NOT OLD BARRIERS BUT NEW FORMS OF COOPERATION

Spitsbergen is both remote and close

Mark Verba,
Chief geologist of GNPP "Sevmopgeo",
Doctor of geological and mineralogical sciences

        Old cultural and scientific bonds connect our northern capital, St.Petersburg and the remote northern archipelago Spitsbergen. For example, few people know that young Maya Plicetskaya, daughter of a chief mine-geologist, spent much of her formative years here. For about a half-century groups of scientists making invaluable stone collections were sent to various parts of the archipelago by the Leningrad association "Sevmorgeologia" which included the Polar Geophysical expedition. The legendary ice-breaker "Krasin" which once contributed greatly to the development of the Arctic islands is moored on the Neva, near the Institute of Mines.
        Spitsbergen is the most extraodinary arctic archipelago. On none of the other arctic islands are there such big settlements with populations of up to a thousand people as on Barentsburg, where our consulate is situated and where our other settlement Piramida, which was abandoned by people two years ago, was also situated. Where else can sea water pools, gymnasiums, cinemas, clubs, libraries, supermarkets and even a university be at the disposal of miners at 78o north ? This university has been recently established in Longier, and it provides education for 60 students. High rocky mountains, from which the name of this island derives, long tongues of emerald-blue glaciers, the smooth surface of fiords and sparse plots of polar vegetation rub shoulders harmoniously in this severe high-latitude winterscape.
        The interests of Russians and our neighbours are not so oddly crossed anywhere as they are here. Unfortunately, after the October Revolution, Russia lost almost all its rights to these lands. At that time the Bolsheviks did not think about a few barren islands, and Norway seizing the moment, laid its hands on that, for which territorial claims had been poorly made. As a result the archipelago, frankly speaking, became like the South Kuril Islands for us if we look at them through the eyes of the Japanese. To tell the truth, this analogy is not very exact - Spitsbergen and the shelf of the Baltic sea adjacent to it keep their status which reflects, to some extent, the deficiency of Norway's claims to it's sovereignty and permits us, as well as other countries, to carry out free prospecting and quarrying of minerals on the islands. As a result, Russia has at its disposal some plots where coal is being produced, surveying is being made, and scientific research is being carried out.
        The situation was historically such that Russians always were ahead of other countries in developing this remote part of the Arctic region. This tradition originates from the times of Ivan Starostin, a trader from Arkhangelsk, who founded the first settlement of coast-dwellers on Spisbergen and who was buried on the biggest island of the archipelago. Despite all the economic difficulties of recent years this tradition has been maintained. Three large coal deposits are being prospected on Russian plots. These differ widely in composition and age and far exceed Norwegian deposits in size and volume. One of these deposits - Piramidskoye - contains rare and valuable kinds of coking coal not found anywhere else on the archipelago. Methane gas from the Trias deposit complex, the same complex from which oil is produced on other side of the Barents sea - on the Kolguev - are obtained from two deep wells on the brook Vassdalen.
        The first oil from the paleogenetic precipitate complex was obtained on the cape Laila. It is interesting that this deposit "is preserved" in section or, as geologists say, "shielded" by a thick layer of permafrost. And, finally, spouts of gas, gas condensate and light oil from older cavity age-of-coal deposits were obtained in shallower wells on the coast of the bay of Petunya. It is significant that rich output, but at bigger depth - up to 2-3 km, is obtained from these deposits in the Pechorskaya province, on Spitsbergen these deposits are productive beginning from 600 m, which decreases considerably operating expenses. The author of this text had a chance to participate in testing and must say that, taking into account all the data obtained, the section tested has everything that is needed to form big accumulations of hydrocarbon. Traps, that is favourable structural conditions like traps where well known Baku fields are accumulated, were found. Good reservoirs, that is porous layers capable of containing and giving accumulations of very viscous oil have been revealed, too. Meanwhile a section of precipitate deposits with good prospects for gas and oil has been studied, but insufficiently. According to geologists' forecast the main oil-rich layers of the high and middle Devonian period like those in Timano-Pechorskaya province have not been stripped by drilling. According to specialists' estimates the total estimated resource of the archipelago, including adjacent water areas exceeds 6 billion tons in oil equivalent. Admittedly, sceptical voices on the further production of gas and oil in the archipelago's depths can be found in the foreign mass-media; here it is necessary to remember that, in general, all Russian successes in prospecting and studying mineral resources are belittled by Norwegians for understandable reasons, and our priorities are hushed up; as a result the estimate of it's potential is wrongly calculated.
        Besides combustible resources, Spitsbergen is rich in phosphorites, gypsum, rock crystal, and other kinds of semi-precious stones. Copper manifestations are found in Devonian sandstone in the Land of Andre, pyrite ore is found in the environs of Veide fiord, increased concentrations of gold, silver, some non-ferrious metals are revealed in liswanite in the Land of Oscar II. The outlet of mineral waters have been studied in details in the region of Grun fiord. Bogheads have been found on the shore of the Mimer. Besides this there are carbonaceous shales wherein diamonds often lie….
        All "stone evidence" of these minerals are presented in the most northern geological museum, the creation of which Aleksandr Krasilschikov from St.Petersburg, a veteran of Russian geological prospecting of Spitsbergen, gave his last years. Such a magnificent collection of minerals and rocks which he had collected in three decades in Barentsburg could bring honour to any natural history museum of the country. It is to be regretted that this collection is practically unavailable to visitors from Russia. Tourists from Oslo, London, Stockholm can be seen there more often than tourists from Moscow, St.Petersburg or Veliky Novgorod. It is appropriate to say that from the point of view of tourism in fact Spitspergen is a "gold-mine", an untouched seam. It is well known that besides general tourism, specialized tourism exists, for example, for geologists, glaciologists, ornithologists, biologists and so on. From this point of view Spitsbergen is an open air musum, covering various spheres of knowledge. Therefore a lot of territories of the archipelago are declared as reserves and national parks.
        In particular, Spitsbergen is interesting to geologists because it gives the possibility to trace all the history of the archipelago from the Riphean to Paleogenic era over about 1 billion years in one cross section of a length of a dozen kilometers. Therefore the west shore of Spitsbergen has served students of Cambridge University as a training ground where many known geologists had received first skills in research work. The young volcano is not far off, close to it there is a source of thermal waters where it is possible to take a bath throughout the whole year. "Castle" rocks of different shape gave the name to one of the most picturesque fiords, namely to Temple-fiord. Here the names of the mountains speak for themselves - Sphinx, Pyramid.
        Incidentally, five years ago Harald V, the King of Norway, visited the settlement Piramida now abandoned by Russians. In his speech before the miners he said that it is one of the" pearls" of the island. Before it was abandoned there was a 200 m artificially cultivated lawn, there was a boiler-house, mooring, a dressing plant, a mine, a canteen with a wonderful mosaic panel the size of the whole wall, an inn, cattle-yard, a helicopter platform and a plumbing system - now all these and a lot of the others are left, abandoned for the usual prosaic reasons- because of the unavailability of means to support coal production at a profitable level.
        At the same time it is an ideal place to organize a tourist base, stationary scientific observatory, stone carving production, not to mentionon coal production traditional to these places.
        On entering the new century one should not loose sight of the achievements of last centuries. Owing to its favourable geographical position and relatively soft climate Spitsbergen often served as a unique base for studying the inner regions of the Arctic Ocean, that is why it attracted the attention of Russian sailors for a long time, and St.Petersburg was always the centre where plans of arctic research were made and where they were implemented. Here, live on the traditions of polar researchers, it would be reasonable to use the available opportunities to strengthen the priorities of Russian science in the Arctic regions and as a result to obtain gains from the investment of research and labour that many generations of Russians have put into this region.