Petroleum and Environmental Management Tool (PEMT) – High Arctic

The High 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 in the High Arctic Archipelago and contains both marine and terrestrial components. The boundaries of the study area are based on the NOGB leasing grids applied in the High Arctic, under which exploration, significant discovery and production licenses may be issued. The Sverdrup Basin (and Lancaster Sound) has the highest known oil and gas potential of the sedimentary basins of the Arctic Islands (Nunavut Planning Commission 2000) and it is expected that there is oil and gas potential on Melville Island and Bathurst Island (Sivummut Economic Development Strategy Group 2003). To date, no gas has been produced, and 321,470 m³ of oil has been produced from the Bent Horn oil field (Morrell et al. 1995).

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 Eastern Arctic datasets.