Petroleum and Environmental Management Tool (PEMT) – Eastern Arctic

The Eastern Arctic dataset comes from the Petroleum and Environmental Management Tool (PEMT). The online tool was decommissioned in 2019 and the data was transferred to Open Data in order to preserve it.

The PEMT was originally developed in 2009 to help guide development in the Canadian Arctic by Indian and Northern Affairs Canada (INAC). The online tool mapped the sensitivities of a variety of Arctic features, ranging from whales to traditional harvesting, across the Arctic. The tool was intended to aid government, oil and gas companies, Aboriginal groups, resource managers and public stakeholders in better understanding the geographic distribution of areas which are sensitive for environmental and socio-economic reasons.

The study area is located east of Baffin Island, Nunavut and encompasses marine habitat in Baffin Bay and Davis Strait. The boundaries of the study area are based on NOGB leasing grids applied in the Eastern Arctic, under which exploration and production licenses may be issued. Although portions of the study area hold high oil and gas potential and several small oil fields and substantial reserves of gas have been found since the 1960s in the north Baffin region, exploration for oil and gas has been limited to seismic operations and geological field work.

DISCLAIMER: Please refer to the PEMT Disclaimer document or the Resource Constraints - Use Limitation in the Additional Information section below.

Note: This is one of the 3 (three) datasets included in the PEMT application which includes the Beaufort Sea and Mackenzie Delta and High Arctic datasets.