Ice-free Arctic could be here in 23 years - Guardian

Source: The Guardian

Ice-free Arctic could be here in 23 years

David Adam, environment correspondent
The Guardian Wednesday September 5 2007

The Arctic ice cap has collapsed at an unprecedented rate
this summer and levels of sea ice in the region now stand
at a record low, scientists said last night. Experts said
they were "stunned" by the loss of ice, with an area almost
twice as big as Britain disappearing in the last week alone.
So much ice has melted this summer that the north-west
passage across the top of Canada is fully navigable, and
observers say the north-east passage along Russia's Arctic
coast could open later this month. If the increased rate
of melting continues, the summertime Arctic could be
totally free of ice by 2030.

Mark Serreze, an Arctic specialist at the US National Snow
and Ice Data Centre at Colorado University in Denver which
released the figures, said: "It's amazing. It's simply fallen
off a cliff and we're still losing ice." The Arctic has now lost
about a third of its ice since satellite measurements began
30 years ago, and the rate of loss has accelerated sharply
since 2002.

Dr Serreze said: "If you asked me a couple of years ago
when the Arctic could lose all of its ice, then I would have
said 2100, or 2070 maybe. But now I think that 2030 is a
reasonable estimate. It seems that the Arctic is going to be
a very different place within our lifetimes, and certainly
within our children's lifetimes."

-snip-

Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2007/sep/05/climatechange.sciencenews

By 2030, I'd suspect there won't be any wintertime icecap, either.

the acceleration of processes.

a few of them -- damned few -- understand the massive changes this will bring about for humankind and all other species on the planet, and they'll push to do something about it . . .

they'll be vastly outnumbered, though, by those who see only dollar signs as they try to calculate ways to take economic advantage of what can only be described as a new age for the planet:

"Yesterday's announcement will also increase political interest in the Arctic, with a number of countries currently jostling to exploit the oil and gas reserves believed to lie under the ocean, which could become more accessible as the icy cover retreats. Last month Russia claimed a huge area around the north pole, and Denmark and Canada are preparing similar claims, which rely on showing that a chain of underwater mountains that runs across the region are connected to their respective continental shelves."

we are, in the main, represented by selfish, short-sighted idiots who can't see beyond their own noses . . . and therein will lie our downfall -- as a nation, as a species, as a planet . . .

Whatever. :eyes: