Artic Sea Route Now Open To Commercial Traffic

[Dark Phoenix Rising]

Due to a loss of 1,000,000²KM of ice.

Now is it me, or should we be worrying about the loss of the ice, or the fact that we can send ships over the top of the world?

[Elliot Kane]

I can't see this as a good thing, I must admit.

[LaFille]

It's been a little while now since the loss of ice in the north is concerning environment specialists and that there lies one of the most explicit effects of the climate changes. The more time goes and the more ecologic losses there are. The Arctic is also becoming an increasingly hot economic and politic interest (the situation with global warming opens the door to water, oil & gas, diamond, fishery, strategical resources, among else), and the big heads wanting to profit from it have ways and purposes that can be frankly disgusting. The increased commercial and military activity up there isn't to help things environmentally either. A topic that I'm skeptic about expecting sane developments in, in the current situation, and that will lead to more international tensions.

[killerzzz]

Am I the only one who thinks that the melting Arctic has something to do with a polar shift?

Seriously though, I think its really time that we start hoping...
...that those penguin movies inspire people to stop polluting! ;D

Ok, that wasn't very serious.

Seriously seriously, I'm really hoping that new electric car they're comming out with is gonna be a success. All this pollution is really... stupid. We could have moved on to other stuff by now, but the damn oil politics (among others) are keeping us back!

And now, if there's rich and powerful people after the resources up there, they're probably gonna pollute more, just to get at it faster! "Hurry up with that global warming, will ya? I've got kids to feed million-dollar-bills to!"

Killerzzz

[Galadriel]

We have a saying in Dutch, I'll try to translate it:
"Someone's death is someone's bread"
It's sad, but that is the way the world goes, the ice caps are melting, and we can't stop it any more, so why not make it into a profit? If only the big worldcompanies would look better after their pollution, the world would already be a better place.

[LaFille]

Yeah, profiting from losses can be good, but if it's done with measure, responsibility, respect and equity, which are unfortunately generally still tossed aside to favor short-term economic and politic power growth; durable development is hardly what will be done there, and indeed increased commercial activity will most likely go with increased pollution and accelerated destruction of ecosystems there. We can also not stop the big machine that's running about the climate and environmental changes, but we can at least choose to try to stop feeding the phenomenons; that's even a question of interest, to give a chance to our future and the generations to come as the way we consume right now we're biting the hand that feeds.

[Glance A'Lot]

seriously, I'm really hoping that new electric car they're coming out with is gonna be a success.

And where do you think the electricity will come from?

Most electrical plants are still operated by fossil fuels (that includes coal) - and those aren't the cleanest...

'Clean' though is nuclear power, and thus it's promoted - however there was Tchernobyl and Harrisburg and ... - overall more luck than could be hoped for. I'm not at all convinced that diminishing fossil pollution by increasing the risk of nuclear pollution is a sensible approach.

We will have to accept that there also, nothing in life is free - energy costs, more energy costs dearly. Whether in filters or safety features or in basic technology for bio-energy. Energy is, as drinking water will be, a luxury - a luxury all need or want and few can afford.

To avoid conflicts, we'll need a global concept for its (fair) distribution - unlikely, I concede, but necessary in the long run.

[LaFille]

Nuclear energy isn't even clean, even if we except the accidents, leaks and dangers; nuclear waste is quite a problem to get rid of and the more nuclear facilities there will be the biggest the puzzle will be. At least until fusion power would be exploitable and would improve things there.

Beside nuclear there's water, waste-to-energy, wind, solar and geothermal power that would be less damageable to the environment, but none of these are clean either and there are significant drawbacks to each. Right now the most productive bets would probably be on efficiency, renewable energy and durable development as well as to promote local exploitation as much as possible, but all these require so significant costs to put in place and the current economic and politic contexts are still so driven elsewhere that too few initiatives of the kind can take place. It's changing, slowly but surely, at least, and we can only hope that this trend continues to grow.