The forces of climate change that are reducing ice cover and opening up the Arctic to more activity are making Alaska more important in regards to Homeland Security. For the Department, which has a combination of public safety, emergency response and law-enforcement functions, climate change is creating new challenges for which old responses are no longer adequate.

Story telling provides a powerful tool in a changing climate. Epen Hobson has been experiencing the land and ocean through the perspective of an Inuit photographer and hunter. A recipient of the Arctic Resilient Communities Fellowship he shares, "We're an oral people, we tell stories, we teach by telling stories," The effects of climate change are concrete and dramatic for the Arctic communities such as Utqiagvik, and Hopson is hungry to see infrastructure and policy solutions to address them.

In Alaska, a new oil boom is on the horizon even as climate change arrives and greenhouse gas emissions climb.

A growing number of Arctic underground cellars are being rendered unreliable as global warming and other modern factors force changes to an ancient way of life.

“Climate change is happening faster than it’s ever happened before in our record,” Utquiagvik-based NOAA scientist Bryan Thomas said. “We’re right in the middle of it.”

At risk from surging storm waves and floods, Alaska's coastal villagers are dealing with the immediate consequences of climate change -- threats to their health, safety and even their ancestors' graves.