Kivalina (kiv-uh-LEE-nuh)[4] (Inupiaq: Kivalliñiq) is a city[5][6] and village in Northwest Arctic Borough, Alaska, United States.

[5] The island on which the village lies is threatened by rising sea levels and coastal erosion caused by climate change.

[8] In addition to well-publicized impacts of climate change, the Village of Kivalina has been a party in several environmentally related court cases.

Three bodies and artifacts were found in 2009 representing the Ipiutak culture, a pre-Thule, non-whaling civilization that disappeared over a millennium ago.

[19] Per the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act, NANA Corporation owns the surface and sub-surface rights to the city site and surrounding area.

[19] Manilaaq Association serves the community as an Alaska Native non-profit regional corporation providing social, tribal and health care services.

Teck Cominco settled the suit in 2008 by agreeing to build a wastewater pipeline from the mine to the ocean that would bypass discharging into the Wulik River.

In 2012, the US Ninth Circuit court upheld the decision of the EPA Appeals Board to not review the permit, citing the insufficiency of the Tribe's argument.

City Administrator Janet Mitchell told the Associated Press that the substance has also shown up in some residents' rain buckets.

[30] Later, officials of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) confirmed that the orange colored materials were some kind of crustacean eggs or embryos,[31][32][33] but subsequent examination resulted in a declaration that the substance consisted of spores from a possibly undescribed species of rust fungus,[34] later revealed to be Chrysomyxa ledicola.

[36] While the risk of inundation from sea water has always existed, storms caused extensive flooding in 1970, 1976, 2002, 2004, and spurred a village-wide evacuation in 2007.

[36] To slow erosion, the US Army Corps of Engineers conducted a rip-rap revetment project along the tip of the barrier island[19] and adjacent to the airport.

In 2018, a decision was made to build an evacuation road across the Kivalina Lagoon to provide a means for the community to escape devastating storms that can inundate the barrier island.

[37] Kivalina's environmental issues were prominently featured in The 2015 Weather Channel documentary "Alaska: State of Emergency" hosted by Dave Malkoff.

[41] The village's plight was also examined in Kivalina, an hourlong documentary released as part of the PBS World series America ReFramed.