
Old Arctic Ice Is Disappearing, and Taking the Rest of the Ice With It - ra88it
http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2014/02/20/global_warming_old_arctic_ice_is_melting_away.html
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simonh
When the Vikings settled Greenland over a thousand years ago they grew crops
and raised cattle on it, hence the name.

I do appreciate that global warming is a fact, and that we are responsible. I
also realize this is going to have severe consequences all over the world. I
also don't think anything we do at this stage could slow down or stop the
process, other than banning modern civilization. What we need to do is
psychologically and politically prepare ourselves to mitigate the damage. This
means cutting back judiciously on fossil fuel usage, without ruining the
economy that we're going to need to be able to deal with the worst
consequences. It means being prepared to help those countries or regions that
will be worst hit. Hysterical articles about sticking our heads in the stand
honestly don't really help at this stage, they just perpetuate the sense of
controversy without contributing positively to the debate.

~~~
jellicle
The best part of watching global warming unfold is watching the deniers move
straight from "it doesn't exist and isn't a problem, so we should do nothing"
to "of course it exists and is a huge problem, I've never denied that, but
it's far too late to do anything now, so we should do nothing".

~~~
at-fates-hands
While I'm in "even if its not happening, shouldn't we do something just in
case it is" camp, I see a LOT of hypocrisy on the part of people fervently
saying it does exist.

Al Gore? The guy who's the poster boy for climate change owns a huge mansion
that's incredibly inefficient in its energy use:

[http://www.snopes.com/politics/bush/house.asp](http://www.snopes.com/politics/bush/house.asp)

"In ONE MONTH ALONE this mansion consumes more energy than the average
American household in an ENTIRE YEAR. The average bill for electricity and
natural gas runs over $2,400.00 per month. In natural gas alone (which last
time we checked was a fossil fuel), this property consumes more than 20 times
the national average for an American home"

This doesn't even take into account the amount of fuel the guy burns on all of
his globe trotting talking about the evils of Global Warming. So yeah, there's
the deniers, but it's hard to take these people seriously who are talking
about the end of the world, yet are greatly adding to its demise.

I'm all for alternative energy sources, but when do you think you're going to
get solar to a point where's its more economically feasible? I just got an
estimate from a company last summer and to get a few panels installed and up
and running, it was around 40K up-front and then I would break even with the
energy savings in about 10 years.

Now think about low income families, you think they'd ever be able to afford
something like that? Add in the fact renewable resource companies keep going
bankrupt and I keep wondering when, if ever there will be a decent alternative
to actually mitigate the ongoing damage.

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chc
Natural gas is relatively clean-burning AFAIK -- not perfect, but better than
other fossil fuels -- so that seems like a bit of a red herring. He's an
advocate for awareness of climate change, not a Mennonite. You can't attack
him for using electricity.

~~~
shiftpgdn
More importantly it actually comes out alongside crude oil so the cost of
getting it out of ground is minimal. Many oil rigs simply burn it on site
instead of containing it due to the difficulty in containment and transport.
There is actually a big issue in North Dakota at the moment where all the
natural gas that comes up along with the oil is simply burned as there are no
pipelines out there yet.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gas_flare](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gas_flare)

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vixen99
Meanwhile the Alfred Wegener Institute reported (October 2013) that the
Antarctic sea ice coverage is the greatest for 30 years. I don't know what
this means but it's odd that apparently good news (if it is) is more or less
ignored in the more widely read media accounts.

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lotsofmangos
Bruce Sterling's Khaki-Greens are about due.

