WHEN we think of climate change, it is almost an abstract notion that is happening elsewhere. We can follow the news and see the devastating effects of wildfires in Australia and America, or the calving of glaciers in the Arctic, but all of these consequences seem very far removed when you live in the Central Belt in Scotland. For me, my eyes were opened to the significances of weather changes relating to global warming in 2019, when I was fortunate enough to be chosen to go on an expedition to Greenland.

I was part of a group of teenagers who enrolled with the Polar Academy – which is a children’s charity based in Scotland. We all trained for a year in order to get fit enough to join a ten-day winter sledge hauling expedition.

The expedition starts from a small hunting community in East Greenland named Tasiilaq, and we headed off north, exploring the landscape – and even climbed some unnamed peaks on route. The Polar Academy is predominately a teenage mental health charity and runs these expeditions each year. They also work very closely with the local Inuit population in Tasiilaq.

Our expedition set off in March and the weather was as expected in Greenland. Winter conditions were normal, and the bay leaving the community was frozen, so we skied over the sea ice on the first day. Storms regularly hit the hunting community and we did have some high winds a few days in, but nothing out of the ordinary.

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On day 4, the weather changed, and it changed very quickly. The temperature began to rise, and it rose so much that rain fell instead of snow. This had a cascading effect; water lying on the ice began to accelerate the melting process much more rapidly than it would normally at that time of year. Our expedition was cut short, and we had to quickly get back into the village while the sea ice was still passable. While we all maybe felt a little disappointed, the consequences of this early ice melt had a devastating impact on the local community.

The town of Tasiilaq is a hunting community, and they still rely on their hunters to be able to travel across the sea ice to gather enough food to feed the community in the months when the ice is scarce. In 2019, the melt came 4 weeks early. All of the dog teams had to be brought back home and they were all kennelled a month early. While 2019 was a slightly unusual event, as it stands, I believe Greenland is losing a day of winter per year. Those who rely on their dog teams to earn a living from tourism also lost their ability to ply their trade that year.

For the local Inuit, being self-sufficient and being able to support each other is heavily reliant on good winter conditions during the hunting season. This is about survival and a way of life that dates back centuries. With COP26 being hosted in Glasgow last year, I was pleased to receive an invitation to an event hosted by Renew the World at the New York Times hub. I was joined on the panel by the founder of the Polar Academy, Craig Mathieson, and other teenage climate activists. We were given the opportunity to share our concerns with a wider audience than we could have reached normally.

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On occasion, I am asked what the local people in Greenland can do to offset the impacts they are already feeling with changing weather conditions. The very sad but brutal truth is that there is nothing they can do. This is being done to them. They are having to live with the consequences, while developed nations carry on regardless, or just fritter around the edges with introducing paper straws and larger blue bins. We need to agree to all support the communities and countries who are feeling the heat the most. This is a global, not a local issue.

There is certainly a worry that no one is acting fast enough, and perhaps this is because we are not yet feeling enough direct impact ourselves. The consequences of losing the Greenlandic Ice sheet don’t bear thinking about – but it’s happening already, and once the ice is gone, it will be everyone’s problem.

Greenland is one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen, but it’s changing rapidly. We may be the last generation to witness the true Arctic, in all its glory, unless we do something about it. It’s time to stop feeling guilty about using plastic bags and start holding the huge corporations accountable for pumping endless gasses into the air, or excavating for minerals on a massive scale. We are ruining communities and amazing wonders only a handful of us have had the privilege of seeing. By working together now, we can give nature a chance to recover. Nothing is inevitable.