Baked Alaska

mithras the prophet writes "Global warming stories usually focus on the hotbutton politics, scientific debate, or latest disturbing anecdote of receding ice. A very interesting New York Times story takes a different tack, highlighting the reality of climate change for small-town Alaskans. Whatever the cause, temperatures in Alaska have risen by seven degrees in the last 30 years. This has very real consequences for ordinary citizens; the rest of us would do well to consider their stories. Lucy Eningowuk and her 600 fellow citizens of Shishmaref will vote next week whether to move their town to the mainland. Despite community efforts, thawing of permafrost and wave action from melting ice has eroded away most of the land the village is built on. Residents of Barrow (warning: MIDI-enabled page), on the North Shore, are swatting mosquitos for the first time in their lives. In an ironic twist, managers of the Trans-Alaska Oil Pipeline are putting in supports to keep the pipeline from breaking as permafrost thaws."

Comments

I live in Alberta

[Tim_F]

Our Premiere is currently very anti Kyoto, and yet we see every day the effects that global warming is having on this province and in Canada. It is the people that focus on capitalism that will lead to the downfall of our species, for they are too short sighted to look into alternatives for the fossil fuels that we use in our daily lives.

Re:I live in Alberta

[atrowe]

Your Premiere is a very smart man, then. The Kyoto treaty was a notoriously bad idea, and I applaud those few nations who had the gumption to stand up for themselves and abstain from signing into the treaty. Many Asian and European countries who signed Kyoto are now regretting their decision.

Now, I'm not implying that cutting pollution is a Bad Thing(tm), but merely that Kyoto is a restrictive and impractical way to cut pollution output. Air and water quality in most first-world nations is far cleaner today than it was 30 years ago, and we're improving upon this yearly. Cars burn less fuel, and the fuel they do burn is burned much more efficiently, than older cars. Factories have installed pollution scrubbers on their smokestacks, and have ceased dumping waste into the water supply. People are also more aware of the environment these days, and community recycling programs are reducing waste going into landfills. Capitalism has done its job and continues to do so in improving environmental quality every day. There is no need for government mandated pollution reduction, and to attempt to legislate such a reduction plan would waste billions of dollars. The Democrats can whine and moan all they want, but the Capitalist system WORKS. Big Business is policing itself and the quality of our environment is improving constantly.

Argh!

[URoRRuRRR]

It's amazing how much our leaders don't get it. Bush is saying that there is no such thing as the greenhouse effect, yet it's been proven time and again! Alaskian Temps up, Canadians remarking about how hot it is. Yet we're still withdrawn from the Kyoto protocol and Our leaders are saying "There is no such thing as global warming, please buy more gasoline"

It's hard not to ignore the fact that Exxon-Mobile and the other oil companies are the ones who are REALLY in charge.

I'm saying this and I'm a Texan, even.

Re:Days of denial are over.

[GigsVT]

You can't deny that during the last century, both the production of various waste gases and global temperature have risen.

You can't deny that during the last century, both the number of ice cream cones sold in New York and the global temperature have risen. We must end ice cream sales in NY right now!

Re:you have got to be kidding me

[Wyatt Earp]

CAFE has been proposed and wrangled on and never, ever made into a binding law for the automakers.