Mr. Rautajoki is a member of the National Arctic Delegation of Finland, a board member in Finnish Arctic Society and he is influencing in several EU based working groups such as ENPI, Interreg IV A Nord, ERDF.
Andrew Revkin
Senior Fellow
Pace Academy for Applied Environmental Studies, Pace University
Andrew Revkin, a distinguished New York Times columnist who writes the global blog, Dot Earth, has covered science and the environment for more than three decades in newspapers, magazines, books, and documentaries. He has received the nation’s top science journalism awards multiple times, as well as a Guggenheim Fellowship. He was a staff reporter at the Times from 1995 to 2009. Since 2010, Revkin has been the Senior Fellow for Environmental Understanding at Pace University, where he teaches courses on blogging, environmental-science communication and documentary video with a focus on sustainable development. He has written acclaimed books on global warming, the fight to save the Amazon rain forest, and the changing Arctic (The North Pole Was Here: Puzzles and Perils at the Top of the World). Twitter @revkin @dotearth
Robert Rich
Executive Director
Arctic Research Consortium of the U.S
Robert Rich became Executive Director of the Arctic Research Consortium of the U.S. in 2015. Previously he served as Director, Strategy Development for the American Chemical Society (ACS), where he served for 16 years in a variety of roles including career development, research grants, membership, and strategy. He has also worked with the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) Research Competitiveness Program and the U.S. National Institutes of Health in fundamental research and in the Office of Science Policy. Rich holds a PhD in chemistry from the University of California, Berkeley
Arne Riedel
Director,
Arctic Summer College
Arne Riedel is an environmental lawyer at Ecologic Institute in Berlin, where he coordinates the Institute’s activities on Arctic issues, serves as Director of the Arctic Summer College, and works on climate and energy laws and governance, including in collaboration with the German government, the European Union, and the WWF International Arctic Programme. He supports the German Ministry of the Environment in the negotiations on the UNFCC and the Paris Agreement and provides legal expertise on renewable energies for the German Ministry of Economic Affairs and Energy.
Kathrin Riemann-Campe
Post-doctoral Scientist
Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research, Alfred Wegener Institute
Dr. Kathrin Riemann-Campe works as a postdoc in the sea ice physics department at the Alfred Wegener Institute (AWI) in Germany. She received her PhD in Meteorology from Hamburg University in 2010. Kathrin Riemann-Campe has worked within the EU-funded projects ACCESS (Arctic Climate Change, Economy and Society) and ICE-ARC (Ice, Climate, Economics - Arctic Research on Change). In ACCESS, she downscaled climate model results of Arctic sea ice for economic sectors (shipping included). In Ice-Arc, Kathrin Riemann-Campe works on the improvement of sea ice parameterizations in climate models. Furthermore, Kathrin Riemann-Campe is deputy director of the European Severe Storms Laboratory (ESSL).
Mika Riipi
County Governor
Lapland
Mr. Mika Riipi is the County Governor of the Regional Council of Lapland. The mission of the Regional Council of Lapland is to operate for the good of the region, its municipalities and inhabitants of Lapland in all issues regarding development, planning, research and the representation of interests of the region. He started in the position on March 1st, 2013. Previously, he has been the Mayor in Posio, town secretary in Haapavesi and senior adviser in the Municipality department at the Ministry of the Interior. Mr. Riipi holds a Master´s degree in Administrative Sciences, majoring in municipality jurisdiction. He graduated from the University of Tampere in 2002.
Carter Roberts
CEO
World Wildlife Fund-US
As a CEO of the only conservation organization with a permanent presence in all eight Arctic countries and an NGO observer on the Arctic Council, Carter serves on the Arctic Circle Advisory Board. WWF works with governments, corporations and communities in over 100 countries to craft and scale solutions to achieve a sustainable planet. Carter earned degrees from Harvard Business School and Princeton University and serves on the board of Duke University’s Institute for Environmental Policy and the Grantham Institute for Climate Change at Imperial College and London School of Economics.
George Roe
Adjunct Research Professor
University of Alaska at Fairbanks
George Roe is the program manager at the University of Alaska in Fairbanks for the Arctic Remote Energy Networks Academy (ARENA). As part ofthe research faculty at the University of Alaska in Fairbanks, he is affiliated with the Alaska Center for Energy and Power (ACEP) and the Alaska Center for Unmanned Aircraft Systems Integration (ACUASI). His work at ACEP focuses on adaptation and integration of energy grid technologies, working in conjunction with industry, utilities, federal agencies and communities. George’s efforts at ACUASI emphasize advanced energy systems for unmanned systems and their remote bases, and inter-regional collaborations to explore advanced system applications. His research interests also address the energy and system developments needed to enable sustainable marine operations related to the evolving potential for greater traffic along northern sea routes. With Bachelor and Master of Science degrees in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Washington, George’s experience base includes 35 years in engineering and management capacities at Boeing. He worked in research and development for a range of aerospace energy subsystem technologies, in roles that emphasized engagement of multiple organizations within the company, teaming with both prime contractor and subsystem suppliers, and acquisition and management of government research and development contracts.
James I. Rogers
Associate Lecturer in International Politics
University of York.
Yves Rossier
Secretary of State
the Federal Department of Foreign Affairs, Switzerland
Yves Rossier is the State Secretary of Foreign Affairs and head of the Directorate of Political Affairs. He served as a personal adviser to two ministers of the economy and was director-general of the Federal Office of Social Security. Mr Rossier holds a master’s degree in law from Fribourg University. His postgraduate studies included research in European Law at the College of Europe in Bruges and a master’s degree in law at McGill University.
David Runnalls
Distinguished Fellow
Centre for International Governance Innovation and International Institute for Sustainable Development
David Runnalls is Distinguished Fellow of the Centre for International Governance Innovation. He is Senior Fellow at Sustainable Prosperity and Visiting Professor at the Institute for the Environment, University of Ottawa. He served as President of the International Institute for Sustainable Development for eleven years before retiring in 2010. He is Chair of the International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development, and of the Pembina Institute for Appropriate Development. Runnalls has served as Senior Advisor to the President of the IDRC and to the Administrator of UNDP. He worked with Barbara Ward to found the International Institute for Environment and Development and directed its London and Washington offices.
Arctic Circle Assembly 2016
Breakout Session Speakers:
Canadian Arctic Policy: Recent Developments and the Way Ahead
Organized by: The Center for International Governance Innovation (CIGI)
Title: Climate Change and the Canadian Arctic
Cristine Russell
Senior Fellow
Environment and Natural Resources Program, Harvard Kennedy School of Government
Cristine Russell is an award-winning American journalist who has written about science, health and the environment for more than three decades. She is a Senior Fellow in the Environment and Natural Resources Program, the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, and Adjunct Lecturer at Harvard Kennedy School. Russell has written for Columbia Journalism Review, Scientific American, the Atlantic, and other publications and is a former national science reporter for The Washington Post. Russell is Co-Chair, Organizing Committee, the 10th World Conference of Science Journalists 2017 in San Francisco. She is immediate Past-President of the Council for the Advancement of Science Writing and a past president of the U.S. National Association of Science Writers. Twitter @russellcris @BelferCenter
Paolo Ruti
Chief
World Weather Research Division, World Meteorological Organisation
Paolo Ruti is an experienced scientist and science manager with strong leadership and relationship-building skills, currently working as chief of the World Weather Research Division at the World Meteorological Organization (UN). The International R&D specialist has a strong focus on strategic research planning of weather and climate related topics. Paolo Ruti has extensive projects development experience on climate services and on regional climate change (Africa and Mediterranean), acquired in several European research frameworks and in international scientific committees. He is involved in international research activities since 1996 (PhD in Geophysics), and author or co-authors of more than 60 peer reviewed papers.
Barbara J. Ryan
Secretariat Director
Group on Earth Observations
Barbara J Ryan is the Secretariat Director at the Group on Earth Observations (GEO), a partnership of governments and organizations established in 2005. GEO envisions “a future wherein decisions and actions for the benefit of humankind are informed by coordinated, comprehensive and sustained Earth observations and information”. As of 2016, GEO’s 103 Members include 102 countries and the European Commission, and there are 103 GEO Participating Organizations. All Arctic States and many organizations active in the far north are represented in GEO. Together, the GEO community is creating a Global Earth Observation System of Systems (GEOSS) that will link Earth observation resources world-wide across multiple Societal Benefit Areas and make those resources available for better informed decision-making.
After graduating from State University of New York (SUNY) at Cortland in 1974, Barbara joined the US Geological Survey (USGS). At the USGS she was instrumental in the introduction of full and open data policies for Landsat imagery, resulting in upwards of 41 million data downloads around the world to date. Barbara has served as chair of the international Committee on Earth Observation Satellites and in 2008 became director of the World Meteorological Organization’s space programme, before joining GEO in 2012.
Daniel P. Schrag
Director of the Center for the Environment, Director of the Science, Technology and Public Policy Program
Harvard University
Daniel Schrag is the Sturgis Hooper Professor of Geology, Professor of Environmental Science and Engineering at Harvard University, and Director of the Harvard University Center for the Environment. He also directs the Program on Science, Technology and Public Policy at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at the Harvard Kennedy School. Dan’s interests include climate change, energy technology, and energy policy. He has studied climate change over the broadest range of Earth’s history, including how climate change and the chemical evolution of the atmosphere influenced the evolution of life in the past, and what steps might be taken to prepare for impacts of climate change in the future. He currently serves on President Obama’s Council of Advisors for Science and Technology (PCAST), contributing to many reports to the President including energy technology and national energy policy, agricultural preparedness, climate change, and STEM education.
Yeong Wai Seng
Senior Business Development Manager
Keppel Singmarine
Education: BSc Honours Naval Architecture, University of Newcastle
MBA National University of Singapore
Career: 1980 – 83 Shiprepair Manager Keppel Shipyard,
1984 - 91 Consultant, Det Norske Veritas
1991 – 93 Engineering Manager, (OCEP) Far East Levingston
1993 – 97 Technical Manager, Keppel FELS
1997 – 2010 Senior Project Manager, Keppel FELS
2010 -2014 Project Director FloaTEC (P61 Project)
2014 -2016 Senior Business Development Mgr, Keppel Singmarine
35 Years of Experience in Marine Technology, Shipyard Production Processes, Marine and Offshore Oil and Gas Technology
Alexander Sergunin
Professor
Saint-Petersburg State University
Alexander Sergunin is Professor of International Relations at the St. Petersburg State University, Russia. His fields of research and teaching include International Relations Theory, Russian foreign policy thinking and making, and Arctic politics. His most recent book-length publications
Michael Sfraga
Vice Chancellor
University of Alaska Fairbanks
Dr. Sfraga earned a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Alaska Fairbanks, a Master degree from Bowling Green State University, and UAF’s first Ph.D. in Northern Studies and Geography in 1997. Dr. Sfraga has worked for UAF and the University of Alaska System since 1985 in a broad range of administrative, academic and executive positions. Dr. Sfraga oversees a broad range of programs and leads a number of Arctic-related initiatives: Co-Lead Scholar, Fulbright Arctic Initiative, Chair, Board of Directors, Institute of the North, Co-Director, University of the Arctic’s Institute for Arctic Policy, member of the Alaska Arctic Council Host Committee, member of the Governor's Alaska Arctic Policy Team.
Jessica Shadian
Distinguished Senior Fellow
Bill Graham Centre for Contemporary International History, U. of Toronto
Dr. Jessica M. Shadian is Distinguished Senior Fellow of the Bill Graham Centre for Contemporary International History (BGCCIH) and Director of Arctic360, a BGCCIH collaboration with the University of Toronto and the Wilson Polar Institute. Shadian has spent the past 15 years living and working throughout the European and North American Arctic. Her research focuses on Arctic and indigenous governance and law and her 2014 book entitled: The Politics of Arctic Sovereignty: Oil, Ice, and Inuit Governance is the first in-depth history of the Inuit Circumpolar Council (ICC) and Inuit sovereignty in global politics reaching back to pre-European discovery.
Þór Sigfússon
Founder and CEO
Iceland Ocean Cluster House
Thor Sigfusson is an Icelandic entrepreneur. He is the founder of the Iceland Ocean Cluster, Codland, Collagen and several other startups in seafood related industries. Thor has published six books on subjects as different as business and salmon. He has a PhD in international business and business networks and his research has been published in academic business journals. His main interest is better utilisation of fish resources.
Gylfi Sigfússon
CEO
Eimskip
Gylfi Sigfússon has been in a management role for Eimskip and related companies in Iceland and USA since 1990. Before taking on the position of the CEO and President of the Eimskip Group, Gylfi managed Eimskip Americas. Between 2008 to 2009 he led the restructuring of the Eimskip group with the aim of being the leading container carrier in the North Atlantic. Gylfi is the vice chairman and an executive board member of the Icelandic Chamber of Commerce, is on the board of the Greenland-Icelandic Chamber of Commerce, the American-Icelandic Chamber of Commerce, and the Icelandic-Canadian Chamber of Commerce.
Guðmundur Haukur Sigurðarson
CEO
Vistorka Company
Guðmundur Haukur Sigurðarson is General Manager of Vistorka
Björgvin S. Sigurðsson
Executive Vice President
Marketing and Business Development Division at Landsvirkjun – National Power Company of Iceland
Dr Bjorgvin Sigurdsson has serverd as Executive Vice President and Managing Director of Marketing & Business Development of Landsvirkjun since 2013. His role is maximise Landsvirkjun’s long-term profit potential, through the innovative and effective promotion and sale of products and services, within the national and international energy sector. Dr Sigurdsson holds a PhD in Management Science and Engineering from Stanford University. Prior to joining Landsvirkjun he worked for eight years in the finance sector in London
Jóhann Sigurjónsson
Special Envoy on Ocean Affairs
Icelandic Ministry for Foreign Affairs
Jóhann Sigurjónsson works as Special Envoy on Ocean Affairs at the Icelandic Ministry for Foreign Affairs (MFA). Since 1976, Jóhann has been involved in research and management of large whales and fish stocks at national and international level and was vice-president of ICES Council Bureau. He was Project Leader (1981-1994), Deputy Director (1994-1996) and Director General (1998-2016) at the Icelandic Marine Research Institute (MRI). In 1996-1998, Jóhann was Ambassador and Chief Negotiator on Fisheries at MFA. He is co-chair of Arctic Council Task Force on Arctic Marine Cooperation and participates in negotiations on management of fisheries in the Central Arctic Ocean.
Sjúrðrur Skaale
Member
the Danish Parliament from the Faroe Islands
Sjúrður Skaale – Member of the Danish Parliament and Chairman of the Arctic Working Group Sjúrður Skaale is a former Journalist, Teacher and Political advisor with a degree in Political Science and Spanish Language from the University of Copenhagen. He is a member of the Faroese Social Democrats, elected to the Danish Parliament where he also is Chairman of the Parliament’s Arctic Working Group. He has published several books on political matters in the Faroe Islands.
Bryndís Snæbjörnsdóttir and Mark Wilson
Artists
Bryndís Snæbjörnsdóttir and Mark Wilson conduct their collaborative practice from bases in the north of England and Reykjavík, Iceland. With a strong research grounding, their socially engaged projects explore contemporary relationships between human and non-human animals in the contexts of history, culture and the environment. The practice sets out to challenge anthropocentric systems and thinking that sanction loss through representation of the other, proposing instead, alternative tropes of ‘parities in meeting.’ The work is installation based, using objects, text, photography and video.
Timo Soini
Minister for Foreign Affairs
the Republic of Finland
Mr. Timo Soini was born 30 May 1962 in Rauma. He is the Minister for Foreign Affairs Deputy Prime Minister since May 2015. He has been Party Leader for since 1997 to the present, Member of Parliament 2003 – 2009 and again in 2011 to the present and The Finns Party Master of Social Sciences. He was a Member in European parliament from July 2009 to May 2011.
He has been a member of Espoo City Council sins 2001 and was a Member of Espoo Local Executive from 2006 to 2007
He is married to Tiina Soini and has two children
Ditte Sorknæs
Chief Executive Officer
Great Greenland
Ditte Sorknæs has been the CEO of Great Greenland since the beginning of 2016. She has worked with seal and marketing hereof since 2012. Ditte holds a master’s degree in marketing communication from CBS (Denmark). From 2005, she worked at Kopenhagen Fur with marketing and business development. During her last three years at Kopenhagen Fur, Ditte held the job as VP of Marketing with responsibility for seal skins. After Kopenhagen Fur, Ditte joined Unidrain as Marketing Director, while working as a board member at Great Greenland. After a year as a board member, she stepped in as the CEO.
Arctic Circle Assembly 2016
Breakout Session Speaker:
Sustainable Marine Resources: a Piece of the Blue Economy Puzzle in the Arctic?
Organized by: The North Atlantic Marine Mammal Commission, NAMMCO
Title: The Economical and Societal Consequences of Trade Barriers on Inuit Communities.
Thomas Spengler
Professor of Meteorology
University of Bergen
Dr. Thomas Spengler is a professor in meteorology focusing on the combination of theory, observations, and modeling. He has specialized on a variety of scales ranging from smaller to large-scale flow and participated in several field campaigns addressing meso-scale atmospheric flow and atmosphere-ocean interactions. Since 2015, he is the director of the Norwegian Research School on Changing Climates in the Coupled Earth System. He is currently leading research projects focusing on high impact weather in the Arctic with an increasing interest on atmosphere-ocean-ice interactions. Since 2012 he is an elected member of the International Commission for Dynamic Meteorology and joined the Atmosphere Working Group of IASC 2013. Since 2015 he is chair of the Atmosphere Working Group. He was awarded the prize for best lecturer for the academic year 2012/2013 at the Faculty for Mathematics and Natural Sciences at the University of Bergen and nominated for the IAMAS early career scientist medal in 2013.
Jorden Splinter
Senior Arctic Official for the Netherlands
Mr Splinter is currently Senior Adviser on polar affairs at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands, and has been Senior Arctic Official to the Arctic Council since 2014. Previously, Mr Splinter dealt with bilateral relations with Germany and with China, and was posted in Shanghai from 2003-2007.
Jørgen Staun
Associate Professor
Institute for Strategy, Royal Danish Defense College, Copenhagen
Jørgen Staun is Ph.D. in International Relations from University of Copenhagen. He is Associate Professor at the Royal Danish Defence College (RDDC), Institute for Strategy. Before coming to the RDDC he was a project researcher at the Danish Institute for International Relations (DIIS). His main area of research is Russian foreign and security policy. His latest publications at the RDDC Publishing House is the report “Russia’s Strategy in the Arctic” (2015), and two book chapters in Danish: ”Ruslands strategiske interesser i Syrien (Russia’s strategic interests in Syria) (2016) and ”Ruslands indenrigspolitiske interesser i Syrien” (Russia’s domestic interests in Syria) 2016).
Konrad Steffen
Director
The Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research
Dr. Konrad (Koni) Steffen is the Director of the Swiss Federal Research Institute WSL and a Professor in Climate and Cryosphere at ETH-Zurich and EPF-Lausanne in Switzerland. He is responsible for instrumentation deployed in the Arctic to help us monitor the significant changes taking place on the Greenland Ice Sheet showing the melting dynamics of the sheet. He has led field expeditions to the Greenland ice sheet and Antarctica for the past 40 years to measure the dynamic response of ice masses under a warming climate. He has published over 130 peer-reviewed papers and 15 book chapters.
Anne H. Steffensen
Director-General
Danish Shipowners Association
Anne H. Steffensen has since 1 October 2013 been Director General of the Danish Shipowners’ Association.
Following a Master of Science from London School of Economics (1988) and a Master of Politics from the University of Aarhus (1990) Anne H. Steffensen joined the Foreign Service in 1990. Her first posting was to London in 1992. From 1995 she worked as Head of Section in the Secretariat for Foreign Trade.
In 1998 she was posted to the Danish Consulate General in New York as Deputy Consul General. From 2001-2004 she headed the Department for Bilateral Relations and Project Export and the Secretariat. In 2004 she was appointed Ambassador, Under-Secretary for Foreign Trade and Investment.
In 2006 she was appointed State Secretary for Trade, Investment and Trade Policy and in 2011 Ambassador of Denmark to the Court of St. James’s.
Lars Stemmler
Head of International Projects
bremenports GmbH & Co. KG
Lars took over the position as Head of International Projects at
Nils Christian Stenseth
Professor
CEES, University of Oslo
Dr. Nils Christian Stenseth is a Research Professor and the Chair of the Centre for Ecological and Evolutionary Synthesis (CEES) at University of Oslo. In addition, he is a Chief Scientist II at the Institute of Marine Research and Professor II at University of Agder. His interests span a broad spectrum of ecological and evolutionary topics, most of which are rooted in population biology. Dr. Stenseth is a ISI highly cited researcher and is an elected member of The Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters (DNVA). Dr, Stenseth has been awarded honorary doctorates (Doctor Honoris Causa) at the University of Antwerpen, Belgium (2001) and at the École Normale Supéreure, Lyon, France (2011), is an honorary Professor at Addis Ababa University in Ethiopia and is a Chevalier (Knight) in the French National Order of the Legion of Honour.
Julienne Stroeve
Professor
University College London
Dr. Julienne Stroeve is a professor at University of College London and a senior scientist with the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) at the University of Colorado. Her Arctic research interests are wide-ranging and include atmosphere-sea ice interactions, sea ice predictability on the short and longer term time-scales, climate change and impacts on climate and local communities. Dr. Stroeve has given keynote addresses around the world on Arctic climate issues and briefed congressional staff and former Vice President Al Gore. Dr. Stroeve was named by Thompson Reuters as one of the most influential minds in 2014 and 2015.
Nicola Sturgeon
Nicola Sturgeon is Scotland’s first female First Minister.
Born in Irvine in 1970 and educated at Greenwood Academy, she studied law at the University of Glasgow where she graduated with LLB (Hons) and Diploma in Legal Practice. Before entering the Scottish Parliament as a regional MSP for Glasgow in 1999, Ms Sturgeon worked as a solicitor in the Drumchapel Law and Money Advice Centre in Glasgow. She is currently MSP for Glasgow Southside.
She served as Cabinet Secretary for Health and Wellbeing between May 2007 and September 2012 and then Cabinet Secretary for Infrastructure, Investment and Cities with responsibility for government strategy and the constitution until November 2014. Throughout this period she also served as Deputy First Minister of Scotland.
She became Leader of the Scottish National Party in November 2014 and was first sworn in as First Minister on November 20, 2014. She was re-elected First Minister in May 2016.
Sigríður Ragna Sverrisdóttir
General manager
Hafið
Sigríður Ragna Sverrisdóttir is general manager and co- founder of Hafið – Center of Excellence for Sustainable Use and Conservation of the Ocean. Ms. Sverrisdóttir is a Geographer and Cartographer with extensive experience sailing the big seas as well as the in the Arctic and Antarctica. Sigríður has studied environmental science as well as the Law of the Sea, amongst other ocean related studies. She has participated in several international projects and coordinates Hafið´s work. Her main interests are; ocean health, ocean related innovation, polar development and adapting societies.
Tara MacLean Sweeney
Vice-Chair
Arctic Economic Council
Tara Sweeney is the Executive Vice President of External Affairs for Arctic Slope Regional Corporation (ASRC), the largest locally-owned and operated
Grímur Sæmundsen
CEO,
Blue Lagoon
Grímur Sæmundsen was born in 1955. A medical doctor by education, he is the founder and CEO of Blue Lagoon, leading the company’s development and growth since its establishment in 1992.
As the CEO of Blue Lagoon, Grímur has emphasized support for the development of Icelandic tourism: he has served as the chairman of SAF – the Icelandic Travel Association – since 2014; he is a board member of SA-Business Iceland – a service organization for Icelandic businesses; he is a board member of the Icelandic Tourism Task Force; and he is Chairman of the Board of the Icelandic Tourism Fund.
Robert Templer
Professor of Practice and Director of the Center for Conflict
Negotiation and Recovery at Central European University
Robert Templer is a Professor of Practice and Director of the Center for Conflict, Negotiation and Recovery at Central European University. He was the Director of the Asia Program at the International Crisis Group between 2001 and 2012, led a Crisis Group team that investigated war crimes in Sri Lanka and headed the organization's research on Myanmar. He was the Indochina correspondent for Agence France-Presse before becoming a visiting scholar and Freedom Forum Fellow at the University of California at Berkeley. He is the author of Shadows and Wind: A View of Modern Vietnam and has written extensively for publications around the world including the New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Telegraph, The Guardian, The New Republic and The Far Eastern Economic Review.
Alison Thompson
Chair & Co-Founder
CanGEA
Having held several positions at a coal based utility in the US, and hydrocarbon giants in Canada such as Suncor and Nexen and now as the Managing Director of the Canadian Geothermal Energy Association (CanGEA), Alison Thompson has stood on both sides of what sometimes seems like a deep divide between renewable and non-renewable energy production. As an engineer, she brings a depth of understanding of the technology behind energy production. Through her incredible diversity of experience, she has developed an intimate understanding of the political landscape and business culture of energy in Canada and beyond.
Arctic Circle Assembly 2016
Breakout Session Speaker:
The Potential For Geothermal In The Arctic
Organized by the Canadian Geothermal Energy Association CanGea
Canada’s 175 Aboriginal and Northern Off-Grid Communities: Geothermal Power, Heat, Greenhouses and Jobs Opportunities.
Helgi Thorarensen
Professor of Aquaculture and Fish Physiology
Holar University College in Iceland
Helgi Thorarensen is a Professor of Aquaculture and Fish Physiology at Holar University College in Iceland. He has a Ph.D. from Simon Fraser University in British Columbia, Canada and was a postdoctoral fellow at Massey University for two years. His present research is mainly focused on the effect of rearing environment and genetics on the growth and performance of aquaculture fish and the use of statistics in aquaculture growth studies.
Skúli Thoroddsen
Orkustofnun
Skúli Thoroddsen, attorney (hdl.), has been a legal adviser at Orkustofnun since 2011. His responsibilities include, inter alia, public administration, resource issues such as licensing for research and utilisation of resources and power plants. He graduated as a lawyer from the University of Iceland in 1977 and received a Diploma in public health from the Nordic School of Public Health in 1996. Skúli has worked as a National Expert at the EU Directorate of Public Health in 1997-1999, was General Secretary of the Federation of Special Workers in Iceland 2003-2011, been a Board Member of the European Mine Chemical and Energy Federation (EMCEF) in 2006-2011.
Abbie Tingstad
Physical Scientist
RAND Corporation
Abbie Tingstad is a physical scientist at RAND and a professor at the Pardee RAND Graduate School. Her research focuses on issues related to security, defense, and climate change. Some recent projects include work on acquisition and technology, force employment, future planning, unmanned systems, Arctic policies, and the impacts of different types of climate information on decision-making. Tingstad received her Ph.D. in geography from the University of California, Los Angeles. Prior to that, she was awarded an M.Sc. in environmental geomorphology from the University of Oxford, and a B.S. in mathematics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Arctic Circle Assembly 2016
Breakout Session Speaker:
The Arctic as a Venue for U.S. and Asian Cooperation with Russia
Organized by the RAND Corporation
Title: The Arctic as a Venue for U.S. and Asian Cooperation with Russia (moderator)
Mead Treadwell
former Lieutenant Governor
Alaska
Sergio C. Trindade
President
SE2T International, Ltd. sustainable business consultants
Sergio C. Trindade is a Brazilian/American global consultant on sustainable business with an accent on energy, environment and technology management with a vast international experience. He is a former UN Assistant Secretary-General for Science and Technology. He contributed to the work of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change – IPCC, which was awarded the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize. From the Massachusetts Institute of Technology -MIT he earned a
Tatjana I. Troshina
Professor
the Department of Social Work and Security of the Northern - Arctic Federal University
Tatjana I. Troshina, Ph.D. (history) is a professor at the Department of Social Work and Security of the Northern - Arctic Federal University, Arkhangelsk, Russian Federation. She specializes in historical demography, conflict studies, social and cultural history and has research interests in the remote areas of the Arkhangelsk region and the Russian North. Dr. Troshina is the author of more than two hundred publications, including seven monographs and three textbooks.
Fran Ulmer
Chair
U.S. Arctic Research Commission
Fran Ulmer is chair of the U.S. Arctic Research Commission, where she has served since being appointed by President Obama in March 2011. From 2007 to 2011, Ms. Ulmer was chancellor of the University of Alaska Anchorage. She is a member of the Global Board of the Nature Conservancy and on the Board of the National Parks Conservation Association. Ulmer served as an elected official for 18 years as the mayor of Juneau, a state representative, and as Lieutenant Governor of Alaska. Ulmer earned a J.D. cum laude from the University of Wisconsin Law School.
Grímur Valdimarsson
Senior Advisor
Icelandic Ministry of Industries and Innovation
Grímur Valdimarsson works as a Senior Advisor at the Icelandic Ministry of Industries and Innovation. He was Director of the Icelandic Fisheries Laboratories (1984-1997), a Government Institute dealing with all aspects of fish processing, and Director of the Fish Products and Industry Division at FAOs headquarters in Rome (1997-2010), dealing with how best utilizing fish for food or feed and the fishing sector compliance with increasing environmental demands. He led FAO´s Reykjavik conference on Responsible Fisheries in the Marine Ecosystem in 2001. Grimur holds a B.Sc. in Biology (University of Iceland) and a Ph.D. in Marine Microbiology (University of Strathclyde, Scotland).
Matilda Valman
Post-doctoral Researcher
Stockholm Resilience Center
Dr. Matilda Valman has a PhD in Political Science from Stockholm University, Sweden. She now holds a post doc position at the Stockholm Resilience Centre, Sweden. Her main research interests are institutional, organizational and policy changes within marine governance. Within her post doc she researches changes within fisheries in the North East Atlantic and the Bothnian Bay and how these relate to sustainability in general and blue growth in particular, using interviews and text analysis.
Anton Vasiliev
Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary
the Russian Federation to the Republic of Iceland
Anton Vasiliev is a senior Russian diplomat. In January 2008 he became ambassador at large for Arctic cooperation at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation. He is also the senior Arctic official of Russia in the Arctic Council and in the Barents Euro-Arctic Council (BEAC). He was chairman of the Committee of Senior Officials of BEAC during Russian chairmanship of the council between 2007 and 2009.
From 2002 to 2007 he was deputy head of Mission of the Russian Federation in Geneva, and from 1996 to 2002 he was deputy director of the Department for Security and Disarmament Affairs, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in Moscow.
Between 1976 and 1996, he had three postings at the USSR and Russian embassy in Beijing. He graduated from the Moscow State Institute of International Relations in 1976 and received a Ph.D. in economics in 1986 from the USSR Academy of Sciences.
Florian Vidal
PhD Candidate
University of Paris Descartes
Florian Vidal is a
Andrian V. Vlakhov
Research Fellow
European University at St. Petersburg
Andrian Vlakhov graduated from St. Petersburg State University and European University at St. Petersburg with degrees in Linguistics and Cultural Anthropology. He works as Junior Researcher at the European University at St. Petersburg, preparing to defend his doctoral thesis in late 2016.
He has been dealing with the Arctic issues for several years, studying various Arctic communities in Northern Russia and Scandinavia. That included studies of the local identity in the borderland communities in Northern Russia, as well as the profound study of the Russian-speaking community in Svalbard. In addition to that, he has been involved in several research projects focusing on the Arctic, having published several research papers in Russian and English.
During his career, he has participated in several international conferences, workshops and summer schools; he was also involved involved in the international scientific cooperation, serving as IASC Fellow for the Social and Human Working Group and as UArctic Student Ambassador.
Ralph Watzel
President
Federal Institute for Geosciences and Natural Resources
Prof. Ralph Watzel studied geology at Heidelberg university, and geology and geophyscis at Karlsruhe university. He took his doctoral degree at Freiburg university where since 2000 he is engaged in academic teaching. In 2007 he completed a management training at St. Gallen University, Switzerland. After more than 10 years of practical experience as hydrogeologist, he worked as consultant for sustainable development at the Ministry of Economy of Baden-Württemberg from 2001 to 2006. From 2006 to 2016 he was the head of the State Geological Survey and Mining Authority of Baden-Württemberg. Since 2016 Prof. Watzel is President of the Federal Institute for Geosciences and Natural Resources (BGR) in Hannover, the National Geological Survey of Germany.
Rockford Weitz
Professor of Practice, Entrepreneur Coach & Director
Maritime Studies Program, Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University
Professor Weitz is Entrepreneur Coach and Director of the Maritime Studies Program at Tufts University’s Fletcher School. He also serves as President and a Board Director at both the Institute for Global Maritime Studies Inc. and Blue Water Metrics Inc. A serial entrepreneur and angel investor, he was founding CEO of CargoMetrics from 2008 to 2013 and founding Executive Director of FinTech Sandbox Inc. in 2014. He earned a J.D. from Harvard Law School, M.A. and Ph.D. degrees from the Fletcher School, and a B.A. in International Relations: Political Economy from the College of William and Mary.
Jack Whitacre
Research Fellow
Institute for Global Maritime Studies Inc
Humbled by a Java coding class and inspired by grand strategists throughout time, Jack hopes to integrate the latest literature in cyber security with his interests in BlueTech and maritime affairs. Jack serves as a co-founder of Blue Water Metrics, an ocean data start up, and as a boat captain in Maine. He hopes to enroll in a PhD program.
Jim White
Fellow and Director
INSTAAR
Jim White is a Professor in the Department of Geological Sciences and also the Environmental Studies Program at the University of Colorado, Boulder. He is the Director of the Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research. He is the founding Director of Environmental Studies Department at CU. He is actively engaged in exploring new paradigms of interdisciplinary education and research, and has worked steadily to break down barriers between the social sciences, natural sciences, humanities, journalism, arts and business to better educate and train students and conduct research in the area of sustainability and environmental change.
Amy Wiita
President/Senior Research Scientist
Cinza Research
Dr. Wiita is an interdisciplinary scientist who has worked in the Arctic for the past twenty years. Her work in the public and private sectors includes doing land and natural resource management, conducting research, and managing research companies. She is the Senior Research Scientist of her company Cinza Research in Anchorage, Alaska where she promotes interdisciplinary understanding in the social, natural, and public health sciences. Her interests include community-based research, community engagement in natural resource and land management, human dimensions of natural resource use, artists' experience of place, the connections between art and environment, and the culture of climate change.
Jeremy Wilkinson
Sea Ice Physicist
British Antarctic Survey
Sea Ice Physicist and Lead Investigator, NERC Arctic Research Programme, British Antarctic Survey. UK representative on the Arctic Ocean Science Board (AOSB)/International Arctic Science Committee’s (ISAC) Marine Science Working Group. Member of the Programme Advisory Board for Arctic Science for the UK funding agency NERC.
Emma Wilson
Director,
ECW Energy
Emma Wilson is an independent researcher and consultant, director of ECW Energy Ltd., and Associate of the Scott Polar Research Institute, University of Cambridge. She has over 20 years’ experience of researching and consulting on issues related to oil, gas, mining and renewable energy, community relations and corporate responsibility. This includes social impact assessment and social audit of industrial projects, company-community relations, anthropological and sociological field research methodologies. She speaks fluent Russian and has worked in Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Ukraine, Russia, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Norway, Nigeria, Ghana, South Africa and Qatar.
Elana Wilson Rowe
Senior Research Fellow
Norwegian Institute of International Affairs
Elana Wilson Rowe holds a
Arctic Circle Assembly 2016
Breakout Session Speaker:
The Arctic as a Venue for U.S. and Asian Cooperation with Russia
Organized by: The RAND Corporation
Title: Network diplomacy and Arctic politics
Shaleen Woodward
Deputy Secretary Indigenous and Intergovernmental Affairs
Government of the Northwest Territories
Deputy Secretary Indigenous and Intergovernmental Affairs, Government of the Northwest Territories
Shaleen spent many of her early years with the Government of the Northwest Territories focused on
Maksim Zadorin
Assistant Professor
Northern-Arctic Federal University, Arkhangelsk, Russian Federation
Maksim Zadorin, Ph.D. (law), Northern Arctic Federal University, Arkhangelsk (NARFU) – is an assistant professor at the department of International Law and Comparative Jurisprudence, Law Institute of the NARFU. He specializes in constitutional law, including the rights of Indigenous Peoples of the Russian Federation.
Konstantin Zaikov
Head of the Arctic Center for Strategic Studies
Northern-Arctic Federal University, Arkhangelsk, Russian Federation
Konstantin Zaikov, Ph.D. (history), Pomor State University (Arkhangelsk) - is the Head of the Arctic Center for Strategic Studies, Northern Arctic Federal University, Arkhangelsk, Russian Federation. He specializes in international relations in the Arctic, economics, policies and interests of Scandinavian states in the Arctic. He has published widely on the history of Norwegian-Russian relations, political issues and processes in Northern Europe, border studies, political geography and sociology.
Robert Zierenberg
Professor of Geology
University of California
Robert Zierenberg is a professor of Geology in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, University of California-Davis. His research has focused on water/rock interactions in hydrothermal systems, including submarine hot springs on the mid-ocean ridge spreading centers and active geothermal systems that produce electricity with low carbon emissions. He has participated in scientific drilling of seafloor hydrothermal systems on the Juan de Fuca/Gorda seafloor spreading center off-shore of northwestern North America, and is a member of the international science team participating in the Iceland Deep Drilling Project whose goal is to produce electricity from deep, very high temperature fluids.
Gerald Zojer
PhD Candidate
University of Lapland
After a having a career as mechanical engineer and in the project management for an oil and gas exploration company, Gerald studied International Development at the University of Vienna. Currently he is carrying out his PhD studies in political sciences at the Faculty of Social Sciences at the University of Lapland. Gerald is also working for the HuSArctic research project in the Northern Institute for Environmental and Minority Law at the Arctic Center, University of Lapland. His main research interests are in the fields of environmental politics, political ecology, natural resource management, and hegemony theories, with a particular focus on the Arctic region.
Ágústa Ýr Þorbergsdóttir
Director
NAVIGO ehf
Passionate about direct use of geothermal for heating, industry and food production. Ágústa is an expert on EU Energy climate and energy policy programme management and international finance in climate and energy related investments. Ágústa has worked closely with Icelandic companies on strategy and funding of geothermal projects in Europe and internationally and provided advise on policy and legal framework.
Arctic Circle Assembly 2016
Breakout Session Speaker:
The Potential For Geothermal In The Arctic
Organized by the Canadian Geothermal Energy Association CanGea
Erla Björk Þorgeirsdóttir
Project Manager
Orkustofnun
Erla Björk Þorgeirsdóttir works as Manager of Electricity regulation and Master Plan at the National Energy Authority. She has participated in committees on policy formulation and managed the international North Atlantic Energy Network project, a study that explored the potential of connecting currently isolated energy systems and some of the best renewable energy sources in the Arctic, Nordic and northern European regions to the large energy markets of the UK and European continent. The project involved collaboration between representatives from the Faroe Islands, Greenland, Iceland, Norway and Shetland and has since February 2015 facilitated the informative exchange of knowledge between the participating regions and organisations.
Þóra Ellen Þórhallsdóttir
Professor of Botany
the University of Iceland
Þóra Ellen Þórhallsdóttir is professor of Botany at the University of Iceland and chairperson of the Institute of Life and Environmental Sciences. She has studied various aspects of the ecology of the central highland of Iceland, esp. Þjórsárver nature reserve. She has worked on Icelandic landscapes and, in collaboration with Þorvarður Árnason, developed a landscape classification system. Þóra Ellen was part of the team that prepared the basis for Iceland‘s revised Nature Conservation Act of 2013. She has been on the board of all three phases of Iceland‘s Framework Plan for Energy and the Conservation of Natural Areas.
Andreas Østhagen
Doctoral Research Fellow
Fridtjof Nansen Institute, Norway
Andreas Østhagen, from North Norway, is a Doctoral Research Fellow at Fridtjof Nansen Institute while he is obtaining his
Arctic Circle Assembly 2016
Breakout Session Speaker:
Regions as Arctic developers – sustainable development through multilateral cooperation
Organized by: Troms County Council, Norway
title: The EU and the Arctic.