NANUQ2020 is a joint effort by experienced researchers and workgroups with various competences and backgrounds, all gathered around the common intent to better understand the Arctic and to encourage public awareness of its current environmental situation. S/Y NANUQ, as an environment-friendly floating research lab will host several experiments and activities all aimed to clarifying possible threat scenarios for the environment in the Arctic region and to spreading knowledge about problems and possible solutions. NANUQ was developed by Sailworks (www.sailworks.com) upon design and direction by Peter Gallinelli. Scientific activities onboard will be coordinated by Frederic Gillet and conducted by an international team of onboard and onland scientist. The project’s leading institutions, i.e. boat-builder Sailworks, sailing association Acapela, scientific association Aqualti have developed considerable previous experience in Arctic operations. After her launch in 2014, NANUQ was in Arctic every summer including a year-round navigation and permanence in Greenland in 2015. In summer 2018 NANUQ and her crew were involved in the Polarquest2018 scientific expedition, cruising from Iceland to Greenland and to Svalbard. She then circumnavigared the archipelago reaching a top Latitude of 82°07’. During that expedition, NANUQ served as floating laboratory to perform, among several scientific activities under 3 different research programmes, relevant cosmic-ray detection and measurements, sampling of micro-plastics in those remote Arctic regions, and several geographic observations. In 2019, NANUQ and her crew visited several locations in Norway. NANUQ2020 will be another step in this quest for knowledge and awareness about environmental issues of today and tomorrow.
