Oral evidence: Arctic follow-up, HC 533Wednesday 17 December 2014 (am)
Oral evidence, 17 December 2014.
Witness
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo, Head of Arctic Council Working Group on Emergency Prevention, Preparedness and Response, gave evidence.
Chair
Good morning, Mr Bjerkemo. I thank you on behalf of the Committee for coming before us this morning. I’m not sure how much you are aware of our work, but we did produce a report earlier in 2012 and a subsequent follow-up one in 2013. We are returning to some of those issues in the final year of this parliamentary session, just to try and get a current up-to-date understanding of what the issues are. We will be interviewing Shell later today. One issue that we are concerned about is the readiness to be able to deal with oil spill responses. We obviously have other concerns as well. I think you have just heard some of the evidence from our previous witnesses. They were alluding to the fact that the Arctic Council, and the committee that you chair, could well fill in the gap about where the regulatory pressure is coming from. It would be helpful for us to have an indication of your working group’s remit and what the detail of your work is in respect to emergency prevention, preparedness and response, and have that overall picture of how critical your work is.
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
Thank you very much for your invitation. I will, of course, try to answer your questions as well as I can. Perhaps I can first explain a little bit about the working group I am sharing in. They are six working groups within the Arctic Council. In addition to that there are also currently some task forces that have a goal to deliver some product in the end. That is also important to know. My working group—the emergency prevention, preparedness and response working group—deals not only with oil spills, but also with radiation and natural disasters. Currently, the focus is on oil spill response. Regarding prevention, we delivered a report in 2013 based on the decision by the ministerial meeting in 2011. I have the “Summary Report and Recommendations on the Prevention of Marine Oil Pollution in the Arctic”. This summary report is based on a more extensive report, “Recommended Practices for Arctic Oil Spill Prevention”, which sums up prevention measures related to not only oil and gas, but to shipping and land-based activity and influence on the Arctic environment. As a follow-up to this report the Ministers decided to establish a task force on oil pollution prevention. This task force is working now and will deliver a report or a plan, or whatever, for the ministerial meeting next spring in Canada. I have been involved in all of the meetings of the task force, but since the result is not there, I cannot tell you the result of this work. That is related to prevention.
Chair
Okay. Thank you for that. Just in terms of the powers that you have, are there any legal powers? What enforcement powers would there be if there was any contravention? How does it work in monitoring, enforcement and taking countries to task over their responsibilities?
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
The Arctic Council is a consensus-based organisation, so the result is not better than the consensus among all the states. As for power, we do not have any power within the working group.
Chair
Would it go against the grain to have a power to deal with enforcement in some way?
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
We can recommend and give advice. Enforcement is up to the different nations. There are two legally binding agreements among the Arctic states: the oil-spill agreement and the SAR agreement. Those are legally binding instruments, but all the other projects are recommendations that must be followed up by the different Governments, or in other forums such as the IMO.
Chair
I know there is a great deal of sensitivity in the UK about the sovereign states of the Arctic Council countries. I am thinking about the observer status that countries have. What is the role or the input of the observer countries into your taskforce?
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
Some observers, but not all—in fact, too few—are in the different working groups. Some observers have the possibility to take the floor and give input to the working groups. There are also observers in the Senior Arctic Officials meetings, where they can take the floor and give their views. It is also possible for observers—not only observer countries, but observer organisations—to propose activities, but those activities must be supported by the different states. It will normally be a project or activity that will be conducted; the observer country or organisation may take part in it, and could give really good input to it.
Chair
So observer states could initiate action, could they? Or would that have to be done through consensus? I am not quite sure how something could be brought to the table and taken forward.
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
My understanding is that it is possible to initiate activities, but that has to be done through a member. You cannot just initiate as an observer; it must be through a member of the Arctic Council. That is my understanding of how this works.
Chair
Have you got any examples of where that has been done—where proposals on safety have been initiated by observer states?
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
I don’t think anything on the prevention side has been initiated by observers. That has been done through the different states themselves, because they have the business in their own territorial waters, and they would like to have the best preventive measures possible.
Chair
Finally from me, what kind of opportunity do the oil companies and NGOs have for input in how you take your work forward?
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
I can only answer for my working group. We had a meeting two weeks ago in Seattle, USA, where WWF introduced an idea for a project. They presented this as a document, and it is up to the different countries to consider if it is something they could go forward with, or how to deal with it. It is important that the NGOs and observer countries try to influence the different countries, so that they are really on board and can bring a proposal forward, if they really want to.
Mrs Spelman
Good morning, Mr Bjerkemo. We heard from you just now that one of the working groups will report in the next quarter. It is always difficult to be asked to say something about what has not yet been published, but could you give us an indication of the particular changes that you think the Arctic circle might recommend as part of the revision of the operational guidelines? Could you give us any indication of the direction of travel?
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
The Arctic circle is not for us; I am not involved in the Arctic circle.
Mrs Spelman
Arctic Council, sorry.
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
If you are referring to the taskforce I mentioned—
Mrs Spelman
Yes.
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
They were asked to deliver an action plan or other instruments, but that is not concluded yet. They are now in the final process. The last meeting was a few weeks ago, so now there is a consultation between the countries to deliver something at ministerial level. As I said, everything must be done on consensus. From my point of view, that could be the weakness, because the result is not better than the consensus.
Mrs Spelman
So you couldn’t give us any indication of whether they might consider particular techniques to be appropriate for dealing with spillage in Arctic conditions, such as dispersal, burning or other mechanical recovery techniques?
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
This taskforce is dealing with prevention measures, not a response, but I understand that a very great concern of the states is standardisation of the prevention measures. That is considered very important and is highlighted. The different authorities among the Arctic states should work together on the regulations, so that they have knowledge of the regulations and how to work with them. Regarding standards for operations, standards are developed through the industry, but also supported by the Governments. I heard that somebody would like the Governments to set the standard, but then the standard would be behind the development; it could really reduce the development. I have also learned from my home country that the standard is not at the forefront if it is developed through the Governments.
Mrs Spelman
I am deeply sympathetic to your point that trying to achieve consensus is not easy, even among the relatively small group of nations that are members of the Arctic Council, but you may have heard me mention earlier that all the Arctic Council member countries are also signatories to the Nagoya agreement on biodiversity, because that was a United Nations agreement of 193 countries; it was unanimous. Obviously, oil exploration in the Arctic and the risks that that entails have implications for biodiversity loss in a biodiversity-rich part of the world. Has this been discussed by Arctic Council members?
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
Yes, but not in my working group; the other working group is dealing with this. It is a big issue in the Arctic Council, including in the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Programme. CAFF is another working group dealing with it, and many others are dealing with it. All the thinking behind the work of the Arctic Council is, of course, to try to reduce the impact on the Arctic environment. That is really the goal for the work of the Arctic Council. But then we have the different states, with their right to follow up on what they would like to do; that is their decision.
Zac Goldsmith
I think you heard the Greenpeace evidence; I think you were sitting here during that. Its view is that the conditions in the Arctic are such that a spill is inevitable. That view is shared by a lot of the people who gave us evidence in previous inquiries, and it seems to be the view of at least one and possibly more oil companies that are no longer interested in exploring the opportunities there. So I want to know this: in the event of an oil spill, which would necessarily be an international problem, for all the Arctic states, what would be the role of the Arctic Council? You would have diplomatic issues there, at the very least. What would be the actual role of the Arctic Council?
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
To answer your question, the Arctic Council will have no role, because the agreement is not an Arctic Council agreement; it is an agreement between the Arctic states. It is the same as the agreement between the countries around the North Sea: it’s an agreement between the states. The business of our working group is to follow up this agreement—to ensure that the operational guideline is up to date.
Zac Goldsmith
I take that point, but given what we know about the Arctic Council and the evidence that you have already given this morning, it is hard to understand the point of the Arctic Council, other than to provide a platform for the interested states and stakeholders to talk. Is there anything beyond that? Other than creating a room for talking, what is the actual value of the Arctic Council? I do not want to ask a rude question, but I am genuinely struggling with that.
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
I think that many important reports have led to developments in many aspects. For example, the Arctic marine shipping assessment was a huge report with many recommendations. It had a really big follow-up, and the result was the polar code. That is an example of a recommendation from that report. There are many examples of recommendations that come out of Arctic Council work that lead to initiatives between states bordering the Arctic. I cannot give you a detailed example of that, but that is one of the main goals. Another is to ensure that the states in the Arctic—Russia, the US, Canada and the others—are sitting around the same table.
Zac Goldsmith
We have also heard evidence about the movement towards at least thinking more about creating an Arctic reserve. If that gained ground—if, for example, the Scandinavian countries developed a joint position in favour of an Arctic sanctuary—is that the kind of process that would be managed and handled via the Arctic Council? Would that be put on the agenda in the Arctic Council? What would its role then be?
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
There are initiatives on that already. Currently, there are many Arctic reserves—if you take the whole Arctic as a reserve, that is one issue, but there are already many reserves in the Arctic. In my country, the Spitsbergen area is really a big reserve, with some exceptions. There are initiatives to consider other reserves in the Arctic through Arctic Council working groups.
Caroline Lucas
Following up on the idea of the governance of the Arctic Council, would it be more effective if some of the guidelines that it came up with could be mandatory, and if it had a different governance system whereby it could be more forceful?
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
I cannot answer that on behalf of my working group—
Caroline Lucas
No, but from your experience.
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
My experience is that if a guideline is mandatory, it will of course be more effective, because a guideline is a guideline. We are developing guidelines, and it is up to different countries to follow them.
Caroline Lucas
First, the development of guidelines is not mandatory, as you said. Secondly, I was a little perplexed when you said that in a sense you wait for the companies themselves to develop the guidelines because you do not want to set something that might be difficult or impossible for them to meet. The other side of that is that we never have the ambition and incentive to develop higher standards if we do not have something to meet. If you know that something is coming in 10 or 20 years, or whatever it is, that gives you time to adapt. If you know that that is where you have to be, does that not provide an incentive and put investment into finding ways to meet those standards?
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
On Governments developing regulations, in my country they are goal-based regulations—goals that the different operators should achieve. There are also initiatives and incentives so that the companies really try to reach the goals. When all the regulators from Russia, Canada, the US, Norway and so on are working together, they know the regulations in the different countries. My view is that, through such co-operation, the regulation and the goals will be more strict, which will lead the oil companies and the industry to work even harder to achieve the goals in the regulations.
Caroline Lucas
Your website indicates that the oil spill guidelines would be updated after an exercise that was due to be held in Canada this summer. Did that exercise take place? In what ways have the guidelines been updated?
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
As I mentioned, we had our meeting in Seattle two weeks ago, where Canada informed us about this exercise.
Caroline Lucas
What has changed concretely as a result?
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
Here is the report from the exercise. It will be delivered to the ministerial meeting.
Caroline Lucas
Okay, can we get a few headlines?
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
Of course, contact details are an example. There are also things about how to deal with equipment coming to a remote area in the Arctic when asking for support from other countries. Those are two examples.
Caroline Lucas
Contact details? I am sorry, but we heard a huge amount of evidence about how dangerous and risky this whole area is. We set some store in the fact that the oil spill guidelines will be updated following an important exercise earlier this year, and the first thing that has been updated is the contact details. One doesn’t need a big meeting to update contacts.
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
But I’m not sure what you think the guidelines are. It is about how different countries should co-operate in the case of a spill in the Arctic.
Caroline Lucas
Is there anything more rigorous? Has something come out of that that will now mean that how countries co-operate after an oil spill will be much more effective?
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
Yes. There was some improvement on how to co-operate between states. If the incident happened on a platform—in this situation it was a ship incident in the Canadian Arctic and some lessons were learned. This agreement is about how countries should help each other, notify each other and work together in case of a large incident in the Arctic. So the details, such as telephone numbers, must be updated, but that is a small issue.
Caroline Lucas
One thing that could be updated might be an understanding that it is absolutely crucial that particular pieces of kit are effective in real-world conditions. Having been to one of your meetings, you might now say that you really understand the importance of testing technology in real-world conditions, and that you will do more to make that a priority. Is that something that you could imagine?
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
I heard the previous evidence. The agreement has nothing about what equipment the different countries should have. That is up to the different states. I have not seen any other global agreement that states that there should be certain kinds of equipment.
Caroline Lucas
I don’t mean that the equipment must be agreed down to the final specification; it is about how robust the equipment will be in real-world conditions. That seems fairly crucial.
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
That is another issue. This exercise was the first one. Normally, the first exercise of an agreement or plan is a table-top exercise. It was not about testing equipment. There are other examples of exercises in which we share information and learn about how different equipment works, methods and so on. That is another issue.
Dr Whitehead
I think it’s fair to say that some frustration was expressed back in 2012 about what seemed at the time to be relatively slow work by the IMO in moving towards a mandatory polar code on shipping, in particular as regards ship design and resilience, back-up, way stations and so on. I understand that the polar code was finally agreed by the Arctic Council last month, although I don’t think that we have a great deal of information about what is in it and the extent to which it has developed over the recent period. Do you think that the polar code as it now stands goes far enough, in terms of the sort of issues that we were raising in 2012? Is it as comprehensive as you might have hoped?
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
My understanding is that it is an important first step to preventing shipping incidents in the Arctic, but some countries would like to see a stronger polar code.
Dr Whitehead
Are the countries that would like to see the polar code the core polar countries, or is that generally felt across states taking part in the Arctic Council?
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
I am not involved in the work of the polar code, so I cannot answer your question. Sorry.
Dr Whitehead
But the implication is that the code may be something of a compromise at present. Would it be fair to say that?
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
It is an international kind of agreement so, of course, it will always be based on compromises.
Dr Whitehead
So there is more work to be done.
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
That’s my understanding, if the highest standards are to be reached.
Chair
I have one final question before we bring our proceedings to a close. Faced with the evidence that we heard from our earlier witnesses, our previous reports, the concerns about summer melting, the economic opportunities that are opening up in the Arctic, and the slow rate at which the IMO is operating, is there scope for real leadership on how to balance the economic issues with the environmental and social ones? Looking at the Arctic Council, I understand everything you say about it needing to be a consensual body. Where is the leadership coming from to ensure that there is a reconciliation of all the conflicting demands in the urgent situation facing us in the Arctic?
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
It is not easy to answer that. As I said, in the beginning the Arctic Council was about protecting the Arctic environment; that is really its goal because of the melting ice. You can see the possibility of developing the Arctic, because people live there and people would like to have work and activity. Different countries would like to extract resources such as oil, minerals or whatever, so people could live in that area. We see, through the initiatives from the Arctic Council and the Ministers, that they would like to see that the development is done in a sustainable way.
Chair
But do you honestly feel that the preconditions for that development to be done in a sustainable way are in place? What more could be done to ensure that they are in place to a greater extent?
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
There is a lot of good documentation from the different working groups, and from other groups such as NGOs; the WWF, for example, is trying to influence decision making. It is up to Governments and Ministers to extract what we could do to improve safety and environmental standards in the Arctic. It is difficult to answer your question clearly.
Chair
Sure, I appreciate that. I need to bring our proceedings to a close now. I thank you sincerely for taking the time to address us. The work that the Arctic Council is doing will be absolutely key. We are grateful to you for coming and for the work that you are doing.
Ole Kristian Bjerkemo
Thank you. Oral evidence: Arctic follow-up, HC 533 16