Tuesday, December 22, 2009

Polar Bears Are the Least of Our Arctic Worries - Newsweek.com

Polar Bears Are the Least of Our Arctic Worries - Newsweek.com

Uh, excuse me? Rumors of my extinction should not be discussed in my presence. You wreck my habitat and then you want to discuss "how to divvy up the globe's truly last frontier," while I'm still alive and kicking? Not bloody likely, mate.

Sigh.

"...Scientists have declared that both of the world's ice caps are in perilous states; the Arctic is more vulnerable than the Antarctic because of added climate volatility at the top of the planet. The intuitive victims are the polar bear, and further down the line, the world's grandchildren. Those, certainly, are the victims who have received the most attention.

But in his new book, After the Ice, Alun Anderson makes the insightful case that consequences cast too far into the future ignore geopolitical factors of today. Water where ice once stood changes global trade routes and national-security calculations, especially between countries like the U.S and Russia, whose icy relationship used to be separated by the expanse of the great Pacific. Just this summer, for example, the sea above Russia opened to international commercial shipping as the ice melted."

Read rest of absurd Newsweek article

Yes, so much for you all to figure out. Oh goody, we can run a boat through the Artic!! But who owns the shipping lanes?

Better get some more lawyers involved. You'll be hearing from mine.

Rev. Paul R. Bear, Blogger-in-Chief
www.CarbonConfession.org

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Carbon Confessions from Earth Day 2009, Santa Barbara, CA

The Tree of Carbon Forgiveness

The Tree of Carbon Forgiveness
Carbon Penance Generator

 

   Instructions

 

  1.  Click the Forgiveness Button.
  2.  Implement Carbon Penance quickly.
  3.  Avoid future Carbon Temptation through greater

     personal and social awareness. 

 


Penance -- Then and Now

Penance -- Then and Now
In the Middle Ages, there was no buying and selling of carbon indulgences. Now it's a booming business. "The worst of the carbon-offset programs resemble the Catholic Church's sale of indulgences back before the Reformation," said Denis Hayes, the president of the Bullitt Foundation, an environmental grant-making group. "Instead of reducing their carbon footprints, people take private jets and stretch limos, and then think they can buy an indulgence to forgive their sins." The New York Times, 4/29/07

What's a Carbon Footprint?

What's a Carbon Footprint?
A carbon footprint is a "measure of the impact human activities have on the environment in terms of the amount of green house gases produced, measured in units of carbon dioxide". It is meant to be useful for individuals and organizations to conceptualize their personal (or organizational) impact in contributing to global warming. A conceptual tool in response to carbon footprints are carbon offsets, or the mitigation of carbon emissions through the development of alternative projects such as solar or wind energy or reforestation. A carbon footprint can be seen as a subset of earlier uses of the concept of ecological footprints

Source:  Wikipedia - Carbon Footprint