Tweet
If you see a web page not available error message on the video, please refresh the page.
As countries surrounding the freshly exposed waters in the Arctic region are poised to claim the areas for commercial fishing and other exploits, more than 2000 scientists have signed an open letter begging for a moratorium on the use of natural resources in the area, until ecological studies are completed. The warming climate trend has melted a 2.8 million km square of ice in an international waters area, and raised policy concerns.
In a document titled Expanding the EU’s Institutional Capacities
in the Arctic Region
Policy Briefing and Key Recommendations, Roderick Kefferpütz & Danila Bochkarev state:
According to the recent U.S. Geological Survey, the region holds significant oil and natural gas reserves. Melting ice cover would facilitate the exploitation of these resources and open up access to fish stocks and particularly new shipping routes, which promise shorter distances for trade between
Europe and East Asia. On the other hand, the melting of the Arctic’s ice cap, while increasing the region’s geopolitical and geo-economic importance, significantly exacerbates its environmental fragility, threatens the traditional way of life of the indigenous population and increases the potential for conflict in the region.
What countries stand to profit from Arctic ice melt? Kefferpütz and Bochkarev explain:
Besides the Arctic 5 countries (A5) that encircle the North Pole (United States, Canada, Russia, Norway, Denmark and Greenland), the European Union has signalled a clear interest in the region.
Commissioners Piebalgs and Borg have both stressed the need to tap the region’s natural resources while the EU’s High Representative for the Common Foreign and Security Policy, Javier Solana, acknowledged the Arctic in his recent report on climate change and international security.
The authors point out that the mixture of power and resources could well result in militarization of the new Arctic zone, meaning that climate change and international security will likely be connected in the future. China and Japan are also involved, with Japan funding research for Arctic-class tankers. Legal issues, area governance and regulations are complex and will likely be the topic of concern and discussion among policymakers and international lawyers. Currently, no clear regulations are in place.
Meanwhile, the newly exposed area contains a new and fragile ecosystem. Scientists have insufficient data at this point on what is in the ecosystem, let alone the impact of removing what is there through commercial fishing, for example.
The authors note that the New Arctic zone has fish stocks, metals and likely the world’s largest untapped hydrocarbon (oil) reserves. They also predict “Heavy militarisation, a relic of the Cold War, remains an important challenge for the foreseeable future, particularly in the context of policies pursued by Russia, the U.S. and Canada.”
Will the scientists be kicked to the curb in the name of money? Will the Arctic be kicked to the curb in the name of money?
http://www.oceansnorth.org/arctic-fisheries-letter
http://www.boell.ru/downloads/Arctic_Web-Version-3.pdf
http://blogs.nature.com/news/2012/04/scientists-call-for-no-fishin-zone-in-arctic-waters.html
50 Comments
This situation is scary and disgusting.
For a long time I have wondered why so many people deny climate change when it’s so obvious, given the data, that it’s not only happening, it’s accelerating.
Stupid me. Attacking science, demonizing scientists who warn about climate change and snuffing the existing regulatory framework and enforcement is a well thought out policy to permit environmental destruction and possibly war in order to make money.
The war against science is not an accident. It was devised to make money. Period.
Worse, Barack Obama is totally on board with that.
The people at the top of the power pyramid have knowingly and intentionally decided to destroy the environment and unleash all of its attendant consequences on people and the ecosystem of the Arctic and the rest of the planet so they can make billions.
They used their money to create the illusion of a legitimate debate about climate change and global warning.
I find it impossible to capture in words just how awful these people are.
Somehow we are going to have to stop them, knowing as we attempt to do so, that they are willing to kill us in order to make more money.
They are a clear and present danger to us, the planet and all living things.
They are the true terrorists, not Muslims.
Hat tip Sascha, who turned my attention to this issue.
I believe the sun and the solar system has more of an effect on our Earth than putting some carbon into the atmosphere….that’s just me personally. I also view climate change bickering as just another smoke and mirror show to get people all juiced up, and then when people get all pissed and demand change, they get an additional tax to uhhh fund wars and such.
The science is bought and paid for period, and also, science is what? Finding results and evidence you are “expecting / looking for?” How can you measure the field, when you are the field? I love science and all, I just don’t like how capitalism gets its roots and corruption into everything.
The ice has melted before, the accelerating process may have a beneficial influence on “accelerating the consciousness of all human kind….”
Also, who’s to say what’s good and bad? Something that is viewed as bad now, may turn out to be “good” in a year or vice versa. I realize I’m walking a fine line here, but thought the other side, the side in which you cannot see, may like to be represented as well.
Further, I love the comments and the article, just pondering out loud I guess…..still dreaming….
The bourgeois collective is anarchically predatory. Their “rationality” does not scale and is an eco-logical failure.
Their materialist religion must locate the original sin in the consumer all the while garnering bounteous profit on their behalf.
Their faith is rife with falsehood.
The video is horrifying as are the prospects.
It reminds me of the Denmark climate conference, when so many were gushing so enthusiastically about the commercial potential of a newly melted Greenland.
Most of the “alternative” energy technologies in use are still somewhat dirty, and profit Oil companies. We could switch to clean alternatives, but that wouldn’t necessarily make a profit for Fossil Fuels.
Sure, there have been changes before, but there is a word for changes that happen this rapidly: catastrophe. The world is a dynamic, complex network of feedback systems upon which life depends. We are like children playing with a loaded gun. If you think 7 billion people (soon to be 8 4x faster than the last billion accumulated) wantonly consuming and burning and polluting are not affecting this planet, you need to think a little harder.
When you’re told you’re probably fucking up the only planet we have to live on and you dismiss the mountains of evidence supporting that argument because you’re either too afraid, confused, too hard-headed, or getting PAID to, it then becomes the duty of the rest of us (to us, our children, and humanity as a whole) to take control of the rudder.
Watching the rape of the natural world ain’t no fun at all.
No fun at all!
An unfortunate consequence of living in a capitalist society is most people’s focus is on economics before things like the environment. To the extent that I have the luxury of being concerned about the environment, I’m not absolutely defending that view. It’s only because of my high standard of living that I have that capability in the first place. The question becomes – to what degree does the environment matter in relation to other priorities? With wealth inequality at its largest in 80-some years in the US and other Western nations, a select few are prioritizing economic concerns above everything else. Conspicuously absent from Arctic drilling policy is meaningful public engagement.
I don’t need to think harder, the answer is always in front of us, it’s whether we choose to see it or not. What I am poking at is the fact of, your science, versus my science, versus my inner science etc. How sir, hotdog do you and the others who are mourning over the melting of ice, propose a solution to the unsustainable way of life we all live?!
I think climate coincides nicely with economic as well as all the other unsustainable ways of life we have. View it as one maybe? So it just begs the question more….what are you going to DO about it? Write your congressman? Ride a bike? Don’t buy bottled water? Support organic? When all of these are symptoms of something deeper and greater than we could ever imagine having “control” over.
I am a hippie. I love trees and living beings, I’m just at a point in my own journey where everything seems futile, and the real answer is looking within, in how I am to tap the full potential of my own energy, my own source, my own God within. That to me is where the answer to all is…..I mean, we’re talking about melting ice, rising sea levels and the rape of ecosystems……when nuclear fallout is already occurring, your civil liberties are being boiled to 0, war is part of life, etc etc etc.
Bottom line, this whole dream is based off of fear, all of it, even this video, even this thought, all of it. The only way we are going to change the outcome of the entirety, this home we all share, is by changing this dream we’re all so intoxicated with, by switching our addictions from fear to love, and by letting go.
You are in control of your own dream, you have the ability to create, influence the world around you, I would say for your kid’s sake and the rest, we should start looking into that little thing called love rather than going along with this paid piper and their fear brigade.
One love.
One last thing, what about Geoengineering, and modifying the weather such as HAARP etc? That stuff is real, and what perchance might the scientific studies say about their effects on our climate? Oh ya, they haven’t studied that…….which just continues this fenced in debate, held back by science, and that which science studies and thinks of. There are no fences in a limitless universe, the only fences are within your mind and in this dream that you’re helping co-create.
I’ve covered the kicking to the curb by the Obama administration of the most visible scientist on Polar bears, Dr. Charles Monnett. On May 22nd, Kirsten Stade from Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) wrote, regarding Dr. Monnett and the conduct of the “investigation” of him by Obama’s henchmen:
Today’s NYT contains a long article, very flattering toward Obama, that describes the long campaign Shell Oil has conducted to gain access to drilling opportunities in the Arctic. While written in a POV clearly positive to Obama, it illustrates that he has been more hands-on in developing Arctic policy than is generally acknowledged.
I’ve had a couple of opportunities to discuss aspects of Arctic development with Sen. Begich (interviewed extensively for the NYT article). My discussions have centered on the possibility of using the building of a new generation of icebreakers to create technical institutes tied to shipyards in Alaska to build them.
What I’ve discovered in the process of researching the issue is that there is a powerful group wanting to use the building of seaborne infrastructure opening the Arctic to increased privatization of military assets and other capabilities, such as those now performed by the USCG. A sign that these interests may be centered round Carlyle Group founder David Rubinstein may be in a talk given by his wife Alice Rogoff last November in Juneau:
Between that November talk and now, these people – the Carlyle-Guggenheim axis, have been quietly working to undermine the USCG’s position in this area.
Indeed – demonize a frighten influential scientists and monetize more public resources into private hand. That is the name of the game being played.
Thanks, C-S. I remember writing about Sec. Clinton’s ‘visit’ to last year’s summit, but looks as though she and Gen. Dempsey are sure interested in ratifying UNCLOS now, lol!
Prosperity Doctrine says: Greed is Good!
I apologize if your links or video cover it, I haven’t had time to watch or read yet. Rec’d.
Wealth inequality is high because this is the capitalists’ endgame. Inequality and environmental destruction have the same cause. Furthermore is it possible that one of them can be reduced in class negotiation? Not looking likely.
The Serengeti strategy again!
The CG opposition sounds patently false – the lessors would be glad to sell their icebreaker in a crisis.
The real opposition is totally in the dark and that’s how these shitheads operate.
Highy rcc’d comment.
Well spoken.
I’ve got plenty of love.
I’ve got plenty of sense too.
The emotion of fear is as basic as the emotion love and has the same root and reason we evolved to have it: survival.
There’ll always be time for goodbye kisses, I’d just like to postpone that day for as long as possible.
It is love that enables fear. I can always identify a young, ignorant, self-serving punk by a “No Fear” sticker on his truck. He either has nothing to lose, or doesn’t realize what he has to lose. I knew fear the instant I held my first child in my arms. They go together.
Good work CS thanks for it all. rcc’d.
Mr. ET, also FINE work sir, thanks for sharing that.
On we trudge, LeSigh.
The solopsistic One is a delusion.
Ironically, the antagonistic “won” is also, usually.
They are co-dependent.
I sense a marriage counselor somewhere in the vicinity.
A good possibility but I’d recommend divorce.
One life, but we’re not the same
we’ve got to unmarry each other,
unmarry each other
one flub
Thank you for your thoughts and comments here, chebetts. I really believe that if each person were to look within, and act out of understanding and compassion, rather than react to the latest crisis or fear, that the world in its entirety would be balanced- and, and humans would begin living and not just reacting, posturing and advancing the cascade of the latest created crisis.
I admit, the Arctic situation scares me, because it involves such a large body of water. I am not a scientist, but to my way of thinking, there is great potential for shifts in the environment that are, well unknown at this point, but could be harmful to the human family.
In every color there’s the light
In every stone sleeps a crystal
Remember the Shaman when he used to say man is the dream of the dolphin.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihZClVGxjf8&ob=av3n
I will probably spend most of the day reflecting on your thoughts and perspective, and I thank you.
Well said. It is awful to watch. Sometimes I am at a loss for words.
Thank you for stopping by doremus, very much appreciated!
Well, thank you Edward, and I would very much like to apologize; for some reason I missed your coverage on this. You are very much more qualified to discuss than I am, and I wish you would post something again when you get a chance.
Let me see if I understand:
The New Arctic Zone is a potential cash cow of natural resources, and there is a power game going on to see who gets what and how much and when and for how long.
It is basically an unregulated free-for-all at this point.
Scientists are gravely concerned.
There are efforts to minimize, no wait…undermine and demonize the concerned scientists, and these efforts are from the moneyed interests who wish to work without regulations and without agreed upon and enforced policy regarding unclaimed international waters…Is this sort of what is happening here?
Forgive me, my uninformed questions. They are not snark- I am trying to learn about this topic.
What, in your opinion, will be going on by the year 2020, for example?
Well thank you so much, as I am in learning mode. I am also in and out today, and I will read the link you provide and comment later in the day. The post is really only a brief summary, and I appreciate you addition to the discussion, thank you again (((wendy)))
I don’t need to think harder, the answer is always in front of us, it’s whether we choose to see it or not. What I am poking at is the fact of, your science, versus my science, versus my inner science etc. How sir, hotdog do you and the others who are mourning over the melting of ice, propose a solution to the unsustainable way of life we all live?!I think climate coincides nicely with economic as well as all the other unsustainable ways of life we have. View it as one maybe? So it just begs the question more….what are you going to DO about it? Write your congressman? Ride a bike? Don’t buy bottled water? Support organic? When all of these are symptoms of something deeper and greater than we could ever imagine having “control” over.
I agree, my mystical friend.
We don’t seem to be able to get much accomplished by telling others what they need to do or not do. That just pisses them off and tends to create a polarized situation in a vast trench with a lot of yelling echoing off the walls, particularly if we fail to practice what we preach.
My proposed solution is to show, don’t tell. Set an example while being of service to others and never pass up an opportunity to gently and lovingly teach others as you are of service to them bettering their lives. Like the ripple that spreads outward in a pond when you throw a pebble into it, your good will and your acts will affect others in a positive way and inspire them to pay the resulting debt forward.
As more of us change into sources of love-based energy, the butterfly effect will kick in and we will change our reality.
Me too. I also happen to be a recovering lawyer.
Yes, far too many people are ruled and controlled by fear and that is extremely ironic, given the macho image so many men and women aspire to and have convinced themselves that they are. Case inpoint: Barack Obama beating his chest and taking credit for killing Osama bin Laden, even though he only gave the order and risked nothing by doing so. He seems utterly clueless about how small, cowardly and craven he appears. Bush did the same thing by playing and milking the role of wartime president.
Nevertheless, I think greed is the predominant motivator in the world today, although I think a minority of the people in the world are addicted to and controlled by it. Unfortunately, they are the .01% and they are manipulating and controlling the rest us by fear.
I will, of course, concede that greed may be a product of the fear of never having enough, but I think it can stand on its own as a motivatoYes, I agree and have been writing about the importance of reestablishing love and the Golden Rule as our core value and working to make the core value of our nation’s government and its policies, both foreign and domestic.
Amen, brother.
Great thought provoking comment.
It would be cool for lurkers who may be involved in international law, maritime law, environmental law or policy would summarize a few of the key issues facing the New Arctic zone.
Boy, did I screw up with the strike-through tool instead of the italics tool.
My Kingdom for an edit function. sorry.
Thank you for stopping by Larue and ditto what you said: thank you again @EdwardTeller.
I felt and still feel different as a parent of an adult child, hotdog, thank you for your comment. It is truly being in a position of having something meaningful to lose.
I could not help but feel, reading about the looming dividing up the Arctic for profit- that we all collectively have something meaningful and we stand to lose it.
Ludwig, as always, you have brightened my day and sent me running to the nearest dictionary. So, only one’s own mind is sure to exist.. In other words, the literally self-centered approach is a delusion (a lie)?
BTW, are you a professor of philosophy by any chance? You do not have to answer, but I do enjoy and mull over your thoughtful comments, plus the humor. Bone dry. Am I the first to mention this?
Hope I do not disappoint. I’ve come to accept that Fukushima No. 4 is going to collapse and that Japan and the NW USA, perhaps far much more will become uninhabitable for a long, long, long time. Looking right now to find a way to get a bunch of people together to buy the Kerguelen Islands. Or at least a long-term lease on a fertile area there with good water.
It’s a beautiful place, this world. The arctic despite it’s remoteness, is not isolated. It’s part of the whole, and that’s no delusion.
We need to stop ruining it, not only because of some ideological ethos, but because our survival depends on it.
Sorry if I’m preaching, but I’m not backing down from that imperative.
The missing public engagement is dishonest and purposeful omission, I believe, and it is insulting to the passing public as well. As if we are not entitled to be informed, or as if we are too dumb, or what? Oh. maybe we’ll get in the way by educating ourselves and spreading information. Sigh.
I would like to thank you for your post the other day (all of your posts, actually, I have always looked for your byline)
It is good to hear from one with relevant background much appreciated.
Will there ever be acceptable balance or compromise in the economics versus environment interest in the Arctic issue? What is your take? Do you think the scientists will ever have a voice, so that they can at least complete their studies?
Wow. No doubt this is out of substantial concern, and it sounds like an excellent plan.
As an aside. I live near a Superfund site. Something like 100 landowners sued because they could not fish in the streams, they were sick, their livestock was sick…on and on…they had to drink water from trucks…just a lot of long-term loss and pain. The suit went nowhere for ten years until it reached the Sixth Circuit- they ultimately received a settlement. Um, sorry I must step away for a few- I will provide link on return.
I think you are doing the right thing.
Congratulations, you are the first. On my travels someone did accuse me of being English (can’t have been the accent) so there is precedent.
I am an amateur by discipline.
The solopsistic One, contacted only through the subjective, is a poetic conceit, the refuge of abused mind and simultaneously the justification for abuse. A contagious divinification of conscious minds.
I do think it insignificant to say “only one’s own mind exists” and I would put a twist on “the self-centered approach is a delusion”. It is a delusion promoted by the more self-centered. But by the solopsistic One I refer to the delusion of the Unity behind all subjective experience. It is a great escape and perhaps the skeleton of some society of faith, but dubious.
Yoo – Hoo! It’s water from the drinking fountain at the mall! :) recced.
Greed is an embellishment of the haywire capitalist faith. A necessary sin to simultaneously justify the faith and excuse it’s failure. A dishonest profession to avoid the terminal crisis of a bullshit ideology.
Holy shit that’s deep.
Thanks hotdog.
Commentator of the day award.
/No snark.
Whoosh. You know how I hate when I don’t agree with you, hotdog, but here I will a bit. Obviously, a true sociopath who can’t love is also unlikely to feel fear.
But ordinarily, fear is a response to anything we perceive as a threat, whether genuine and reasonable, or a conditioned response from an event or events in the past. Always, we produce adrenaline as a physical response, which can be helpful, or not, in the case of reflexive fear.
But consider that we can fear the loss of things that we substituted for love or self-regard, even the thought of material losses or comforts can provoke fear. Or the loss of power; add in everyday fears like fear of: death, injury, violence, control over life…disease, not all of which are irrational, imo, but can be if unexamined. For many children, living with unpredictable parental responses can be real and debilitating for life.
Anyway, that your love for your infants showed you your first fear is a testament to the strength of your love. Not all of us have been so fortunate.
Anyway, just thought I might throw that in to the mix. And the kids with the ‘no fear’ shirts are likely afraid, and pretending not to be, as many of the gun-slinger body types (picture quintessential John Wayne types, alert, arms akimbo, tense…and ready to metaphorically whip out their six-shooters. All fear-based; psychologically, prick a defensive character, find underlying fear.
Went and dug up a quote that speaks not only to the poor souls in the last paragraph, but to many in our society who have been wearing masks all their lives, having never been encouraged toward self-actualization.
” “We are so accustomed to disguise ourselves to others that in the end we become disguised to ourselves.”
~ François de La Rochefoucauld
I know it may be off-topic, but I’ve been considering, again, what Arthur Silber is reminding us to explore what’s underlying the political/societal sphere, allowing some to seek and attain power over others, use the language and acts of violence in their quests, while some of us have simply acquiesced for far too long.
Well, anyhoo; sorry. I’ve been trying to write about it, and it hasn’t gelled yet. But as a dad, you know how it should go for your kids, and will give them what they need in terms of love, security and feeding their thirst for knowledge and inter-connectedness to other folks. ;o)
End of the World ??? Can we make a killing on it?
Also, wonder what our favorite Avenging Angel, Mitt Romney, has to say about this problem?
This is a fascinating set of comments to read. We have dared to go where many fear to go and in the process revealed something about ourselves that many may not know.
I enjoy, look forward to, and participate in the political and economic discussions here, but sometimes I feel like we are in an echo chamber talking to ourselves.
This is different and I appreciate it.
Wish more would participate, especially the lurkers.
Come on in, the water is fine.
The Artic likely now faces ecological assault(s) and plundering(s) of the worse sorts being this region is unthawing here in early 21st century when doing both is fully possible and doable.
If humans are/were lucky the deep freeze will soon return and make the Artic unexploitable in any profitable industrial/commericial ways.
When the “new” world was “discovered by the Europeans back there in the late 15th century it soon led to the worse of conquest,genocide,ruthless disregard for anything other than where the gold was or what could be cut down,dug out or ruined easiest and fastest in favor of human development vs. the planet Earth. Some 500 years later this seems to still be where we humans are in relation to the planet we call Earth. Not very much progress has been made.
I just read this AM that Caterpillar is going to build a large factory in SE Asia to produce the machines that are used to attack and rip open any remaining rainforests,wild river runs or buried resources across SE Asia or to export to Central and East Asia/Europe. Must be some more of the “free” trade that POTUS B.Obama and SoS H.R.Clinton are so very interested in promoting. Will mean 2,000 jobs for 2,000 humans perhaps according to Caterpillar. Americans used to build these Cat machines and get paid well doing so. Well this story is perhaps in steep tangent to the Artic story Mib presents above but is a part of the general 21st century game the coming attack on the Artic region now will succumb to.
The Mekong is under steep assault and Myanmar is now ripe to be torn open by other SE Asian nations and any number of European,American and Middle Eastern interests who see a unexploited land,a cheap labor pool and lots to be gained from both now coming around the bend. Caterpillar is placing it’s bets already.
I also read this AM that there is a lot of buying up going on/taking place of the planets farm and fresh water land areas. Investors who can are putting up the capital to position themselves to harvest lots of money via control of farm land and fresh water. A group calling itself GRAIN is suggesting this trend is not going to end well for poor humans or remaining ecological zones not already exploited/ruined due to human invasion,destruction and whatever else humans do using chemicals,GMO or the machines Caterpillar and it’s competitors build and sell.
Great My FDL diary and comments thread. Best part of FDL on full display. Thanks Mib. Recommended.
I should have commended Crane-Station for this My FDL diary but I understand Mib and Crane-Station largely collaborate here at FDL in postings/comments.Sorry for error with credit assignment…:-)
Yes the only thing that can save the arctic is global warming sinking a few cities. Its only when the rich realize that their actions will cost them money do they stop.
You are confusing science with engineering.
Crane-Station – these are very good questions. They’re some of the topics my classes covered in the past year. In my opinion, scientists already do have a voice. Beyond that general statement, I think that their voices are being inappropriately used by policymakers. This has happened so that policymakers don’t have to debate what they should be debating: the values underlying the topics. So science is being used as a proxy in the debate, which politicizes the community. Scientists need to engage with policymakers in more appropriate ways and resist the temptation to get involved in debates they shouldn’t.
That’s difficult to do since policymakers control the purse strings of scientific research. That said, the public and scientists should probably have a different type of mechanism through which they interact: policymakers aren’t providing the full range of interactions possible. These mechanisms are, in my view, necessary because scientists are largely doing their work based on public funds. The public expects and deserves to know what is being done with their money and what results are being realized from research.
I don’t think most of the American public believes that the Arctic should be opened wide up for resource extraction. It’s refreshing that that is the case since most of the public remains largely uninformed regarding the range of impacts extraction might have on the region.
Again, scientists should take advantage of this situation to communicate to the public what those impacts might be. The accumulation of wealth by a very few versus the very limited benefits that the public would realize should be an important point of that interaction.