The islands, together 419,061 km2 (161,800 sq mi)[2] in area, were renamed as a group after Elizabeth II on her coronation as Queen of Canada in 1953. The islands cover an area approximately the shape of a right triangle, bounded by the Nares Strait on the east, Parry Channel on the south and the Arctic Ocean to the north and west. Most are uninhabited although the Natural Resources Canada's Climate Change Geoscience Program Earth Sciences Sector (ESS), has monitors on the islands.[3] In 1969 Panarctic Oils, now part of Suncor Energy, began operating exploration oil wells in the Franklinian and Sverdrup basins and planned on establishing its resource base in the Queen Elizabeth Islands. It ceased production in the 1970s. At the 2013 GeoConvention the Arctic Islands region were called Canada's perpetual "last petroleum exploration frontier". Hogg and Enachescu argued that the development and implementation of advanced marine and land seismic technologies in Alaska, Northern Europe and Siberia could be modified for use in the Queen Elizabeth Islands.[4]
Queen Elizabeth Islands had not been fully charted until the British Northwest Passage expeditions and later Norwegian exploration of the 19th century.
These islands were known as the Parry Archipelago for over 130 years. They were first named after British Arctic explorer Sir William Parry, who sailed there in 1820, aboard the Hecla. Since the renaming of the archipelago in 1953, the term Parry Islands continued to be used for its southwestern part (less Ellesmere Island and the Sverdrup Islands). The regional break down of the archipelago is therefore as follows:
Ellesmere Island
Sverdrup Islands
Parry Islands
Ellesmere Island is the northernmost and by far the largest. The Sverdrup Islands are located west of Ellesmere Island and north of Norwegian Bay. The remaining islands further south and west, but north of the Parry Channel (Lancaster Sound, Viscount Melville Sound and M'Clure Strait), have been carrying the name Parry Islands, which name until 1953 had also included the Sverdrup Islands and Ellesmere Island. South of the Parry Channel are the remaining islands of the Arctic Archipelago.
With a population of less than 400, the islands are nearly uninhabited. There are only three permanently inhabited places in the islands. The two municipalities are the hamletsofResolute (population 198 as of the 2016 census[10]), on Cornwallis Island, and Grise Fiord (population 129 as of the 2016 census[11]), on Ellesmere Island. Alert is a weather station staffed by Environment and Climate Change Canada, a Global Atmosphere Watch (GAW) atmosphere monitoring laboratory on Ellesmere Island, and has several temporary inhabitants due to the co-located CFS Alert. Eureka, a small research base on Ellesmere Island, has a population of zero but at least eight staff on a continuous rotational basis.
Until 1999, the Queen Elizabeth Islands were part of the Baffin Region of the Northwest Territories.
With the creation of Nunavut in 1999 all islands and fractions of islands of the archipelago east of the 110th meridian west became part of the Qikiqtaaluk Region of the new territory, which was the major portion of the archipelago. The rest remained with the now-reduced Northwest Territories. Borden Island, Mackenzie King Island and Melville Island were divided between the two territories.
Prince Patrick Island, Eglinton Island and Emerald Island are the only notable islands that are now completely part of the Northwest Territories.
Below the level of the territory, there is the municipal level of administration. On that level, there are only two municipalities, Resolute and Grise Fiord, with an aggregate area of 450 km2 (170 sq mi) (0.11 percent of the area of the Queen Elizabeth Islands), but with most of the population of the archipelago (327 in 2021). The remaining 99.89 percent are unincorporated area, with a census 2021 population of zero, albeit a fluctuating population centred in Alert and Eureka, Nunavut.
In 2000 it was estimated that the Queen Elizabeth Islands were covered by about 104,000 km2 (40,000 sq mi) glaciers that represent c.14% of all glaciers and ice caps in the world.[1] According to a 2011 report, the surface mass balance of four, the Devon Ice Cap measured 1,699 km2 (656 sq mi) (northwest sector only); the Meighen Ice Cap measured 75 km2 (29 sq mi); the Melville South Ice Cap measured 52 km2 (20 sq mi) and the White Glacier, Axel Heiberg Island glacier was 39 km2 (15 sq mi).[1] The size of these glaciers has been measured since 1961 and their results published in such distinguished journals as the International Glaciological Society's Annals of Glaciology.[1][48][49]
Of the four ice caps that the federal government's NRCan's Climate Change Geoscience Program Earth Sciences Sector (ESS), monitors onsite in the Canadian High Arctic, three are in the Queen Elizabeth Islands: Devon, Meighen and Melville.[3] A 2013 Natural Resources Canada memo says that shrinking of the ice caps started in the late 1980s, and has accelerated rapidly since 2005. The increased melt rate was confirmed by University of California, Irvine in 2017.[50]
Computer analysis of a glacier inventory of Axel Heiberg Island was undertaken in the 1960s.[51] Later inventories of the World Glacier Monitoring Service under the direction of Fritz Müller, who worked on glacier inventories internationally, included the Axel Heiberg Island glacier.[52]
^Hogg, John R.; Enachescu, Michael E (2013). Reviving Exploration in the Arctic Islands: Opportunities and Challenges from an Operator's Perspective. GeoConvention 2013: Integration. Calgary, Alberta.
^"Alexander Island". Archived from the original on 2010-12-23. Retrieved 2010-12-23.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) at oceandots.com
^"Axel Heiberg Island". Archived from the original on 2010-12-23. Retrieved 2010-12-23.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) at oceandots.com
^"Borden Island". Archived from the original on 2010-12-23. Retrieved 2010-12-23.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) at oceandots.com
^"Brock Island". Archived from the original on 2010-12-23. Retrieved 2010-12-23.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) at oceandots.com
^"Byam Martin Island". Archived from the original on 2010-12-23. Retrieved 2009-03-14.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) at oceandots.com
^"Cameron Island". Archived from the original on 2010-12-23. Retrieved 2009-08-17.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) at oceandots.com
^"Coburg Island". Archived from the original on 2010-12-23. Retrieved 2009-08-20.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) at oceandots.com
^"Cornwall Island". Archived from the original on 2010-12-23. Retrieved 2009-08-17.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) at oceandots.com
^"Cornwallis Island". Archived from the original on 2010-12-23. Retrieved 2009-08-17.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) at oceandots.com
^"Eglinton Island". Archived from the original on 2010-12-23. Retrieved 2009-08-17.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) at oceandots.com
^"Ellef Ringnes Island". Archived from the original on 2010-12-23. Retrieved 2009-08-17.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) at oceandots.com
^"Emerald Isle". Archived from the original on 2010-12-23. Retrieved 2009-08-17.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) at oceandots.com
^"Helena Island". Archived from the original on 2010-12-23. Retrieved 2009-08-20.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) at oceandots.com
^"Île Vanier". Archived from the original on 2010-12-23. Retrieved 2009-08-17.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) at oceandots.com
^"Little Cornwallis Island". Archived from the original on 2010-12-23. Retrieved 2009-08-20.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) at oceandots.com
^"Lougheed Island". Archived from the original on 2010-12-23. Retrieved 2009-08-17.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) at oceandots.com
^"Mackenzie King Island". Archived from the original on 2010-12-23. Retrieved 2009-08-17.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) at oceandots.com
^"Massey Island". Archived from the original on 2010-12-23. Retrieved 2009-08-17.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) at oceandots.com
^"Melville Island". Archived from the original on 2010-12-23. Retrieved 2009-08-17.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) at oceandots.com
^"North Kent Island". Archived from the original on 2010-12-23. Retrieved 2009-08-17.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) at oceandots.com
"Prince Patrick Island". Archived from the original on 2010-12-23. Retrieved 2009-08-17.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) at oceandots.com