The Nordic region is one of the most prosperous and stable in the world. The countries here are stable democracies and open societies, with press freedom, low perceived public sector corruption, and technological advancement.

However, areas in the Nordic are also highly sensitive to climate and environmental changes. These sensitivities increasingly intersect with diverse security agendas, with unpredictable outcomes. Three issues can undermine stability in the Nordic region.

Security trumps other concerns

Finland and Sweden joined NATO, and to do so, Sweden put an end to its policy of neutrality and non-alignment, which goes back to 1812. NATO’s longest land border with Russia is now located here, and the Baltic states fall within the Russian sphere of interest. Defence spending is rapidly increasing in almost all countries. Germany, for example, has set a goal to build Europe’s largest conventional army – which was unthinkable in a pre-Ukraine-war context.

Today, submarines ply the waters under the Arctic ice, which both dampens sound and limits surveillance from aircrafts and satellites. Russia relies on the ice to hide nuclear-armed submarines that constitute an important part of the country’s second-strike capability. Nuclear-armed submarines from the US, France and UK also regularly patrol the area.

But that ice is under threat.

Climate change affects the entire Earth, but the extent varies. The poles will experience the greatest warming. If greenhouse gas emissions continue at current levels, the average temperature in the Arctic could increase by as much as three to five degrees by the end of the century compared to today.

In the Nordic region, climate change is intertwined with economic and security interests in several ways. A green transition to lower carbon emissions depends on minerals such as lithium and rare earth elements, and beneath the melting ice and tundra lie vast deposits of these critical minerals. An important driver of change in the Nordic region is how Europe chooses to respond to China’s current dominance in processing of rare earth elements, currently the majority of global capacity. It is not unlikely that the EU will put more political and regulatory pressure on Sweden to increase mining and processing of strategic minerals.

This development places increased pressures on the Sámi people. Land in Sápmi is being reshaped not only by increased interest in the region’s natural resources, but also the emergence of new shipping routes and military build-up. Both the green transition and militarization in the region need to be understood as new regimes of land use that pose a significant threat to the viability of Sámi livelihoods (see Junka-Aikio, 2025). This is yet another example where socio-economic, environmental and geopolitical changes collide in unexpected ways.

Compatible economic interests, conflicting environmental concerns

To understand how different interests and concerns are interwined, one needs to acknowledge that countries in the region view and address climate change very differently. For example, the Climate Change Performance Index (CCPI) shows that countries in the region score from very high (Denmark, Lithuania, Sweden) to very low (Russia).

When it comes to oil and gas extraction, Russia and Norway sometimes have overlapping interests. However, environmental considerations usually have a much more prominent role in Norwegian exploitation compared to Russian efforts.

Of particular interest is that not every country subscribes to the predominantly negative description of climate change. The strategic significance of climate change has long been part of Russian long-term thinking. As early as 2015, Putin said, “with so much land, and such colossal arable land that can still yet increase, in this sense, we are the richest country – not in terms of oil and gas, but in terms of the possibilities for agriculture. And the need for food in the world will only grow.”

Some research indicates that enormous land areas that are not currently arable could be transformed into fertile land within a few decades, should permafrost thaw. Today, Russia is the world’s leading exporter of wheat, a position the country wants to develop into an important element of its strategic arsenal. Russia’s war against Ukraine can be partly viewed through this lens, given Ukraine’s role as a leading exporter of wheat and corn.

In its latest climate plan, Russia has expressed a somewhat more balanced view that acknowledges some negative impacts of a changing climate. Nevertheless, Russia still considers a warming climate to offer significant advantages. By continuing its substantial fossil fuel exports, Russia paradoxically profits both from driving climate change and from the resulting impacts.

A unique adaptation challenge for Nordic countries

Climate change leads to a warmer climate overall on a global scale, but it can paradoxically also lead to certain regions becoming cooler than today. Thanks to the Atlantic Gulf Stream, which transports heat northward, northwestern Europe has a relatively mild climate despite its northern location. With more extensive temperature increases, the probability of the weakening of the Gulf Stream, which is a part of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation, or AMOC, also increases.

A “tipping event”, where the AMOC collapses, would cause a substantial shift of the global climate. Assessing the risk of such an event is necessary, and more recent modelling indicates that the probability of weakening, and even collapse, of the AMOC during this century is greater than previously thought.

Sharp cooling in the region while surrounding regions warm up could in turn lead to extreme weather events that are uncommon today. These risks have been highlighted by the scientific community, and in October 2024, a group of climate scientists wrote an open letter to the Nordic Council of Ministers, urging them to take this risk seriously. But so far, this risk has not been addressed in the policy community.

Adapting to a changing climate, while accounting for scenarios of both warmer and cooler futures, poses a unique challenge for the Nordic region. How this challenge can be addressed in a context of increased geopolitical tension remains to be seen. Given the challenges ahead, including increased uncertainty with regards to irreversibilities and tipping points, it is important to strive for broad coverage of future scenarios to “span the space of the imaginable”. Here, insights and tools developed in Mistra Geopolitics can support policymaking going forward.