
Climate Change Is Hell on Alaska's Formerly Frozen Highways - blondie9x
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2016-08-02/the-alaskan-highway-is-literally-melting
======
rybosome
Is there any reason to be optimistic about our ability to deal with climate
change? I have to admit that this topic depresses me deeply, as the United
States' tepid response does not match the magnitude of the problem. It is
shockingly easy to imagine scenarios resulting in the collapse of civilization
(agricultural collapse places significant pressure on a few areas which leads
to a domino effect of instability triggering nuclear war).

~~~
lisper
> Is there any reason to be optimistic about our ability to deal with climate
> change?

Yes: because failing to be optimistic about it will become a self-fulfilling
prophecy.

Also, you never know what will make people come around. In any process of
winning hearts and minds there is always a time before which things seem
hopeless. Look at the Sanders and Trump campaigns: when they started, no one
believed they could succeed. Bernie came very close, and Trump actually won.
(Not that I want to hold up Trump as a model of how to proceed, but just as a
data point to show that the unexpected can happen.) Maybe if we get enough
"thousand year floods" like just happened in Maryland -- say a dozen of those
events in a year or in a month -- people will suddenly wake up and realize the
gravity of the situation and find their sense of duty and planetary
patriotism.

You also never know what's coming down the technology pipe. This, for example,
looks promising: [http://phys.org/news/2016-07-breakthrough-solar-cell-
capture...](http://phys.org/news/2016-07-breakthrough-solar-cell-captures-
carbon.html)

We can still fix this. Don't lose hope.

~~~
Diederich
This is the correct answer.

We don't know if or how we can deal with the problems coming up. But giving up
will surely make things worse.

Further, we have to choose to not give in to excessive alarmism. I am typing
as someone who struggles with this every day, since I've been watching climate
change closely for quite a few years now. Things are objectively accelerating,
so it's easy to give in to panic.

But that might be even worse than giving up.

We have to approach this with focus, an iron will and with an even
temperament.

Every scary climate related news item should be practically drowned in data,
as hard and objective as we can get it.

Because, these days, nothing puts people 'to sleep' the way unfounded alarmism
does. Because people are _numb_ to all of the alarm handles being pulled, all
over the place.

------
agentultra
It's already hell in many Northern Canadian communities that rely on ice-roads
[0].

From what I understand we're on track for an unavoidable > 2C increase in
global average temperatures this century. It's also quite likely that we'll be
passing the extinction threshold if we don't take extreme measures to avoid
it.

It's quite likely another Syria-like crisis could happen anywhere affected by
climate change. I'm disconcerted that these issues are not the most pressing
issues of our time. There are many valid socio-political issues to consider
but _extinction_ seems to be the most important one to me.

Maybe it's because the predictions are far enough into the future that we
cannot fathom a solution right now... sort of like how smokers don't make the
decision to quit _today_ because it's not going to kill them _right now_.

[0] [https://news.vice.com/article/canadas-ice-roads-are-
melting-...](https://news.vice.com/article/canadas-ice-roads-are-melting-and-
that-is-terrible-news-for-aboriginal-communities)

------
blaze33
So, I've been curious: here's a chart of the mean annual temperature departure
for Alaska (1949-2015)[1](source: [2]), the past two years have been
particularly hotter there with anomalies > 4.5°F.

The NOAA has more detailed datasets but it's a bit more work to extract
meaningful information.

Also I'm sick of hearing that people believe (or don't) in climate change when
it's just factual data.

[1]
[http://climate.gi.alaska.edu/sites/default/files/ClimateTren...](http://climate.gi.alaska.edu/sites/default/files/ClimateTrends/StateWide_Change_1949-2015_F.png)

[2]
[http://climate.gi.alaska.edu/ClimTrends/Change/TempChange.ht...](http://climate.gi.alaska.edu/ClimTrends/Change/TempChange.html)

------
pinaceae
Meanwhile in Russia, Anthrax spores are active again because of the thawing of
(former) permafrost - [http://www.bbc.com/news/world-
europe-36951542](http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-36951542)

------
dharma1
The "fun" starts when the feedback loops really start going

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arctic_methane_emissions](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arctic_methane_emissions)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methane_clathrate](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methane_clathrate)

Depending on how fast we'll see arable land being lost, food supply for 9
billion people in 2040 could be quite problematic

~~~
nibs
We need to create a market for halophyte plants that can be grown using salt
water in dessert/saline conditions. It requires extensive marketing investment
and skill in order to create a market at each level of biomass (biofuel,
animal feed, people food, niche health products, pharma).

~~~
dharma1
Interesting. I had to Google it - it looks like 2% of plants tolerate salt
water to different degrees. It looks like an interesting field for breeding or
potentially GM to cultivate seawater tolerant food crops

------
uptown
So if fresh water will become scarce, and renewable sources of energy are
essential, where can individuals invest to provide financial backing to
companies addressing these issues?

------
Diederich
I decided to drive to the arctic ocean from California in 2014, and so
traversed the north half of this highway by RV.

It was a magical, difficult, inspiring and sorrowful experience.

I had never seen a black spruce before
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Picea_mariana](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Picea_mariana)),
but they were enormous, pristine forests of them.

But a lot of them were NOT pristine. For dozens of miles at a time, most all
of the trees would be at an odd sideways angle.
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drunken_trees](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drunken_trees))
The permafrost they relied on for stability was melting.

More than two years later, I suspect that the countless trees I saw leaning
steeply to one side are mostly dead.

On the Dalton highway, once past the Brooks range
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brooks_Range](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brooks_Range)),
there were enormously quantities of heavy rain. I didn't realize, at the time,
how unusual that was. It turns out that the Alaskan tundra is typically
extremely dry, and while I was up there, more than a years worth of (not very
cold) rain fell, turning the road into a morass.

My goal was to put my feet into the arctic ocean, and the only way to do that
is to first get to Dead Horse, Alaska
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deadhorse,_Alaska](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deadhorse,_Alaska)).
The 'town limits' are several miles from the ocean, and it's rigorously
patrolled private land in between, controlled by various oil companies.

They typically offer tours, but I arrived a bit too early, so I was thinking
about hiking a few miles up the Sag River
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sagavanirktok_River](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sagavanirktok_River)).
Fortunately, I happened to talk to an oil worker guy at the gas station, and
he said I would not likely survive such a hike. Polar bears, he said, had been
getting extremely aggressive over the past few years. They were starving.

At that moment, I felt a unique feeling, that few people experience these
days. In my four decades living, I've been in a couple of life or death
circumstances. But it wasn't quite like that.

The idea that I had nearly found myself in a situation where I might have been
hunted by an enormous, hungry animal. A creature who rightly considered me
food, and little else. It was a curious feeling!

Fortunately, the tours started the next day, and I took a bus through the vast
oil infrastructure, to a specific spot where tourists got to interact with the
arctic ocean.

It was cold, gray and sleeting. The ocean almost seemed like a very large
lake, with pretty small waves. The ice had melted early that year, again, and
so was not visible from shore.

------
omegaworks
>Annual repair costs for one section that runs through the Yukon are C$30,000
($22,900) per kilometer

Delicious, delicious externalized cost. It's time for a carbon tax.

------
JustUhThought
We are in for a shtt-storm.

But go over to Bloomberg news, and they're wondering why the Japanese won't
make the tough cultural sacrifices needed to increase immigration, to stave
off stagnant GDP caused by declining population and the accompanying
demographics. (I get the workers to non-workers issues in play. Even with
that, I believe it is telling, which solutions are put forth. Increase
immigration. Not, decrease consumption.)

Seriously, our roads are sinking. Record temperatures. Record droughts. Record
greenhouse gasses. But how many times were "jobs" talked about at the DNC and
RNC? "Global warming"?

We, are so, f-cked.

~~~
mc32
I agree climate change has to be taken seriously and we need to study ways to
mitigate the effects of our GHG output. No doubt.

On the Japan question. No, I think and hope they continue to be uniquely
stubborn. Why? Because we are all going to be there (we would have been there
if we'd be as strict as Latin American countries are about their own
immigration). Japan can lead the way for us and for others on how to deal with
this issue (population decline).

Japan is in fact dealing with their issue head on by not importing workers. By
not importing workers they are not defraying the issue. They are doing the
opposite of dealing with consequences later.

~~~
intopieces
In what way is importing workers "defraying the issue"? Also, why would the
population of the US decline? White people aren't having babies like they used
to, but other groups don't show the same trend. It's the reason why the US is
on track to become a majority-minority country long before the original
estimated 2050. California's already there.

People are still clamorimg to get into the US, and fighting tooth and nail to
stay here.

You are the first person I've read that considers not importing workers a
solution, rather than a symptom of cultural insularity that threatens to bring
down their economy through the burden of an aging population.

~~~
mc32
Japan, by some measures, is over populated. But regardless. World population
is stabilizing, at least in mature economies. The US would be in a pop
decline, if not for immigrants. If we only count US born newborns, the US pop
is in decline.

Japan facing this issue we will all face is good for them and for us as their
solutions will pave the way for other countries which will follow (much of
western Europe and east Asia).

~~~
jobu
> _The US would be in a pop decline, if not for immigrants. If we only count
> US born newborns, the US pop is in decline._

That's a popular idea, but it's false:
[http://www.politifact.com/virginia/statements/2016/apr/18/do...](http://www.politifact.com/virginia/statements/2016/apr/18/don-
beyer/don-beyer-wrongly-says-us-population-would-be-shri/)

~~~
mc32
That's looking at the last fifty years. I mean today, these last few years.
We'd be plateauing, if not for new immigrants and their children.

------
scarygliders
Is HN now going to be taken over by climate change stories?

I honestly thought I'd gotten away from all that when I stopped reading
Slashdot. Now it seems to be infesting here too.

I await the inevitable downvotes.

~~~
csours
FYI the downvotes are for not contributing to the discussion.

------
parsnips
Classic propaganda. Fissures on the Alaskan highway are caused by temperature
variance. This has been happening since the highway was built in the 40's.

Example:

>Winter frost is extremely hard on the roads. Do not be surprised to see deep
fissures across the highway.

[http://www.dangerousroads.org/north-
america/canada/747-alask...](http://www.dangerousroads.org/north-
america/canada/747-alaska-highway-canada.html)

So when the author says:

>Scientists say they’re the crystal-clear manifestation that permafrost --
slabs of ice and sediment just beneath the Earth’s surface in colder climes --
is thawing as global temperatures keep rising.

I become extremely skeptical. This is the danger of lazy journalism and
ultimately lazy readers confirmation bias.

------
CWuestefeld
I have trouble interpreting stories like these as anything other than scare
tactics. I'm not a "denier". I'm acknowledging that there's been an increase,
generally in the range of 1-2 degrees F.

But given an increase of that magnitude, I find it very hard to blame for the
kinds of problems being described here. 1F to 2F is well within the normal
range of variation, and so if the roadways are suffering from it, it must be
that the roads weren't properly designed for the expected variations to begin
with.

~~~
JustUhThought
1-2 degrees _globally_. _Celsius_.

And the predictions are consistently outpaced by reality.

~~~
gruez
To add to this, it's not as if temperatures everywhere went up by 1-2 degrees.
polar areas are more affected than average by global warming

~~~
vkou
The average world temperature is 1.4 C above the baseline this year. Yes, the
poles have been hit the hardest, but we are still outpacing all predictions.

Meanwhile, in 2015, the world's governments have agreed to cap warming to 2.0
C by 2100... But won't take any action today. Why do I have the feeling that
we will completely miss that target?

~~~
CWuestefeld
_but we are still outpacing all predictions._

It's this kind of stuff that I'm arguing about. First, there's a wide range of
predictions, and up until a decade ago, the measurements were middle of the
road across them - far from "ALL predicitons".

Then came the "pause". For over a decade, the warming _seemed_ to pause.
Notice I emphasize "seemed". The observed atmospheric temperature barely moved
_at all_ , it was way _below_ ALL predictions. [1]

I'm not denying, I'm not claiming that the "pause" disproves the theory. We
know that there were other phenomena occurring, like oceans acting as a
buffer. But the fact remains that observed temperatures deviated significantly
below predictions for a protracted period of time.

When people come along and make claims like _we are still outpacing all
predictions_ , they make it easy for deniers to single out these exaggerations
and pretend like their inaccuracy disproves the whole idea. By giving the
deniers an easy strawman to argue against, you're creating an obstacle to real
progress on the problem.

[1] "Scientists who study climate change and skeptics of human-caused global
warming can agree on at least this: Global temperatures haven't risen nearly
as much this century as model projections say they should have." \--
[https://www.wunderground.com/news/no-hiatus-pause-global-
war...](https://www.wunderground.com/news/no-hiatus-pause-global-warming-
climate-change-heres-why-20140109)

Of course, if you read on, you'll find proposed explanations for the
phenomenon. But as far as atmospheric measurements go, it's absolutely false
that things have been worse than predicted, and downright absurd to claim that
things have been worse than "all" (i.e., even the most pessimistic)
predictions.

~~~
vkou
When I say all predictions, I should have quantified it as 'all predictions
used by policymakers'.

There are certainly apocalyptic models that have called for more warming then
what we've seen. We aren't using them to set policy - we are using models that
have been underestimating the impact of warming.

