Thomas Nilsen

Russian Kilo-class sails surfaced through NATO anti-submarine exercise

The Kilo-class “Vladikavkaz” is en route to St. Petersburg from the Kola Peninsula.
July 01, 2019

Arctic countries step up nuclear accident preparedness

Øyvind Aas-Hansen with the Norwegian Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority (DSA) is happy to cooperate with Aleksandr Vazhenin and Pavel Borisov from the Emergency Response Centre of Rosatom, Russia’s State Atomic Energy Corporation. A sharp increase in nuclear-powered vessels in Arctic waters causes concern among international safety experts who recently teamed up on a voyage to the Bear Island and Svalbard to see how drones can be used to detect possible hazardous radiation.
June 30, 2019

Freshly painted floating nuclear-power plant gets 10 years operating license

The «Akademik Lomonosov» will be towed from Murmansk to Pevek in August when the sea ice is at its minimum for the season.
June 28, 2019

Radioactive Cobalt-60 measured along Norway's border to Russia

«The levels measured are very, very low and we don’t know its origin,» says Bredo Møller with Norway’s radiation agency’s emergency preparedness unit at Svanhovd in the Pasvik valley.
June 24, 2019

A wave of expedition ships set sail towards Svalbard in 2020

«We will never be able to have a 100 percent rescue preparedness around Svalbard,» says Bent-Ove Jamtli, Director of the Joint Rescue Coordination Centre of North Norway. He calls on the cruise operators themselves to carry life-saving equipment for mass evacuation in cold climate.
June 17, 2019

Finnmark gets world's most advanced EV charging network

17 high-power 150 kW chargers and eight fast chargers will make it possible for practically all kinds of electric cars to drive anywhere in Norway's northernmost region, even in freezing cold winter.
June 11, 2019

Russia to introduce e-visa without invitation from 2021

Single-entry visas for a stay of up to 16 days will come in the start. Later, the goal is to issue multiple entry e-visas.
June 09, 2019

Early June heat wave over Northern Europe

Temperatures over 30°C on the White Sea coast and within the Arctic Circle on the Kola Peninsula.
June 09, 2019

Major step towards a Europe-Asia Arctic cable link

Japanese and Nordic partners team up with Russia’s telecom giant MegaFon, sign MoU to set up trans-Arctic telecom company.
June 06, 2019

Pekka Haavisto is Finland’s new Green Foreign Minister

Finland gets new coalition government with three ministers from the Green Party and a political platform saying the country aims at becoming carbon neutral by 2035.
June 05, 2019

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Thomas Nilsen is editor of the Independent Barents Observer with its news desk located in Kirkenes, northern Norway. He has a long experience in media cooperation across the borders in the high north of Europe, both as radio- and newspaper reporter all the way back to the days before the breakup of the Soviet Union. 

Nilsen has been editor of Barents Observer since 2009.

He was Deputy Head of the Norwegian Barents Secretariat from 2004-2009. Until 2003, he worked 12 years for the Bellona Foundation’s Russian study group, focusing on nuclear safety issues and general environmental challenges in northern areas and the Arctic. 

Thomas has been traveling extensively across northern Scandinavia and Arctic Russia since the late 80’s working for different media and organizations. He is also a guide at sea and in remote locations in the Russian north for various groups and regularly lectures on security issues, environmental and socio-economic development.

Thomas Nilsen studied at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology.

Mobile: +47-90573143

thomas@thebarentsobserver.com
@nilsen.thomas