This year promises to be a busy one for Arctic science, even though International Polar Year is officially over.

Thousands of researchers from more than 60 countries studied the Arctic and Antarctic regions as part of International Polar Year, a two-year research event that ended March 31.

But organizations that support scientific work in Canada's North say they're receiving even more applications now from research and other groups that want to head north.

"We're seeing the same kind of level of activity," said Mary Ellen Thomas, senior research officer at the Nunavut Research Institute in Iqaluit.

While the bulk of field work for International Polar Year had to occur during the past two years, Thomas said several national and international research projects still have work to complete.

Year 'woke people up' to Arctic science

There is especially more interest this year from film crews interested in the Arctic, she added.

"What we are getting [is] more interest in film projects who want to look at everything — from woolly caterpillars to the BBC perhaps doing a program in the North," she said.

"I think the actual Polar Year woke people up to the science of the Arctic. Now we're seeing the science education and promotion and outreach, and that's a new stage."

The Polar Continental Shelf Program, which organizes transportation, equipment and other logistical services for scientists in the North, supported about 155 projects during International Polar Year last year.

Program director Marty Bergmann said it's handling close to 160 projects this year, with work ranging from glaciology to archaeology to zoology.

"It is a very much a 'business as usual' year, which surprised us because we thought in a post-IPY environment, there would a decrease of some sort," he said.

Work will also be done as part of Canada's mapping efforts to support the country's claims to northern territory under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea.

Expansion starting at Polar Shelf facility

Bergmann said the program's facility in Resolute Bay, Nunavut, will undergo major renovations over the next year, with construction work to begin in the next few months.

The renovations, which include building a small, modern laboratory and expanding scientist accommodations from 41 to 76 beds, are funded by $11 million in federal spending announced earlier this year.

"The office space and living accommodations, basically we're looking at a 50 per cent increase in the amount of space available for scientists that use Resolute [Bay] as a base of operation during the summer, and also as a point of departure out into the field," Bergmann said.

Construction is expected to be complete by 2011.

Still, Bergmann said his program is limited by the amount of available funding, and there isn't enough to meet the growing demand.