The Arctic pollution has begun since its development. Today the Arctic landscape is hard to imagine without such details as rusty steel barrels. Tons of garbage is the heritage of the Soviet era and turbulent 1990s, when armed forces were leaving the Arctic. Recently, cleaning of distant islands seemed expensive and challenging task.
But times are changing. In 2010 Vladimir Putin said: "The Arctic needs general clean-up.”
Today in efforts to cleanse the Arctic landscapes many organizations and hundreds of volunteers are involved.
So is the Russian Geographical Society, which leads the project "Arctic cleanup program" for 4 years. Volunteers for the third year come to the Bely Island to restore its original beauty. Container ship "Rossita" removes nuclear waste from Gremikha. Staff of 30 Rosneft companies, including those in Yamal, participated in the all-Russian cleaning day "Green Russia". Russian Arctic National Park was created in 2009 on the Novaya Zemlya archipelago, where in the middle of the last century nuclear explosions thundered.
The idea of "Arctic clean-up” is also supported by the famous polar explorer Arthur Chilingarov. In addition to appearance on scientific events devoted to the Arctic, he is personally involved in the Arctic cleaning.
“Arctic general clean-up” is a long process, but year by year more and more people understand the importance of this idea.
