A major problem looms, says entrepreneur Fonger Ypma. “According to some climate models, the North Pole may be completely ice-free in summer for the first time as early as the 1930s or 1940s.” Once the sea ice has melted, the North Pole is no longer white, reflecting a lot of solar heat, much like a white T-shirt does in the summer sun. Dark sea water actually absorbs heat. As a result of the melting of the polar ice, global warming could thus end up in a self-reinforcing spiral. “Doing nothing is not an option,” says Ypma.
So he founded Arctic Reflections, a start-up working on a plan to spray up the Arctic ice to reverse the melting of the polar ice caps. Yes really. With large installations, Ypma wants to spray seawater at strategic places in the Arctic ice to stimulate ice growth and halt melting.
In the context of ‘thinking big, starting small’, Arctic Reflections wants to do a field test next winter near Spitsbergen, where it wants to spray a small piece of ice. The company is now busy raising the 1 million euros that is needed for this, but it has not yet received any major investments. Ypma works together with one partner and two researchers from TU Delft. “After securing the first investment, we have to hurry.” Because the ambition is greater. The idea is to continue spraying ice on a large scale for several decades to ensure that the Arctic ice is maintained. In the meantime, climate policy must curb further temperature rises and ultimately ensure that this is no longer necessary, he believes.
‘A true beta’
Fonger Ypma (44) wears rectangular glasses with large lenses, under a wavy cut of strikingly thick, light gray hair. “A real beta,” he describes himself. He obtained his PhD in mathematics and physics at Oxford University, after which he worked as a strategy consultant and head of a department at Eneco that deals with the energy transition.
The melting of the Arctic ice has irreversible consequences for the planet. Why can’t we help that ice grow?
Fonger Ypma founder Arctic Reflections
In times of corona, he decided that he wanted to do more to help solve the climate problem. “I studied how fast the Arctic ice is melting, and what irreversible consequences that would have for the planet. Then I actually thought very simply: why couldn’t we help that ice grow?” Even in the most favorable scenarios, some intervention is necessary to maintain polar ice: melting will continue for decades anyway, due to the slow effect of measures on temperature.
How exactly does Ypma want to reverse that melting? By spraying seawater on the ice in the polar winter, so that a much thicker ice layer is formed, and the ice caps remain in place longer in the summer.
It sounds grotesque and simple at the same time, and it’s not the idea of Arctic Reflections itself: Ypma based it on a plan by scientists from 2016 that was quickly shelved at the time due to doubts about its feasibility.
According to him, it is less unrealistic than it sounds, because you can transport large amounts of artificially created sea ice on already existing sea currents in the Arctic Ocean, so that the created ice can quickly spread over a large area – like a kind of conveyor belt of ice. According to his calculations, an area of 100,000 square kilometers must be reclaimed every year: that is 2.5 times the Netherlands.
Read also: Join us on an expedition to the North Pole, the fastest warming place on earth
White surfaces
Is it realistic? “In principle it should work,” says Herman Russchenberg, professor of Atmospheric Remote Sensing at TU Delft. Among other things, he conducts research into artificially whitening clouds above oceans by atomizing seawater droplets into them, in order to reflect more sunlight. And his studies indeed show that whiter surfaces can have a major climate effect. “To do this at the North Pole, there are only major technical challenges,” he says: among other things, to allow the new ice to form on a large, extensive surface. “You don’t want to create scattered ice floes.”
Russchenberg, who is not involved in the start-up himself, also sees challenges with regard to the energy supply for the installations that Ypma wants to build. This requires large-scale installation of floating wind turbines at sea, in an area with very extreme weather conditions. “But those are technical challenges that are not necessarily unsolvable.” Russchenberg does think that proper research should be done during the experiment into side effects such as changes in sea currents or the consequences for ecosystems in the Arctic Sea.
According to Ypma’s calculations, an area of 100,000 square kilometers must be reclaimed every year: that is 2.5 times the size of the Netherlands
Michiel van den Broeke, professor of polar meteorology at Utrecht University, is also curious and skeptical about Arctic Relections. “We know that artificially maintaining ice can work. This is done successfully, for example, at some glaciers in the Alps by stretching large reflective cloths over the remaining glaciers. “But we are talking about the North Pole here, and that is a completely different scale.”
To get this working, new technical solutions have to be devised to reach the scale that is needed. “But it is in any case to be welcomed that these types of start-ups are trying,” says Van den Broeke. “Maybe they’ll discover something useful.”
Keep the North Pole
How does Ypma listen to these concerns? Take that bowl. The gigantic area of ice to be created means, according to calculations by Arctic Reflections itself, that about a thousand large installations will probably have to be built, spread over an area that cuts across several national borders.
The costs to build, maintain and run are astronomical. It is estimated by Ypma itself that it would cost around 10 billion euros per year to spray up the area of the North Pole that is needed to halt the annual summer ice decline.
In addition to all the technical innovation, raising such amounts of money requires unprecedented political organizing power and international cooperation. Ypma also recognizes this himself, and he also identifies many new initiatives in the field of saving the polar ice with which he likes to work.
At Cambridge University you have the Center for Climate Repair where research is being done into this, in Finland there is a youth movement Operaatio Arktis, in America the NGO Ocean Visions, there is a start-up in Wales: Real Ice. “We have good contact with them. It is only good if more people are involved, because then you can learn from each other.” Ypma is also looking at the offshore industry for collaborations.
Risks
But even if this can be scaled up, there is still the question of what pumping up seawater and artificially creating ice will do to the Arctic ecosystem. What if, in addition to seawater, the installations also spray all kinds of fish, crabs and plankton onto the ice? The ambitious plastic cleanup project Ocean Cleanup was also discredited a few years ago because all kinds of marine animals ended up in the cleanup hoses. The solution to one problem can sometimes cause all kinds of new problems. Can that be prevented?
That is one of the things they want to investigate during the field test, according to Ypma. In addition, he says that it is important to carefully weigh up risks against each other. “It is important not to take the current situation as a starting point, but the situation in twenty years.” If nothing happens, huge damage will occur to the Arctic nature due to the disappearance of the ice.
Technology, permits, collaborations, extremely challenging weather conditions. Ypma gets herself into trouble with all those uncertainties, ifs and buts. “But someone has to offer an antidote to despair,” he says. “I hope that in 40 or 50 years we can say: it was difficult, but we were able to keep the polar ice.”
A version of this article also appeared in the newspaper on July 18, 2023.