Who is Svalur

Published:  13 June 2025

SVALUR brings together a highly interdisciplinary team of international experts from Sweden, USA, Norway, the Netherlands and the UK, covering a wide range of focus areas within the natural and social sciences.

We will work with many partners, including the Norwegian Polar Institute, Norwegian Meteorological Institute, Climate-Ecological Arctic Observatory (COAT), Svalbard Integrated Arctic Earth Observation System (SIOS), tour operator Oceanwide and WWF Global Arctic Programme.

SVALUR is led by René van der Wal, Arctic ecologist, of the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU), and co-led by Astrid Ogilvie, climate historian and Arctic human ecologist, of the Instititute of Arctic and Alpine Research (INSTAAR) at the University of Colorado, Boulder, USA. 

Participating researchers by country and institution:

Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU), Uppsala, Sweden:
René van der Wal 
Annette Löf 
Lars Hallgren 
Jasmine Zhang 

Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI), Stockholm, Sweden:
Rasmus Kløcker Larsen 

University of Iceland, Iceland:
Steven Hartman 

Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research (INSTAAR), University of Colorado, Boulder, USA:
Astrid Ogilvie 
Martin Miles 

The Arctic University of Tromsø (UiT), Tromsø, Norway:
Vera Hausner 
Ann Lennert 
Linn Bruholt 

The Norwegian Polar Institute (NPI), Tromsø, Norway:
Virve Ravolainen 

University of Groningen (RUG), Arctic Centre, Groningen, the Netherlands:
Maarten Loonen 
Annette Scheepstra 
Zdenka Sokolíčková 
Esteban Ramirez 

Center for Alternative Technology, UK
Sam Saville 

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