Squabbling over the "arctic map"

[r45 4]

Just read a very interesting thing on the arctic and all the territorial squabbles over parts of it.

 

Wonder how big those 'squabbles' could get?

 

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/graphics/2008/08/06/eaarctic106.pdf

 

Quote:

The race to find new reserves of oil, gas and minerals has led to the spotlight falling on the Arctic which is believed to contain about 20 per cent of the world's untapped resources under its pristine ice.

 

A year ago - to the fury of its neighbours - Russia sent a submarine to plant a flag on the seabed underneath the North Pole as part of its campaign to claim rights to a large part of the Arctic.

 

Russia claims that its continental shelf extends along a mountain chain running underneath the Arctic, known as the Lomonosov Ridge, which it claims gives it the right to claim a huge territory.

 

United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) says that if a state can prove its rights, it can exploit the resources of the sea and the seabed within its territory.

 

So far all of the Arctic nations have stuck to the rules for establishing seabed jurisdiction set out in UNCLOS but Russia and Norway have made submissions to the UN Commission on the Limits of Continental Shelf, and Canada, Denmark and the USA are likely to do the same.

[kokodoko 67]

I saw on Ice Road Truckers that they were mining diamonds in Arctic Canada. plus who knows what else is up there, gold, oil. etc etc..

 

What happens when it all melts?

[Mantas 3]

Also, the polar bear has been listed as endangered by the World Wildlife Fund. This is of course disputed by some nations that have an eye on those oil and gas reserves.

 

Last September saw the largest melt of sea ice since for thousands of years. Ice (snow) is the best reflector of heat on the planet and sea water is the worst. Add to that, the permafrost under many of those northern forest is only a degree or two from melting and destroying those forests. Scientists believe we are at the 'tipping point' of GW.

 

Total lunacy to be looking for more oil and gas!

[thursday 1]

There is plenty of oil there. Bush has been bullying congress to allow dirlling in Alaska and "to leave nothing but footprints" bolllocks.

[kokodoko 67]

the google earth nerds have been tracking the melting of the greenland ice cap, and it is shrinking every year.

 

The other danger is that the melting of the ice caps will cause the gulf stream to stop flowing..

[Mantas 3]

Yes. If this happens, Europe's temperature may plunge by 5-10 deg.

[kokodoko 67]

causing another ice age.. ironically..

[BagOfCrisps 24]

Climate change: Prepare for global temperature rise of 4C, warns top scientistDefra's chief adviser says we need strategy to adapt to potential catastrophic increase

 

The UK should take active steps to prepare for dangerous climate change of perhaps 4C according to one of the government's chief scientific advisers.

 

In policy areas such as flood protection, agriculture and coastal erosion Professor Bob Watson said the country should plan for the effects of a 4C global average rise on pre-industrial levels. The EU is committed to limiting emissions globally so that temperatures do not rise more than 2C.

 

 

In todays Guardian

[Mantas 3]

Can someone please tell George 'oil' Bush!

[Domokun_72dpi 0]

This is quite scary, I'm not versed enough with this to comment heaps, but, these countries are excited, because they can get another 20-50 years worth of resources (oil, gas etc), which will then create a mass change in world economies.

 

I just wish, instead of fighting over these untapped resources, they would look at cleaner alternatives.

 

It seems if Russia go ahead, they could become one of the richest nations around, outdoing the Saudies.

 

Go green, we have the technology!

[thursday 1]

That ice cap thing, sounds scarey, but is it just that; to get people scared.

 

I saw An Inconvenient Truth and I was quite shocked, like everybody else. But there has been alot of discussion on GW and the science presented in the film.

 

I've not made up my mind either way on GW. I'm sitting on the fence burning my gas in my guzzler car.

[Rag-Doll 0]

Originally Posted By: Domokun_72dpi

It seems if Russia go ahead, they could become one of the richest nations around, outdoing the Saudies.

...and then they will be able to afford to buy the fancy new technology once it is reliably available. There is a reason why China builds coal fired powder stations - more than the entire UK power capacity added this year alone. It is quick, reliable and most importantly, cheap.

[thursday 1]

don't remind me, I'm crabbed on some coal stock.

[Rag-Doll 0]

You should sell it before global warming brings the world to an end, which, to hear the way the GW zealots describe it, will happen sometime towards the end of October this year.

 

It's just crazy. Aust is very seriously considering an emissions trading scheme which will simply drive up costs and not much else - a sort of environmental equivalent to a hair shirt. It won't do much but our suffering will give us a wonderful moral self righteousness.

 

Even if Aust shut up shop entirely and everyone walked around naked and lived on home grown mungbeans, the carbon savings would be entirely consumed by China's monthly increase. If hysteria could be toned down just a little people might appreciate for that Australia at least, there would be a greater global impact if it were to spend a little more on R&D for clean energy - the results of which could then be utilised around the world

[Mantas 3]

I've heard that when the CO2 emmissions are divied up amost the world's countries, Australia contributes about 0.5% to the total. It make you wonder what my piss-ant little efforts is going to do when China and the U.S. control the fate of us all.

 

Still, what am I suppossed to tell my kids?

"Sorry kids, it was all a bit too hard"

[Mantas 3]

Originally Posted By: thursday

I've not made up my mind either way on GW. I'm sitting on the fence burning my gas in my guzzler car.

There's not too many on that fence these days thurs.

[thursday 1]

From today until the end of the games, there is no polution in China.

[Domokun_72dpi 0]

Originally Posted By: Rag-Doll

It won't do much but our suffering will give us a wonderful moral self righteousness.

You are dead right mate.

Financially, this will screw with Australians. they say, in a Poll, 70% (or something like that), would be happy to pay more, if it means our impact is lower. WTF??? I wasn't questioned, and besides, even if we did this, it probably wouldn't make one ounce of difference.
My advice, buy a house in the hills areas, in 20 years time you can enjoy beach side living.

I'm off to go work on my tan

[Rag-Doll 0]

Originally Posted By: Mantas

I've heard that when the CO2 emmissions are divied up amost the world's countries, Australia contributes about 0.5% to the total. It make you wonder what my piss-ant little efforts is going to do when China and the U.S. control the fate of us all.

Still, what am I suppossed to tell my kids?
"Sorry kids, it was all a bit too hard"

And yet there seems to be a underlying expectation in Australian that if we implement an ETS then somehow the rivers will flow and the grass will be green again and all will be right in our wide brown land of droughts and flooding rain. Kind of odd how those sentiments were expressed all the way back in 1904. How is that Australia was able to have droughts and floods without global warming?

Love the poem though. On a day of uber nationalism, seems only right:

The love of field and coppice
Of green and shaded lanes,
Of ordered woods and gardens
Is running in your veins.
Strong love of grey-blue distance,
Brown streams and soft, dim skies
I know, but cannot share it,
My love is otherwise.

I love a sunburnt country,
A land of sweeping plains,
Of rugged mountain ranges,
Of droughts and flooding rains.
I love her far horizons,
I love her jewel-sea,
Her beauty and her terror
The wide brown land for me!

The stark white ring-barked forests,
All tragic to the moon,
The sapphire-misted mountains,
The hot gold hush of noon,
Green tangle of the brushes
Where lithe lianas coil,
And orchids deck the tree-tops,
And ferns the warm dark soil.

Core of my heart, my country!
Her pitiless blue sky,
When, sick at heart, around us
We see the cattle die
But then the grey clouds gather,
And we can bless again
The drumming of an army,
The steady soaking rain.

Core of my heart, my country!
Land of the rainbow gold,
For flood and fire and famine
She pays us back threefold.
Over the thirsty paddocks,
Watch, after many days,
The filmy veil of greenness
That thickens as we gaze…

An opal-hearted country,
A wilful, lavish land
All you who have not loved her,
You will not understand
though Earth holds many splendours,
Wherever I may die,
I know to what brown country
My homing thoughts will fly.



Thanks Dotty.

[Mantas 3]

>How is that Australia was able to have droughts and floods without global warming? <

 

Are you a fence sitter too RD?

[Rag-Doll 0]

Mantas, I think I'm a non-beleiver. Not because I reckon I have a better idea of the science or anything. It is just that the more something is hyped the less I am inclined to buy into it. Seems as if we never had bad weather before GW came along. Apparently we all lived in a green garden blessed with warm but not too warm summers and cool but not too cool winters and plenty of rain when we needed it. Almost without fail any calamitous weather event is ascribed to GW - it seems to be the default response given without any real justification.

[Mantas 3]

I just finished reading Tim Flannery's The Weather makers. It was full of science (much of which went over my head) with very little hype. The size and scale of the data collected over thousands of years is staggering.

Actually the weather and what we feel has FA to do with GW. Some areas are getting colder. It makes me laugh when we ahave a cold day in summer or a good winter snow fall and people say "pffft...Global warming is a load of bollocks".

 

At the end of the last ice age, global temps rose by 5 deg over 700 years. A classic example of GW NOT caused by humans. This time we are expected to have a similar rise in temp over 100 years! The difference this time is that nature wont be able to adapt in time.

 

I've had a good look at both sides of the arguement now, the information has had some time to rattle around in this little walnut of a brain, and at this stage I'd say I'm a believer.

(I would love to be proved wrong)

[Rag-Doll 0]

Climate change ought to be separated from the greenhouse gas GW concept which has us all living in a crowded sand pit by the end of 2100. I'm all for climate change. I reckon that is definitely going on and localised changes due to farming and land clearance and water usage is definitely taking place and probably has been taking place in different forms for litteraly ages.

 

As for whether CO2 is going to be the down fall of the human race and Gore is right, I guess we'll just have to wait and see. It's going to be an interesting 50 years.

[kokodoko 67]

Why not just start thinking about using renewable resources now instead of in xx years time when it all runs out?

 

Be Prepared is what i learnt in Boy Scouts.

[Mantas 3]

I'm resigned to the fact that we are going to be living in a different world in 30 years time (if I'm still around). The best thing to do is try and adapt.