Global Warming will Open Northwest Passage 598
Makarand writes "For the most part we dread global warming. However, some
experts from the U.S. Arctic Research Commission, studying the polar ice caps,
are now pointing out
some of the advantageous side effects of global warming.
They are predicting
that in 5 to 10 summers from now the
polar ice caps would disappear for around 2 months each year
opening up the fabled Northwest passage for commercial
shipping. This would effectively reduce the shipping
distance between Europe and Asia by 6800 miles compared to the route
using the Panama canal."
There are other shipping routes (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:There are other shipping routes (Score:3, Informative)
Re:There are other shipping routes (Score:4, Funny)
Re:There are other shipping routes (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:There are other shipping routes (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Mod parent down, please (Score:4, Informative)
As a side note, when the Panama Canal opened there were already several ships that were too large to fit in its locks as well. However, the ship designers knew this and had no intention of sending their ships through the Panama locks. The world's largest ships do not use either canal and an open Northwest Passage would shave off considerably more than the 6000 miles listed in the article for these ships.
David McCullough (the critically acclaimed author of the recent biographies of Truman and John Adams) wrote a fascinating historical account of the building of the Panama Canal in, "Path Between the Seas: the Creation of the Panama Canal, 1870-1914 [amazon.com]." I would recommend this book to anyone with an interest in the subject.
Marvelous news. (Score:5, Funny)
Destory the environment so my grandson's console will arrive in time for Christmas.
At least I'll have left him something.
Re:Marvelous news. (Score:4, Insightful)
It's rather like saying, "One fringe benefit of cancer is you'll lose weight." Problem is getting people to take risks seriously until they've got the disease, once they've got it, they're all eyes and ears, wanting to know how to make the problem go away. Well, on the bright side, maybe the flooding will clean the streets of D.C., NYC, SF, etc.
Global warming solution (Score:4, Funny)
ummmm, nevermind.
Wait a minute (Score:2)
Re:Damages outweight benefits? (Score:5, Insightful)
There is a huge cost associated with global warming which we really cannot avoid. That is, we can spend loads of money now trying to stop it, but the cost (in dollars and lives) will be higher than if we just let it run its course and mitigate the effects as they occur (e.g. build flood defences to stop land from being inundated). The reason for this is that we cannot just grab the money out of the air, we have to take it away from other needy causes.
It's important to realise that global warming will probably stop after a while once alternative energy sources such as wind and solar power become cheaper than fossil fuels which will happen some time in the next 100 years. The sooner this happens, the sooner global warming ceases to be a big problem. It follows that cutting carbon emissions is the wrong thing to do. The money spent on this (well some of it) would be better spent on research into alternative energy sources.
Mother Nature's against the northwest passage (Score:4, Interesting)
Don't you people remember the hype around all the freshwater released into the north atlantic shutting down the gulf stream and plungeing Europe into a mini-ice age? What good will knocking 6000+ nm off of the europe-far east trade route be when the ships are frozen in European ports?
Uh... (Score:2)
Re:Uh... (Score:4, Funny)
Agreed (Score:5, Funny)
>rimshot<
Re:Uh... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Uh... (Score:5, Informative)
Firstly sea ice is white, the sea is not. So melting the ice lowers the albedo in the polar regions, which will have a small warming effect as less heat is reflected.
Secondly differential melting and freezing at the base of the sea ice is a major driving force in several ocean circulation systems, notably the 'Gulf Stream'. This plays a major role in transporting heat around the globe, especially to North West Europe and Iceland. It is believed that extensive reduction of the sea ice will reduce or even eliminate this current. There is evidence that in the last few tens of thousands of years the current has turned on and off several times.
Regional changes are likely to include colder winters and drier summers in western europe, and warmer waters and thus potentially more active tropical storms and huricanes in the Gulf of Mexico, although these changes would also depend on the (unpredicatble) response of other major ocean currents to the change.
Exactly what effect such a large change would have on overall world climate is difficult to predict, but since our current population and land-use patterns are based on existing climatic conditions, the maxim of 'any change is likely to be bad for us in the short or medium term' probably applies here.
Re:Uh... (Score:5, Informative)
-1, Wrong.
The block of ice floats because it displaces as much water as the ice weighs -- if a glass of water is at a given level with a block of ice of mass X grammes in it, then removing the block of ice would require one to put X grammes of water back in the glass to return the liquid to the same level as with the block.
As the block of ice melts, the water from the melting will combine with the water in the glass, tending to increase the water level in the glass -- however, there is now less ice in the glass, so it displaces less, tending to decrease the water level in the glass. As it so happens, for ice the equation is balanced and there ends up being zero net change in the water level -- as in the above example (removing the block), we just happened to remove the block (X grammes) by melting the ice (returning X grammes of water).
This isn't the complete story with regards to the ocean, of course, because the ocean isn't pure fresh water -- but the effects of melting ice in seawater would still be orders of magnitude less than you're predicting with an 'overflowing glass of water'.
Re:Uh... (Score:5, Funny)
They should read some Archimedes.
Re:Uh... (Score:5, Insightful)
Now for the exceptions to this. The oceans are salt water (more dense) the ice caps are fresh water, so they are floating a bit higher in the water then they would be in fresh water, so when the melt it would raise the sea level. When I solved this once it came out to an extremely small number so it doesn't really matter. Where the sea level change comes from is from ice in antartica and greenland melting. There you have ice miles thick that's on land. Basicly a lot more ice than the floating Ice, this will raise the oceans and is where the global warming floads come from.
And to the person wondering if all the ice is held up by the water in the artic, yes it is, there is no land there, it touching land like N. America and Russia will not hold it up as water lowers below, just look at a pond or river in the winter as an example, near the edge as the water drops the ice drops, usualy causing a inclind ice sheet that makes getting on and off the river or pond really hard. Also with it moving up and down with tides, it does, the artic is a very broken up pile of ice, ice, it's very dangerous do to pressure ridges and such. If you ever want to see such a break up watch a river in spring when the ice breaks, often you get jams and pressure ridges, when it all blows rivers can rise at feet per second! very dangerous. I had the Susquahanna (live near it, can't spell it) River do this just as I went to get on it, luckily I got away.
Re:Uh... (Score:2, Informative)
Floating ice is not fully submerged because it is less dense. It's less dense and hence takes up more volume than the same mass of liquid water. Simple physics indicates that the *volume* that is submerged is the same as the volume the equivalent mass of liquid water would occupy (assumming the 'floating' is caused by the density difference and not jets you installed on the bottom of the ice...)
Do you think ice floats by magic?!?
Re:Uh... (Score:3, Informative)
In contrast, think about oil and water. Oil, for example, is significantly less dense than water and floats on water as a liquid. So, similarly, imagine some substance, which we'll call "blunge", that acts just like water does (with its relatively unusual decrease in density as a solid relative to liquid) but that both as a solid and liquid it's substantially less dense than water. What would happen?
Frozen, a chunk of blunge would float like water ice does and it would displace a mass of water exactly equal to its mass. Let's call the volume of displaced water x. When blunge thaws, it will no longer displace the water and the water level will fall....but then this liquid blunge, which has volume y, will float on the water and, theoretically (ignoring other factors), will be distributed evenly over the surface of the water. Now we have to ask: is the volume y equal to the volume x? No, we know that y is greater than x. For this reason, the level of the two fluids, with liquid blunge floating on top of the water, will rise relative to the level of water with solid blunge floating in it.
And, as it happens, this is the case with sea water, ice, and melted ice...fresh water. Fresh water is slightly (for these purposes) less dense than sea water; and so when north polar ice thaws, the seal level does, in fact, very, very slightly rise. When the ice in your soft-drink melts, the level very slightly rises. But it's negligible. The naysayers in this thread are technically right, but conceptually wrong.
Re:Uh... (Score:3)
God I can't believe I actually have to explain that.
Re:Uh... (Score:5, Informative)
The rising sea levels due to global warming are/would be the result of the Antarctic and Greenland ice caps partially melting, which are on land and are enormous. Only minor melting of small, outlying portions, decreased global, glaciation, and increase movement of glaciers to the water all have a major impact.
It's also safe to assume that any influx of fresh water into the ocean will cause an even distribution of increased depth, but I know what you meant. :)
[1] The masses are necessarily the same, but the volume slightly differs because of the variance of the density of fresh to salt water.
Re:Uh... (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Uh... (Score:2)
Wishful thinking (Score:5, Interesting)
The oceans are such a large thermal reservoir that the heating of the last half century is only barely perceptible in the expansion of the ocean. The best available evidence is that temperatures globally have been incredibly flat over the last 10000 years (end of the last ice age) up till 1900 or so. The lack of significant long term changes in temperature has kept the ocean volume essentially constant during this time. The problem comes in if global average temperatures have a sustained increase.
If the temperatures jump even one degree Celsius and STAY that way, then the temperatures will gradually diffuse in the oceans over centuries until they reach a new equilibrium. A millenium from now when the entire ocean has warmed a fraction of a degree, the thermal expansion of the oceans will have raised sea levels 10-20 METERS.
Of course this assummes that we do nothing about global warming and simply bask in the warmth while the water rises. It starts at the surface, but if you keep things warm that warmth will saturate the ocean, it's just a matter of time.
Re:Uh... (Score:2)
Guzzle guzzle (Score:2, Funny)
this will be great.. (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:this will be great.. (Score:2)
I'm pulling this directly from my ass though, so does anyone have any hard numbers?
Huh? (Score:2, Funny)
It is my understanding that last summer ('01) the geographical North Pole was open water.
Re:Huh? (Score:4, Funny)
Indeed, Santa lost 3 reindeer and threatened to "sue the sh*t out of the motherf*cking c*cksuckers who f*cked up the godd*mn ice cap."
With the workshop flooded and a good portion of the reindeer out of commission, looks like parents might actually have to go out and spend money this year. Sorry, folks, now get movin'.
Re:Huh? (Score:4, Insightful)
icebergs (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:icebergs (Score:4, Funny)
(w/ apologies to Homer)
Re:icebergs (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:icebergs (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:[o/t/] How to hit icebergs right (Score:3, Informative)
Five years later the Lusitania is sunk by a torpedo, with considerable loss of life. The British had a blue ribbon committee look into her design. They suggested that there would have been less loss of life if she had not had a longitudinal watertight bulkhead.
My recollection is that some of the same people sat on both committees.
As water filled up some of the compartments on one side, the ship started to list to one side. Once she was listing more than, IIRC, fifteen degrees, then passengers couldn't jump across to the lifeboats on the lower side. And while passengers could enter the life boats on the higher side, lowering them was a problem, because they slid down the side of the ship, and in those days the hull plates were sealed with big rivets. The boat deck was sixty feet from the water. Those rivets tore the lifeboats to peices.
Re:icebergs (Score:5, Informative)
I believe the US Coast gaurd's International Ice Patrol [uscg.mil] takes care of most of the monitoring relevent to shipping.
Re:icebergs (Score:5, Informative)
For existing oil rigs they use the above, plus will actually tow large icebergs out of the way of oil rigs and the like.
A lot of the advanced tracking has actually only come on the last few years. NASA put up a satellite back in I think '98 that started tracking a lot of icebergs. This helped eliminate the problem of losing icebergs when they were being tracked by plane and ship based radar/sonar.
If the northwest passage opens up that will be a huge benefit for shipping. Not to downplay the other problems to the environment, but the west has wanted the northwest passage ever since Columbus first sailed the ocean blue.
Re:icebergs (Score:3, Informative)
Artic Information [noaa.gov]
The Canadian Department of Environment also has regular updates and warnings about icebergs and the like. Presumably were the northwest passage to open up they'd track it. (I admit I'm a bit leery of trusting the prediction - but who knows) I suspect that, baring continued war in the mid-east, the United States military would be involved as well. Admittedly it is less of an issue now that the cold war is over. But they have had quite a bit of monitoring of the arctic sea in the past.
Department of Environment [dmiweb.dmi.dk]
what about the ice-bears (Score:2, Funny)
Anyway, I don't understand how they can declare this as an "advantage"! It's a serious problem with our clime, and all they think of is "how can our economy benefit from it"...
Re:what about the ice-bears (Score:2)
Affects winter seal hunting as well (Score:3, Interesting)
Conspiracy (Score:4, Funny)
Meanwhile... (Score:3, Funny)
No, really! (Score:2, Insightful)
Jesus, what are these people thinking?
Re:No, really! (Score:3, Insightful)
So anyway, it's not as much a cancer as a fever. And we're not quite sure what normal temperature should be, anyway.
I can just picture it (Score:4, Funny)
Re:I can just picture it (Score:2)
Good for Canada? Not bloody likely (Score:5, Interesting)
Funny you should say that.
The United States has claimed several times that it does not fully recognize Canada's sovereignty over the North. The US believes it can (and does) move it's nucular submarines through Canada's north (under the ice of course!) without notifying or asking the Canadian government for permission.
If Canada trys to charge some sort of shipping tariff, the US is quite likely to ignore such a request. Moreover, it would not be surprising if the US claimed (annexed I guess is the correct term) the entire northwest passage for itself. After all, Canada lacks the capacity to nforce any shipping laws or tariffs (look at our coast guard for christs sake!), it's only logical for the US to step in and take control. So, I wouldn't get too excited about this being good for the economy... most likely this will be a Bad Thing for Canada. Good for you yanks though
So... (Score:2)
2) ???
3) FexEx gets competition.
Just Doing My Part ... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Just Doing My Part ... (Score:4, Interesting)
Global warming is mostly due to carbon dioxide and methane; the ozone layer doesn't do so much in the atmospheric insulation process.
The ozone layer problems are actually more or less under control. (As best as we can do, anyway.) Under the Montreal Protocol, we all stopped using the nastiest self-catalyzing ozone destroyers, and now just have to wait out their effects. (admittedly, for 50+ years - they're persistent buggers.) There's a kind of hope there - rapid, multilateral action may have very well saved our vapid, multilateral asses.
It's just key to keep the two issues seperate. In part, because while the companies responsible for ozone-layer-depleting chemicals snapped to and helped out with the solution, rather than, (as some of the oil companies are doing - BP and Shell less so, Exxon/Mobil very much so) trying to create bogus "concerns" about the science.
In no small part, if you want to be a cynic, because DuPont et al., realized that outlawing ozone-depleters would create a market for their followons, (which they had ready for market.)
Supertankers... (Score:4, Insightful)
>way around Cape Horn at the tip of South America,
>the trip would be shortened by 11,800 miles.
Really hope that those ships won't pollute the last clean spot on Earth ! If one of those supertankers hits onto iceberg, that's really horrible.
Supertankers + Iceberg = Titanic (Score:2)
Re:Supertankers... (Score:5, Interesting)
FYPG, modern supertankers have double hulls, and in any case, using this passage would definitely increase A LOT the premium that the charterers have to pay for a tanker vessel to go into that kind of waters, i.e. breaking the "IWL" (insurance warranty limits).
So, don't worry, the penguins there won't have any bad "fuelly" surprise anytime soon.
Most of the ships that would eventually use this route are grain loaders from US Gulf to Asia, because the cost of Panama Canal tax has a great influence over the price of the freight... and anyways, it's only for 2 months, roughly the time for a long round voyage... very negligeable.
And yes, I work in shipping
typical capitalism at work (Score:2)
Venice is on the verge of becomming more of a water town than it already is - granted, the fact that the city is sinking doesn't help much - but damn, don't accelerate the problem.
Most cities are near some major bodies of water, which usually means that having the ocean rise a couple meters means deep sh*t for a lot of peope and a lot of financial centers. Before anybody goes "but but" - Even if the city does not drown, you will have serious sewage problems, kay?
Not to mention that melting tons of ice means releasing million year-old viruses and other goodness that we probabbly don't have defences for anymore / or never even had in the beginning.
sigh... this kind of "oh yeah global warming have these benefits" crap should not even be entertained and whoever came up with it really need a good spanking.
Re:typical capitalism at work (Score:3, Insightful)
Everyone loves this argument about rising sea level drowning cities.
I don't buy it - the Dutch have been dealing with the situation for centuries.
Nordenskjöld (Score:2, Insightful)
Benefit of fast polar sea voyages! (Score:2)
Also, way up north the skies will be clearer because there aren't any smoke plumes from burning forests.
See? There are benefits to global warming!
Stefan Jones,
Viridian Archbishop
http://www.viridiandesign.org
North West Passage huh? (Score:4, Funny)
When the poles flip will it still be called the North West passage because they redefined north...
Or will it be renamed the south east passage?
Actually, it will have to be called... (Score:3, Insightful)
Huh? (Score:2, Funny)
We don't need no steenking polar ice caps...
Europe? Japan? (Score:2)
Odd.. (Score:2)
I suppose this is how one feels after seeing one's lottery number called on TV! Yahoooo!
But... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:But... (Score:2)
and you'd have to be careful of them anyways on certain areas, it's not like titanic was taking a shortcut through the pole-
Global Warming Enemy #1? (Score:2, Insightful)
The man's brilliant, and if you see him give a talk then the guy's very convincing, but I wouldn't want the fate of the world on my shoulders.
(If anyone can corroborate this, then I'd be interested.)
That would be great (Score:2)
Finally those air-conditioning units from Asia will become affordable...
Open 2-3 months per year... (Score:2, Interesting)
It would be quite expensive, but the tolls for using the Panama canal can be over a hundred thousand dollars for some ships.
Canada (Score:5, Informative)
Arctic sovereignty has long been a pressing issue in Canada. While ownership of the Arctic Archipelago islands is no longer disputed seriously by any nation (and the inhabitants of this region are professed Canadians), control over the surrounding ocean is still a contentious issue.
Canada claims full ownership of all the seas in the area up to its usual (and accepted) 200-mile limit, as well as full ownership of any sea ice extending northward from it's cost to the North Pole (since, in its opinion, sea ice is effectively land). Many countries, including the United States, refuse to recognise its sea ice claim - and while allowing that the open waters in the area are a Canadian possession, claim that the Northwest Passage (an indeterminate rout through the maze of the Arctic Archipelago) is an international strait that that they cannot be denied passage. This is despite the fact that the Northwest Passage is perhaps the least navigated waterway in the world (the number of ships which pass through it in a year can be counted on one hand, and most of these are government icebreakers).
The United States has, on a number of occasions, attempted to flout Canada's sovereignty by sailing both civilian and military vessels through the passage unannounced. Matters came to a head in the 70's when the United States attempted to navigate a reinforced oil tanker through the passage (an oil tanker break-up in the high arctic would have unimaginably disastrous effects), but public outcry forced it to concede to at least giving notice to the Canadian government before attempting any further navigation.
Also, Russia and the United States have both challenged Canadian sovereignty by sailing submarines under the ice and seas claimed by Canada. During the Cold War they would often conduct cat and mouse games in the area, much to the chagrin of the Canadian government. Canada currently does not have submarines capable of conducting under ice patrols, and does not expect to have this capability until around 2010.
To counter the moves of other countries and to assert its sovereignty, Canada has taken a number of steps. First, it has invested large amounts of money in the people of the area. The Inuit people of the region are provided with full health insurance and welfare (as are all Canadians), and recently efforts have been made to maintain as much of the traditional culture and economy as possible. Recently, the Inuit were even granted their own territory, Nunavut, where they comprise the majority of the population and Inuktitut (the tongue of the Inuit) is an official language. Recently, youth unemployment and lack of housing (because of the high birth rate and rapidly rising population) have both become a cause for concern.
Additionally, the government operates a fleet of icebreakers and aircraft used to supply far northern settlements and outposts. These have presented something of a Catch-22 for the government, since an arctic presence (largely by way of military vessels) must be maintained to assert sovereignty, yet these vessels breaking up the sea ice has a negative effect on local hunting activities (something the government would like to support).
The native people have also been employed directly to assert sovereignty by way of the Canadian Rangers, a program that employs Inuit hunters on the sea ice to patrol for foreign craft and assert Canadian sovereignty (the fact that many Inuit live a large part of the year on the sea ice also gives credence to Canada's claims).
Another aggravating factor in maintaining sovereignty is global warming. The Arctic has been disproportionately affected by warming, and it's expected that commercial navigation of the Northwest Passage will become feasible in the next 10 to 15 years. Many nations (including immerging Asian powers) would have an interest in opening up the passage to free navigation. Not only would such a scenario threaten Canadian sovereignty, but it would also cause immense harm to the lifestyle of the people of the region - and would contribute massive amounts of pollution in an incredibly fragile environment.
Re:Canada (Score:4, Interesting)
However with probably trillions of dollars at stake, I have a feeling Canada will lose this battle. Canada simply doesn't have the power to back up their desires in this matter. And the nations wanting the passage to be international will include basically every nation on the planet other than Canada.
Canada could, of course, react by stopping support for the region and also not providing free navigational information as it does at present.
Re:Canada (Score:5, Informative)
Puhleez! As the damn article said itself, us canucks provide free health care to everyone in our country, so that point is completely moot. And our recent efforts to "maintain as much of the traditional culture and economy as possible" are what we do everywhere in Canada. Our government invests huge amounts of money in protecting the traditions and heritages of our native peoples, not to mention those of everyone in Canada. And finally, the reason we created Nunavut is because now there is (barely) enough people to justify making a territory there! Granted most of these people are native, so I suppose it could be seen as a victory for first nations, but really it's just common sense.
Finally, the concerns about youth unemployment and lack of housing that you cite are almost universally applicable in Canada's indian reserves. So really all of these points are some idiot's poor attempt to BS his way into sounding legit. If had left out this paragraph, his article actually would have been decent because he does have a good grasp of the technical aspects. But the above shows an appalling lack of knowledge regarding the situation in Canada's north.
International maritime law (Score:4, Informative)
Ironically, Canada itself contains one of the best precedents of this - the St. Lawrence Seaway is an international strait from the Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes, even though substantial stretches of it are Canadian territory on both banks. (Other stretches have Canada on one side, the US on the other.)
There's also the pesky fact that the Canadian waters do not cover the entire distance - the western terminus will be in either US or Russian waters, and the US could use Canada's own claims to claim all sea ice and surrounding waters to the North Pole itself.
Look on the bright side (Score:5, Funny)
Wife: "Great! Now we finally have that third door we've always hoped for. Now excuse me while I go vote for George Bush. We're going to need a lot more of that Iraqi oil to keep this place warm in the winter!"
Global warming and the environmental issues (Score:4, Insightful)
If you're really concerned about the environment, then buy goods that are produced near you instead of goods that needs to be transported halfway across the globe. The transportation industry is a big contributor in polluting our environment. But as long as there's a demand for cheap goods from overseas, the pollution will continue to increase. The opening of the Northwest passage will most likely be better for the environment than shipping the stuff through the Panama or Suez canals.
This of course assumes ... (Score:2)
There's more (Score:2)
(So we'll finally are able to really get to the moon.)
It's Canadian Territory (Score:5, Informative)
We should make energy more expensive (Score:5, Insightful)
Energy use, in particular, should be very much more expensive in order to cut our consumption. Our energy excesses are damaging the environment of the planet and have set the scene for the dangers current security situation.
In Europe we don't quite reach US levels of pollution mostly because we are not as wealthy - but we obviously would like to catch you up.
I believe energy use is our primary ethical issue. We must change the rules of world trade so that the "hidden hand of the market" does not choke us all. A good example would be a global agreement to tax air travel for its pollution.
BTW. I saw a protest plackard on TV saying Americans are over 100 times more polluting to the world than the inhabitants of Bangladesh. I know Londoners are pretty bad (See CityLimits [citylimits.com]) but surely you can't be that much ahead of us.
Re:We should make energy more expensive (Score:3, Insightful)
i think theres a bit more to it than that
for example, the average new car in germany has over double the mileage per gallon than in america.
why? because the government taxes petrol heavily to encourage this. not only does this help the environment, but it also reduces their dependence on arab oil (i.e. they don't have to start wars to gaurantee an oil supply), and causes them to develop cars a significantly ahead technologically (at least in fuel consumption, but also in safety and a few other areas) than what america produces.
just one of many reasons
i think the average western european is pretty much as wealthy as the average american
besides, it would be a lot cheaper, for example, for many european countries to use nuclear power than invest heavily in wind turbines etc, so i don't think that the american's wealth can be used as an _excuse_ for their environmental poisoning.
developing countries may have a reasonable excuse to pollute excessively as they go through the process of industrialisation (and all developed countries have been through that phase so aren't really in a position to criticise), but america's wealth provides no such excuse, rather the opposite.
just my 2 cents worth.
what's missing in the Global Warming argument (Score:5, Insightful)
However, here's what's bugging me. In talking to everyone, including James Hansen (who first popularized the thought), I have never heard anyone say anything positive about Global Warming. Even in a worst case scenario there should be positive aspects. The fact that those are never mentioned makes me worry that this is more a political agenda than scientific certainty.
New England will need less fuel oil. Crops will grow longer in much of the US Midwest, Central Russia, Canada, etc. Less people will die from cold weather related trauma.
It would be as if we decided to eliminate the internal combustion engine without looking at the downside of living without cars, trucks and planes... or the air pollution that dried animal poop particles used to bring to our cities.
The atmosphere is incredibly complex. Processes that work to warm the atmosphere can later turn and cool it. Heat causes more evaporation, causes more clouds, causes more cooling (very simplified).
I just worry we're not getting the full story. That's all.
Re:what's missing in the Global Warming argument (Score:5, Informative)
All of this was taken from Climate Change 2001: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability by the IPCC.
Re:what's missing in the Global Warming argument (Score:3, Interesting)
So, yes, you are missing a large part of the Global Warming argument - the effect on ocean currents, and their impact on the environment.
other benefits, too (Score:3, Interesting)
- makes Alaska and Minnesota more livable
- reduces global overpopulation by
- drowning people in sudden floods
- spreading disease
- making the ground water more saline
- altering precipitation patterns and causing famine
- create lots of new beachfront property in formerly hot, dry, inland
areas
- create lots of new islands, as coastal mountain ranges get surrounded
by water
- lets you grow Marijuna more quickly in Northern California
George is probably also not all that unhappy that the more liberal enclaves in the US tend to be coastal and will likely get flooded. But I suspect Texas won't be doing so well either. Sorry about that one, George.The Northwest Passage (Score:5, Informative)
I think it is a rather interesting topic myself and one that the various governments with a partial stake in it should be further investigating. The northwest passages provides a very good alternative to the Suez canal, which has been closed twice since WWII, and could possibly get closed again if war were to somehow break out in that area. The northwest passage also eliminates over 3350 miles in the route from Trellheim, Norway to the west coast of Canada, which could improve trade between these areas.
And now the bad news (Score:5, Informative)
What happens when the ice finishes melting?? The water temperature rises.
Ice acts as a thermal buffer. It keeps the water temperature near freezing... When it gets too cold, freezing ice releases heat as it freezes. When it gets too warm, melting ice eats a lot of thermal energy.
As the size of the ice drops, it's ability to regulate the temperature lessens. Temperature swings in the northern hemisphere are going to get larger and generally go towards the warmer. (I'm guessing that this has something to do with the already noted amplification of global warming in the far north).
Of course, Europe could be the ones that get royally worked over in the long run.... if the predictions mentioned on slashdot some time ago come true about the shrinking icecap messing up the ocean currents that keep europe unusually warm for their latitude.....
Great: You can get from Japan to Europe far faster, but most of the farms in Europe are now frozen over for most of the year. (kinda like the George Karlin skit: "The good news is that you'll live to a ripe old age, but you'll be bleeding from both eyes for the whole time")
Quick Freeze, actually. . . The Mammoths say so. (Score:5, Interesting)
"Back in the 1940s Dr. Frank C. Hibben, Prof. of Archeology at the University of New Mexico led an expedition to Alaska to look for human remains. He didn't find human remains; he found miles and miles of icy muck just packed with mammoths, mastodons, several kinds of bison, horses, wolves, bears and lions. Just north of Fairbanks, Alaska, the members of the expedition watched in horror as bulldozers pushed the half-melted muck into sluice boxes for the extraction of gold. Animal tusks and bones rolled up in front of the blades "like shavings before a giant plane". The carcasses were found in all attitudes of death, most of them "pulled apart by some unexplainable prehistoric catastrophic disturbance"
The evident violence of the deaths of these masses of animals, combined with the stench of rotting flesh was almost unendurable both in seeing it, and in considering what might have caused it. The killing fields stretched for literally hundreds of miles in every direction. There were trees and animals, layers of peat and moss, twisted and tangled and mangled together as though some Cosmic mixmaster sucked them all in 12000 years ago, and then froze them instantly into a solid mass.
Just north of Siberia entire islands are formed of the bones of Pleistocene animals swept northward from the continent into the freezing Arctic Ocean. One estimate suggests that some ten million animals may be buried along the rivers of northern Siberia. Thousands upon thousands of tusks created a massive ivory trade for the master carvers of China; all from the frozen mammoths and mastodons of Siberia. The famous Beresovka mammoth first drew attention to the preserving properties of being quick-frozen when buttercups were found in its mouth.
What kind of terrible event overtook these millions of creatures in a single day?
Well, the evidence suggests an enormous tsunami raging across the land, tumbling animals and vegetation together, to be finally quick-frozen for the next 12000 years. But the extinction was not limited to the Arctic, even if the freezing preserved the evidence of Nature's rage. Paleontologist George G. Simpson considers the extinction of the Pleistocene horse in north America to be one of the most mysterious episodes in zoological history, confessing that "no one knows the answer." He is also honest enough to admit that there is the larger problem of the extinction of many other species in America at the same time: The horse, giant tortoises living in the Caribbean, the giant sloth, the sabre-toothed tiger, the glyptodont and toxodon. These were all tropical animals. These creatures didn't die because of the "gradual onset" of an ice age, "unless one is willing to postulate freezing temperatures across the equator, such an explanation clearly begs the question."
Massive piles of mastodon and sabre-toothed tiger bones were discovered in Florida. Mastodons, toxodons, giant sloths and other animals were found in Venezuela quick-frozen in mountain glaciers. Woolly rhinoceros, giant armadillos, giant beavers, giant jaguars, ground sloths, antelopes and scores of other entire species were all totally wiped out at the same time, at the end of the Pleistocene, approximately 12000 years ago.
This event was global.
The mammoths of Siberia became extinct at the same time as the giant rhinoceros of Europe; the mastodons of Alaska, the bison of Siberia, the Asian elephants and the American camels. It is obvious that the cause of these extinctions must be common to both hemispheres, and that it was not gradual. A "uniformitarian glaciation" would not have cause extinctions, because the various animals would have simply migrated to better pasture. What is seen is a surprising event of uncontrolled violence. In other words, 12000 years ago, a time we have stumbled across again and again, something terrible happened - so terrible that life on earth was nearly wiped out in a single day.
Harold P. Lippman admits that the magnitude of fossils and tusks encased in the Siberian permafrost present an "insuperable difficulty" to the theory of uniformitarianism, since no gradual process can result in the preservation of tens of thousands of tusks and whole individuals, "even if they died in winter." Especially when many of these individuals have undigested grasses and leaves in their belly. Pleistocene geologist William R. Farrand of the Lamont-Doherty Geological Observatory, who is opposed to catastrophism in any form, states: "Sudden death is indicated by the robust condition of the animals and their full stomachs
The conclusion is, again, that the end of the Ice Age, the Pleistocene extinction, the end of the Upper Paleolithic, Magdalenian, Perigordian, and so on, and the end of the "reign of the gods," all came to a global, catastrophic conclusion about 12000 years ago. And, as it happens, even before this evidence was brought to light, this is the same approximate date that Plato gave for the sinking of Atlantis."
--This is pretty intense stuff, (which, naturally, nobody likes to look at), so I went to check out the sources. Both Dr. Frank C. Hibben and William R. Farrand are real guys, and their observations were are indeed accurately presented here. Go check for yourself.
-Fantastic Lad
Re:Quick Freeze, actually. . . The Mammoths say so (Score:4, Funny)
Heh. Indeed. . ! (Score:3, Interesting)
Heh, yeah. I always hate to consider it, but you'd probably be right about that. I wonder exactly how many hard-core creationists there are in the U.S. . .
Still, peer-reviewed science, while it no doubt is an attempt at the best foot forward, doesn't impress me very much these days. I have seen and read too much, -and spoken to enough members of the scientific community complaining about stupidity and corruption to be much more than highly cynical of anything supported by the party line.
The writer of your quoted materials isn't a standard flood geologist / creationist. However, the claims made are similar enough (6k or 12k years ago, giant quantities of salt water temporarily covered vast quantities of land), that evidence against a global flood also applies to his case. Evidence from the talk.origins flood faqs [talkorigins.org] that doesn't support recent floods includes ice core, tree ring, lake bed sedimentation and desert pack rat nest samples. They don't show a layer of salt water 12,000 or any recent thousands of years ago.
Well, sure. I'd buy all of that. But the writer of the article I cut & pasted didn't make a single claim about flood waters of any kind, so the point, while well taken, is moot.
But as I browse talk.origins, I see they specifically address your writer. Quoting from this article [talkorigins.org]: "...their claim that hundreds of thousands of frozen carcasses have been found is simply incorrect. At most, only a few tens of frozen carcasses have been documented in all of Siberia and Alaska. In Canada, the frozen mammal material found consists of scraps of hide and muscle found attached to bones. All of these "frozen carcasses" that have been carefully examined show evidence of decomposition, scavenging, or both prior to be buried, e.g. Gutherie (1990). Also, the sediments in which these carcasses occur are clearly of noncatastrophic origin (Gutherie 1990, Lister and Bahn 1994, Pewe 1975, Uraintseva 1993)..." [bold added] Please note that the references are all articles you can find and read. And browsing talk.origins will find more links to mammoth articles...
Ah! Now here's where it gets interesting!
I've been able to find lucid arguments on both sides of the flash-freeze fence. --There is the general theory which attempts to explain the un-gnawed upon carcases. --That the dead mammoths which were discovered had fallen into crevices where predators could not get at them, and that snow and freezing mudslide covered them up so that they were preserved. --Though the scientists who promote this argument also describe how much of the tissues were in fact extremely rotted upon inspection 12,000 years (or so), later. They use this to discredit the idea of any flash-freezing taking place.
This makes me wonder, because the problem with that idea would seem to be two-fold:
For one, it would suggest that the method they indicate for the preservation of the carcas didn't work. (You can't freeze a subject for 12,000 years and still have have extensive rotting. At least not the way my freezer works.) --Indeed, when I did some further looking, it appears that a regular guy found one of the now famous mammoth carcases extruding from a melting ice flow on a melt river. He didn't report it for a whole year, (because he wasn't sure what it was at first; it took time for the ice to melt back enough to reveal the beast). When he finally did report it, the mammoth had been exposed to the elements and bacteria of the 1800's, which, I would think, should have offered enough time for the pre-historic meat to get a head start on rotting.
My point here is that the scientists who oppose a catastrophic world view jumped quickly and somewhat recklessly upon the whole rotting idea in order to discredit ideas which didn't fit with theirs, despite the fact that it didn't actually help their theories. This is exactly the kind of behavior which makes me hesitate before embracing main-stream science.
Anyway, I am now thoroughly intrigued. I'm going to be hunting down one of the quoted books, (by Frank C. Hibben, who by all accounts, appears to be a very reputable and respected scientist), in order to get from the horse's mouth exactly what he saw and did when visiting Alaska. Every other endeavor he was involved with during his long life, (which ended just earlier this year), leads me to think that he was a card-carrying member of the main stream scientific community. So if he really does write that he saw what he is quoted as having seen in the frozen north, then I will be willing to keep the book open on this and do some further research.
The main problem with catastrophism is that it's too much fun; far too many of the people who write about it seem to be inclined to exaggeration and hearsay, which does nothing but erode any credibility they might have.
And hopefully I'll also be able to validate another intriguing claim I ran across; supposedly among certain areas of the bone and tusk fields, were significant quantities of volcanic ash.
Okay. Enough for now. --Thanks for engaging me in this cool conversation! I don't often find such willing people on Slashdot!
-Fantastic Lad
Natural Global Warming (Score:5, Interesting)
What the hell is wrong with some of you Americans? (Score:4, Insightful)
WTF is wrong with you people?
Why must Americans stick their finger in everyone's eyes? Is this honestly how your country feels about us and other countries' rights? Your arrogance astounds me.
The NorthEast passage (Score:3, Interesting)
I read a book on German armed merchant cruisers during World War 2. The German merchant fleet was confined to harbour during World War 2. About two dozen of their fastest merchant ships were refitted with cannons, mines, and mine-laying rails, and sent out to raid allied shipping.
Large naval crews sailed aboard them. And they became really skilled at altering the ships appearance to resemble other, real, allied or neutral vessels. Some of these raiders were very successful.
Anyhow, prior to Germany attacking the Soviet Union, the Germans chartered a Soviet ice-breaker to escort one of these commerce raiders across this Northeast passage, so it could attack allied shipping in the Pacific.
Nitpick. Re:Always knew it! (Score:2)
The switchover to ozone-safe refrigerants is actually an excellent example of how things can work out right. There's a good chance that the ozone holes will be a thing of the past, thanks to international agreements banning the bad stuff.
See?? See what? (Score:3, Insightful)
Yet another reason why the greenniks should be locked in a cage and poked with red-hot branding irons.
On a side note, while this might be a potential consequence of global warming per se, it does nothing (and no one else has done anything) to plausibly correlate human activity to GW.
When I read this, I had a choice to either mod you as -1 Troll or respond. I decided to do the latter, since the former would be me reacting more out of emotion than logic, and at least by posting another moderator can decide if I did the right thing.
I will not go into a lengthy disseration about all the research that has been done that does indeed correlate human behavior in the past half century with global warming, for I am sure you will find fault with whatever study I cite, as I am sure other /. readers would.
At the same time, I think it can be safely said that many of the people to whom a clear connection has not been established in their minds still entertain the notion that it is possible that human actions have caused the current warming trend, or have exacerbated a natural warming trend. As a result, these people choose not to do anything about it until that connection is established.
My response to that is: you're taking one hell of a chance with the planet.
We have exactly one planet available to us to live on. While many may claim that there is no 100% hard and fast undeniable irrefutable undebateable proof of human-induced global warming, if there is even a possibility that there is indeed a link, do you really want to take that risk?
Here's a bit of a news flash for everyone waiting for that iron-clad evidence, including the environmentalists: You're never going to find it. The factors that control the Earth's climate are far too variable and numerous to calculate. Change a single variable and you get widely differing results. Yet at the same time, statistically speaking there is a general trend that says that it is possible we are causing it. If we're talking about the planet, I think that even that possibility, no matter how small, needs to be taken into consideration.
The reason for this should be clear: If we're wrong, and we ignore the problem, we will not be able to simply say later on "Oops, we'll go and fix it." You can't fix a planetary ecology once its been damaged that badly. Let me rephrase that: we will not be able to fix it to be habitable to us. The planetary environment will most likely adapt given time, but with no consideration for our civilization or even our species. The polar caps melt and flood our cities? Oh well, tough luck, so long as the overall ecology of the planet survives.
So think for a moment before you make comments like yours. Make a risk assessment. See if you really want to take that chance. Remember: one planet, no "backup copy", no spare parts, no warranty.
Re:See?? See what? (Score:3, Interesting)
There have been many ice ages in the earth's past, long before humans ever existed and between each glacial period there was - GLOBAL WARMING! The earth warms and cools, the magnetic pole flips and every so often there is a mass extintion event that wipes out large portions of life (http://www.hi.is/~joner/eaps/tlm.htm). Just get used to it. Planet earth can be a real bitch.
Only one more time ... (Score:2)
Re:I knew it made sense... (Score:3, Informative)