Our footprint on Antarctica competes with nature for rare ice-free land
Construction and operation of research stations present the most pronounced human impacts on the Antarctic continent across a wide range of environmental values. Despite Antarctic Treaty Parties committing themselves to comprehensive protection of the environment, data on the spatial extent of impac...
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ftunivwollongong:oai:ro.uow.edu.au:smhpapers1-1599 2023-05-15T13:57:48+02:00 Our footprint on Antarctica competes with nature for rare ice-free land Brooks, Shaun T Jabour, Julia Van Den Hoff, John Bergstrom, Dana M 2019-01-01T08:00:00Z https://ro.uow.edu.au/smhpapers1/585 unknown Research Online https://ro.uow.edu.au/smhpapers1/585 Faculty of Science, Medicine and Health - Papers: Part B rare nature competes ice-free antarctica land footprint our article 2019 ftunivwollongong 2021-08-23T22:25:24Z Construction and operation of research stations present the most pronounced human impacts on the Antarctic continent across a wide range of environmental values. Despite Antarctic Treaty Parties committing themselves to comprehensive protection of the environment, data on the spatial extent of impacts from their activities have been limited. To quantify this, we examined the area of building and ground disturbance across the entire continent using geographic information system mapping of satellite imagery. Here, we report the footprint of all buildings to be >390,000 m2, with an additional disturbance footprint of >5,200,000 m2 just on ice-free land. These create a visual footprint similar in size to the total ice-free area of Antarctica, and impact over half of all large coastal ice-free areas. Our data demonstrate that human impacts are disproportionately concentrated in some of the most sensitive environments, with consequential implications for conservation management. This high-resolution measurement of the extent of infrastructure across the continent can be used to inform management decisions to balance sustainable scientific use and environmental protection of the Antarctic environment. Article in Journal/Newspaper Antarc* Antarctic Antarctica University of Wollongong, Australia: Research Online Antarctic The Antarctic |
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Open Polar |
collection |
University of Wollongong, Australia: Research Online |
op_collection_id |
ftunivwollongong |
language |
unknown |
topic |
rare nature competes ice-free antarctica land footprint our |
spellingShingle |
rare nature competes ice-free antarctica land footprint our Brooks, Shaun T Jabour, Julia Van Den Hoff, John Bergstrom, Dana M Our footprint on Antarctica competes with nature for rare ice-free land |
topic_facet |
rare nature competes ice-free antarctica land footprint our |
description |
Construction and operation of research stations present the most pronounced human impacts on the Antarctic continent across a wide range of environmental values. Despite Antarctic Treaty Parties committing themselves to comprehensive protection of the environment, data on the spatial extent of impacts from their activities have been limited. To quantify this, we examined the area of building and ground disturbance across the entire continent using geographic information system mapping of satellite imagery. Here, we report the footprint of all buildings to be >390,000 m2, with an additional disturbance footprint of >5,200,000 m2 just on ice-free land. These create a visual footprint similar in size to the total ice-free area of Antarctica, and impact over half of all large coastal ice-free areas. Our data demonstrate that human impacts are disproportionately concentrated in some of the most sensitive environments, with consequential implications for conservation management. This high-resolution measurement of the extent of infrastructure across the continent can be used to inform management decisions to balance sustainable scientific use and environmental protection of the Antarctic environment. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Brooks, Shaun T Jabour, Julia Van Den Hoff, John Bergstrom, Dana M |
author_facet |
Brooks, Shaun T Jabour, Julia Van Den Hoff, John Bergstrom, Dana M |
author_sort |
Brooks, Shaun T |
title |
Our footprint on Antarctica competes with nature for rare ice-free land |
title_short |
Our footprint on Antarctica competes with nature for rare ice-free land |
title_full |
Our footprint on Antarctica competes with nature for rare ice-free land |
title_fullStr |
Our footprint on Antarctica competes with nature for rare ice-free land |
title_full_unstemmed |
Our footprint on Antarctica competes with nature for rare ice-free land |
title_sort |
our footprint on antarctica competes with nature for rare ice-free land |
publisher |
Research Online |
publishDate |
2019 |
url |
https://ro.uow.edu.au/smhpapers1/585 |
geographic |
Antarctic The Antarctic |
geographic_facet |
Antarctic The Antarctic |
genre |
Antarc* Antarctic Antarctica |
genre_facet |
Antarc* Antarctic Antarctica |
op_source |
Faculty of Science, Medicine and Health - Papers: Part B |
op_relation |
https://ro.uow.edu.au/smhpapers1/585 |
_version_ |
1766265690996604928 |