EnviroFest 2008
A great event with lots of wild participants on the wildfilms blog and habitatnews blog
Ze great octopus escape
a video clip taken at labrador on the sgbeachbum blog
Dead shark at Changi
on the tidechaser blog
Changeable Hawk Eagle sighted at Southern Ridge
from Bird Ecology Study Group blog
Small forest butterflies
on the manta blog
Heng King Wey, The Star 29 Jun 08;
Being selected for the International Tropical Field School Programme 2008 has certainly kept me busy for the past seven weeks of my semester break. Discovering Malaysia and its diversity in ecology and biodiversity alongside 10 other international students from University of Victoria (UVic) Canada and National University of Singapore (NUS) was indeed an experience of a lifetime.
Our field trips took us all over Malaysia; I went to places that I’d never gone and would probably not have gone on my own. We visited various national parks around Peninsular Malaysia, mangrove forest reserves in Matang, Perak, the Tasik Bera wetlands and oil palm plantations in Pahang, limestone forests and caves in Perlis, coastal areas of Penang and Pulau Redang, Terengganu. It was a fun-filled educational field trip for all.
We had a first hand experience of the various ecosystems in Malaysia and how these ecosystems connect and become part of the culture and lifestyle of the local community.
Spending 24 hours a day for seven whole weeks with these students from Canada and Singapore was truly a journey of discovery. Seeing my own country from their perspectives has taught me to observe and understand more about why things are the way they are, and that really changed the way I looked at things around me.
During the trips, one of the Canadians from UVic, Kathryn Kozak, 23 (fondly known as Katie) made a pertinent observation.
“People often don’t notice the little wonderful things they have around them. They usually need someone else to point it out to them.”
We started our journey at the Matang Mangrove Reserves where we learnt about how the lives of the people revolve around the mangroves. Wood from the mangroves are used to make charcoal, and for export as well.
There have been efforts to replant mangrove trees because we have realised its importance economically and socially. We also planted propagules of the mangrove trees; it was a very fun and muddy replanting project to make up for our huge ecological footprints (the amount of the environment necessary to produce the goods and services necessary to support a particular lifestyle).
In our attempts to understand our surroundings, we even stayed at a hide in Taman Negara just to get a glimpse of large mammals that roam in the national park. We also camped on a quiet beach away from tourist spots in Teluk Mak Kepit, Pulau Redang and watched turtles come up to shore to lay eggs.
The highlight of my trip was following the baby turtles as they paddle into the sea during one of our night watches. It was really a heartfelt moment for me to watch these baby turtles, the size of mini chipsmore cookies, struggling through the sand, determined to get into the sea.
All the participants in the programme formed firm friendships as we discovered each other’s culture and learnt to accept each other for who we are.
Introducing Malaysia’s culture and food to my newfound friends was an interesting task indeed. From local spicy dishes to traditional cultures and beliefs, durians, the hot and humid unpredictable weather and squat toilets certainly gave us laughs and little jokes that we share.
I discovered that although we live regions apart, we are still similar in many ways as young adults trying to discover ourselves in the world.
Malaysia truly has one of the most amazing biodiversity around and who would have known there was so much to learn from my own “backyard”.
“Malaysia is such a wonderful place and has the friendliest people around. I will definitely be back,” said Brian Murray who celebrated his 22nd birthday with all of us on the trip.
I merely expected to come out of this programme with a better understanding of the ecology and biodiversity in Malaysia, but I realised that I have gained more understanding of myself and how we connect to the world around us.
Field of Power
Teh Jen Lee, The New Paper 29 Jun 08;
Largest solar panel system here to power Marina Barrage gallery and control room
WITH oil prices skyrocketing, it is good to know that the $226-million Marina Barrage project is not only about water, it will also showcase the use of solar energy.
WITH oil prices skyrocketing, it is good to know that the $226-million Marina Barrage project is not only about water, it will also showcase the use of solar energy.
A solar park consisting of 405 panels covering an area of 1,200sq m (roughly the size of an Olympic-sized swimming pool) will help to power the Barrage's exhibition gallery and control room.
When completed, it will be the largest solar panel system at a single site in Singapore.
Delegates from the Singapore International Water Week who were taken on a tour of the Barrage yesterday heard about this and other environmentally sustainable technologies on-site.
The solar energy system is part of the Clean Energy Research & Testbedding (Cert) Programme, a $17m inter-agency effort launched last year that provides opportunities for firms to try out green applications using government buildings and facilities.
The 17 delegates heard how the Marina Barrage will bring about three benefits, namely water supply, flood control and lifestyle attraction.
They found different aspects of the megaproject commendable.
Miss Jill Fagan, an Australian PhD student from Melbourne University who is studying innovations in water systems, praised the attitude of PUB towards new ideas and technology.
She said: 'In Australia, we need to be more open to new ideas. I also admire the integration of different institutions here (in managing water).'
Mr Al Balce, vice-president of project development for a Philippines copper mining company, was impressed by the detailed planning that went into the Barrage.
He said: 'They've thought of everything. It's important to have a master plan so that when you execute, it will be a complete project.
'I also see very good people being trained and they are young so they can stay for longer and improve this place.'
Mr Hamad Al-Mahrooqi, project manager for produced water treatment for Petroleum Development Oman, said: 'I like how this project is not only technical, but it brings about greening of the area as well. It serves the city and it serves the community.'
It wasn't just the Barrage itself that left a deep impression.
The exhibition gallery, showcasing environment sustainability in Singapore, inspired Dr Sherifat Balogun, an assistant general manager from a Nigerian water corporation.
She said: 'We don't need a Barrage in my country, but the gallery is very imaginative and beautiful.'
Straits Times 29 Jun 08;
To most consumers, oil prices just seem to have gone crazy. The price of crude oil has risen more than fourfold since 2004 and shot up over 120 per cent this year alone. Last Thursday, after fluctuating wildly for a few weeks, it hit a new high of US$140.39 (S$191) a barrel.
Traders of oil futures on the New York Mercantile Exchange are now betting that oil prices will remain at about US$120 a barrel for at least eight years. How did this come about? Yang Huiwen looks at the changing forces of supply and demand for oil, and the dangerous new role that speculators are playing in determining the price of one of the world's most precious assets.
DWINDLING SUPPLY
Who produces the world's oil?
There are two types of oil producers in the world - Opec producers and non-Opec producers.
Opec producers:
# The Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec) is a group of 12 countries that have formed a cartel. This means that they do not compete with one another to supply oil. Instead, they meet regularly to set the price of oil for the world market.
# The 12 Opec countries are Saudi Arabia, Iran, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Venezuela, Nigeria, Angola, Libya, Iraq, Algeria, Qatar and Ecuador.
# Opec currently produces about 36 per cent of the world's oil.
# Estimates are that Opec actually has two-thirds of the world's oil reserves.
But actual reserve levels in key Opec players such as Saudi Arabia, Iran and Kuwait remain hazy due to a lack of transparency.
Non-Opec producers:
# The key non-Opec producers are Russia, Brazil, Kazakhstan and Mexico. Russia is the second-biggest oil exporter after Saudi Arabia.
# Together, the non-Opec producers account for the remaining one-third of the world's oil reserves.
But production numbers from some non-Opec countries such as Norway, Britain, Pakistan and Mexico have been flat over the past decade and have even begun to decline.
Who decides how many barrels of oil to supply to the world market, and how are prices set?
Opec adjusts the supply of oil to closely match the world's demand. This stabilises oil prices at a level which is favourable to its member countries.
# Opec production fell by 390,000 barrels per day in April due to supply disruptions in member states Nigeria and Iraq.
# Saudi Arabia, the world's biggest oil exporter and de facto leader of Opec, will raise production by 2 per cent, or 300,000 barrels a day, from next month to curb skyrocketing oil prices.
# Through regulating the supply of oil, Opec indirectly sets the price per barrel. Restricting supply will cause prices to go up, assuming demand doesn't change, and vice versa.
# Non-Opec countries are like free traders of the oil market as they are not bound by any supply controls. High oil prices give them the incentive to maximise production but that results in a faster depletion of oil reserves.
What are the current issues surrounding oil supply?
One key issue that has dogged the industry is supply disruptions in oil-producing countries such as Nigeria, Ethiopia and Iraq due to social unrest.
In particular, Nigerian rebels have been damaging key supply pipelines of oil companies in a campaign to get a bigger share of oil revenue.
# Opec has been reluctant to increase production, maintaining that the world currently has enough oil supply to meet demand. It has blamed high oil prices on speculators.
# With limited production capacity from non-Opec countries, the world will have to be increasingly dependent on Opec for oil production. But there are serious doubts about Opec's ability to meet such production shortfalls in the future as there is a lack of transparency regarding their actual reserves.
RISING DEMAND
How much oil is consumed and who are the world's biggest oil guzzlers?
World oil use will climb by 1.2 million barrels a day this year to 87.2 million barrels a day as demand increases in emerging markets such as China and India, according to estimates given by the International Energy Agency (IEA).
# Total world oil production is averaging at about 87 million barrels per day so far this year, slightly higher than the average of 85 million barrels a day in 2006.
# The United States is the world's largest oil consumer, followed by China, Japan, Germany, Russia and India.
The US, the world's largest economy, guzzles 20.73 million barrels of oil per day, more than the combined consumption of the next five economic powers.
How fast is demand rising for oil?
# Demand is forecast to grow 50 per cent over the next 20 years, with the bulk of the demand coming from developing countries, according to the US Energy Information Administration.
# Crude oil is refined into other products, including petrol and kerosene (jet fuel) which are used in the transportation industry. Naptha and ethane are used as feedstocks in the production of petrochemicals such as plastics and rubber.
# Other useful products which are not fuels are also manufactured by refining crude oil, such as lubricants for machinery, and asphalt, which is used in paving roads.
RAMPANT SPECULATION
Who are the oil speculators?
# The boom in oil prices has brought speculators out in full force, and they are not digging in the dirt looking for black gold.
Rather, speculators profit from big rises and falls in the price of any commodity, including oil.
# The speculation occurs mainly in the oil futures market, which has traditionally been used mainly by buyers and sellers of oil (mainly oil producers and energy-related companies) to hedge price risk.
# But now, a group of new players - including investment banks, pension funds and hedge funds - has become the largest players on the main crude oil futures exchanges, especially the New York Mercantile Exchange.
# hanks to the dramatic price rise, investors are also pouring money into commodities, including oil.
Many investments are made through structured investment products offered by financial institutions that aim to provide investors a hedge against inflation, which is high, and a weak US dollar.
This inflow of money into commodities is further driving up prices.
To what extent have they affected oil prices?
Speculators now control 71 per cent of contracts to buy West Texas Intermediate crude oil on the New York Mercantile Exchange, compared to just 37 per cent in 2000, according to data provided to the House Energy and Commerce Committee by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.
# Trading activity by speculators has caused much uncertainty and increased volatility in oil prices.
The main concern is that oil prices are being determined by speculative money and are no longer a true reflection of underlying supply and demand fundamentals. This makes price changes sentiment-driven, and even harder to predict.
What is being done about them?
# Politicians in the US and Europe have called for curbs on speculators, whom they blame for high prices.
# The US Democratic Party has suggested tightening restrictions on pension funds and investment banks by imposing higher margin requirements for oil-related trading. About a dozen Bills are pending in the US Congress to rein in excessive speculation in the energy futures markets.
Channel NewsAsia 28 Jun 08;
SINGAPORE: Sembawang and Woodlands residents will have a new cycling track that will make both cyclists and pedestrians happy, as it has enhanced safety features.
At both these towns, there are many cyclists among the HDB residents and foreign workers living in nearby dormitories.
They will be happy with the new 7.4-kilometre cycling track in their area. The S$2.8-million project will be completed in the middle of next year.
As far as possible, the cycling track will be built alongside the existing roadside pavement. However, where there are constraints, there will be clear demarcations like boundary lines and icons to show which track is for cyclists and which one is for pedestrians.
Speed-regulating signs with words like "slow" and "dismount and push" will also be put up.
Health Minister Khaw Boon Wan, who is also the MP for Sembawang GRC, officiated at the ground-breaking ceremony for the project on Saturday.
He said the cycling track will also help residents save money on transport and reduce congestion on the roads.
Some 400 residents joined in the day's activities, which included a brisk walk and other exercises. - CNA/ir
Maggie Koerth-Baker, LiveScience.com Yahoo News 28 Jun 08;
As storm clouds begin to lift over the flooded Midwest, experts are predicting an entirely different sort of deluge. Mosquitoes, which can breed out of control in the puddles and pools left behind as flood waters recede, may be poised to add insult to injury.
Midwesterners aren't the only ones ripe for the biting. Mosquitoes are ubiquitous in the United States, living in every state and capable of thriving in all kinds of climates, according to Joseph M. Conlon, technical advisor to the American Mosquito Control Association (AMCA). Wherever there's standing water, there are mosquitoes, he said. And the diseases they carry, such as West Nile Virus, aren't far behind.
But science has some new solutions in the form of improved repellents, genetically modified mosquitoes, and new approaches to vaccine design, as well as some science-based ideas you can put to use at home.
Control just the mosquito
The big strides in mosquito control have largely involved better eradication and population control efforts, aimed to affect only mosquitoes, leaving other animals intact.
One of the most important developments in this effort was bio-rational control materials, said James Stark, executive director of the Metropolitan Mosquito Control District, the public agency charged with keeping Minneapolis and St. Paul relatively mosquito-free. Developed in the 1980s, these "materials" are actually a strain of naturally occurring wetlands bacteria. The District sprays the bacteria onto lakes and other water sources where mosquito larvae hatch and grow. The larvae then eat the bacteria, which kills them by destroying the walls of the insect's stomach. Only mosquitoes and a few related fly species are susceptible. Other animals, including people, can ingest the bacteria without any damage.
The project, one of the largest in the world, according to Conlon, has had a lot of success with this bacteria, particularly when combined with newer computer database systems that allow the agency to easily map and track areas where the bacteria are needed most.
But a new method, or, rather, a new twist on an old method, is on the horizon.
Sterile insect technique, or SIT, involves breeding large numbers of sterile male insects and then releasing them into the wild. Ideally, the huge influx of sterile males out-compete their normal counterparts in the game of love, creating a whole generation of unfertilized eggs and crashing the insect population.
SIT wouldn't eradicate all mosquitoes, but it would keep population levels low enough to control the spread of diseases.
It's a trick that has worked before on other insects, said James Becnel, research entomologist and lead scientist with the USDA's Fly and Mosquito Control Unit. Those past experiments used radiation to sterilize, but that can be problematic with mosquitoes, making them less able to compete for mates.
Now, an English company called Oxytec is pushing a new approach to SIT, using genetically altered mosquitoes. "They have a gene that's sensitive to antibiotics," Becnel said. "You can rear them in the lab with a small amount of antibiotics and grow big numbers. Then, when you release them, there's no wild antibiotics, so the genes are turned on and they become sterile."
This technique could be coming to malaria-stricken Malaysia very soon, according to an article in the May 21 issue of the journal Nature.
Viral vision
Other efforts focus on controlling the ability of living mosquitoes to spread disease among humans. The most obvious way to do this, of course, is through the use of vaccines. But, while there is a vaccine for the tropical Yellow Fever virus, there aren't any for the mosquito-spread illnesses most common in the United States.
In fact, in the case of West Nile Virus, there's a vaccine for horses, but not for people.
This is a funding issue, said the AMCA's Conlon. "Production and distribution of human vaccines is an extraordinarily expensive process and the time investment from concept to commercial production can be as much as 10 years," he said. "There aren't enough people getting sick to make it worthwhile to a company to develop a vaccine."
But a new development in vaccine technology could possibly change that. This week, researchers at Stony Brook University in New York announced they'd developed a new method of designing vaccines that could potentially make the process faster and cheaper.
The researchers, including Steffen Mueller, Bruce Futcher and Steven Skiena, found they could genetically alter viruses to make them weaker and reduce their ability to multiply in the body. In trials, mice fought off a weakened version of polio, leaving them with immunity to the "wild" virus. Details are in the June 26 issue of the journal Science.
The researchers said this method could allow scientists to develop new vaccine candidates much faster than currently possible, basically speeding up the turn-around time between deciding to find a vaccine for a certain virus and having a workable candidate in-hand.
And while much of the expense of developing a vaccine lies in extensive clinical trials, a hurdle which probably won't go away, this new method could cut earlier development costs, and potentially make it possible to create vaccines for diseases that currently don't have one, the researchers said.
Better repellents
Another major area of research is better repellents, which could keep mosquitoes away from people more effectively. Becnel's colleague from the USDA, Ulrich Bernier, along with researchers from the University of Florida, recently made some big breakthroughs in this field.
Using 50 years of data on repellent chemicals, the team trained a brain-based computer program to recognize the molecular structures and components common to effective repellents. Then, they set the program to work analyzing some 2,000 chemical compounds, looking for the ones that shared those traits.
The result was 23 newly synthesized compounds that have the potential to outperform all repellents currently on the market, according to the May 27 issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
In fact, while the most common current repellent, DEET, remains effective in a closed environment for about 17 days, one of the new compounds stuck it out for 85.
This type of data-mining research isn't new, but how it's being applied is. "The pharmaceutical people have been using this method for years to design drugs, but it's just now that the mosquito people are getting into it too," Becnel said.
Home invasion
Actually, fending off mosquitoes doesn't require lab access. Conlon said that folks at home can play along. All you need to do is follow what he calls the Three D's.
Drain: Mosquito eggs need water to hatch. But they don't need large amounts of water. Conlon has seen the bugs breed in everything from discarded bottle caps to creases on tarps. If you don't want mosquitoes breeding in your backyard, you need to be fastidious about removing all sources of standing water, no matter how small.
Dress: Conlon said mosquitoes can bite through tight clothes and are attracted to dark colors. The ideal mosquito-resistant outfits are ensembles that are loose-fitting, long-sleeved, and light-colored. "In particular, they have a hard time seeing the color yellow," he said. "Yellow bug lights can be useful because of this. They don't repel mosquitoes, but they don't attract them, either."
Defend: There are only four active ingredients currently approved by the Food and Drug Administration to effectively and safely repel mosquitoes: DEET, picaridin, ir3535, and, for those who prefer a plant-based option, oil of lemon eucalyptus. Conlon said it's important to look for these ingredients because there are many mosquito repellents on the market that simply don't work.
"Popular folk remedies like garlic and Vitamin B-1 have been shown to be useless in double blind studies," he said. Others, such as oil of clove, are known repellents, but only at high concentrations that would burn human skin. "So it works, but not at the low levels used in any product. There, it just smells nice," he said.
Jonathan Leake, The Times 29 Jun 08;
If Holland is right, then the destruction of the Arctic ice cap could become the first great global warming disaster. Why is it happening so fast? And how will it affect the rest of the world?
New evidence suggests that the Arctic ice cap could disappear in summer within the next five years, leaving environmentalists in despair but oil men delighted.
When Marika Holland announced the imminent demise of the Arctic ice cap 18 months ago, she was worried.
Her findings, based on predictions from one of the world’s most powerful super-computers, had been double-checked and peer-reviewed – but they still seemed extreme.
“We were suggesting the Arctic ice cap could disappear in a few decades,” said Holland, a senior researcher at America’s National Centre for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado. “We were confident of our methods but it still felt very dramatic.”
What Holland and her colleagues from the University of Washington and McGill University in Canada had done was analyse the impact of greenhouse gas emissions on the Arctic – and predict that its summertime ice cap could vanish by 2040.
The corollary was that in the longer term it could vanish in winter too. Future explorers would have to use boats rather than sleds.
The idea that the Arctic ice might shrink had been around for a long time but the suggestion that it could disappear, and so quickly, caused a storm.
Pretty soon the climate change sceptics were at work. Holland and her colleagues, they pointed out, had based their work on a computer model – and such models were hardly accurate enough to predict more than a few days of weather. How could they make predictions over decades?
Within just a few months, however, Holland’s findings were borne out even more dramatically than anyone could have expected.
Each year scientists use satellites to measure the area of the Arctic ice cap as it grows and shrinks with the seasons. In winter it normally reaches about 5.8m square miles before receding to about 2.7m square miles in summer.
Last summer, however, things suddenly changed. For day after day the sun shone, raising water temperatures by 4.3C above the average. By September the Arctic ice cap had lost an extra 1.1m square miles, equivalent to more than 12 times the area of Britain.
The melting reduced the summer ice cover to just 1.6m square miles, 43% less than in 1979 when accurate satellite observations began. It left so much open sea that the Northwest Passage, the fabled link between Asia and Europe, became navigable.
For Holland and her team the great melt prompted a great rethink. Their predictions seemed to be coming true, but far earlier than expected. Why?
Holland now wonders whether she and her colleagues had been “too conservative” in their published report.
When they looked at their models again, they found the events of 2007 had indeed been predicted. “We had said this melting process was likely to start around 2025 but the models also showed that there could be periods of very rapid ice melt much earlier,” she said. “Some even showed that the summertime ice cap could start to vanish by 2013.
“Now we are wondering if that is what is happening now. If it is, then the summertime ice cap may never recover and by 2013, or sometime soon after, it could be gone.”
If Holland is right, then the destruction of the Arctic ice cap could become the first great global warming disaster. Why is it happening so fast? And how will it affect the rest of the world?
At the heart of the melting in the Arctic is a simple piece of science. Ice is white, so most of the sunlight hitting it is reflected back into space.
When it melts, however, it leaves behind open ocean which, being darker, absorbs light and so gets warmer. This helps to melt yet more ice. It means that beyond a point, the ice cannot recover. The process keeps accelerating until there is no more ice to melt.
Peter Wadhams, professor of ocean physics at Cambridge University, has been watching this process for two decades, making trips under the polar ice cap in a Royal Navy submarine equipped with radar that can measure the thickness of the ice. Over that period the average thickness has fallen by 40%.
Professor Mark Serreze, from the University of Colorado’s National Snow and Ice Data Centre, who works with Holland, believes that this latest thinning represents a significant change in the destruction of the ice cap. “The key new idea is that as the ice thins it reaches a point where it becomes very vulnerable. It gets so thin that it can get broken up or just melt away very easily. Once that happens it could be very hard for it ever to recover, especially if we get more hot summers. This year is going to be crucial.”
There is some faintly good news. The melting of the Arctic ice cap will not, for example, cause a rise in sea levels – because it is already floating.
In the short term there may even be some economic opportunities. Already the possibility of new shipping routes, as well as access to the wealth of oil and other mineral resources thought to lie under the seabed, has fuelled a flurry of claims and counterclaims from the nations bordering the Arctic.
Russia has been among the most active. Last August it sent a mini-submarine to the seabed to plant a national flag directly on the North Pole. Scientists from Denmark are mapping the seabed around Greenland, a Danish dependency.
Last August, Stephen Harper, the Canadian prime minister, announced plans for an Arctic military training facility and a deep-water port in the Northwest Passage. America has sent armed coastguard cutters to patrol the waters it claims off Alaska.
All are studying the underwater geology to try to increase their claims. Under international law countries have exclusive economic rights to the sea within 200 nautical miles of their coast. If, however, they can prove that the continental shelf extends beyond that limit, the rights can stretch to 350 nautical miles.
Such an extension could be lucrative. The oil and gas fields in the Arctic ice cap are estimated by some geologists to contain very large reserves.
Others have a different dream for a warmed-up Arctic – as a new cradle of civilisation. Trausti Valsson, professor of environmental planning at the University of Iceland in Reykjavik, believes that as rising temperatures make many lower latitudes uninhabitable, so the lands around the Arctic will evolve into “the new Mediterranean”, with towns and cities springing up in Arctic Canada, Alaska and Siberia.
Such a scenario may seem unlikely now but an ice-free Arctic would have many attractions – not least being the Northwest Passage itself, which would immediately cut 5,000 miles from shipping routes between Europe and Asia via the Suez canal and whose development would prompt pressure for new ports along Canada’s northern coast.
However, most climate researchers view such thinking with despair. “It is a great irony,” said Serreze, “that the melting of the ice cap could give us access to yet more fossil fuels that will accelerate climate change even further.
“I suspect the only thing that is going to stop humanity wrecking the planet is when we get hit by some serious ecological disasters, and by then it may well be too late.”
Dieter Helm, professor of energy policy at Oxford University, believes most politicians have simply failed to grasp the scale of the problem, let alone face up to the dramatic action needed.
China, for example, plans hundreds more coal-fired power stations by 2030. America is working on plans to triple its aviation industry, a big polluter.
It is in extreme places such as the Arctic and the world’s highest and coldest places that the impact will continue to be seen first, according to scientists.
“There are 150,000-200,000 ice masses around the world and most of them are shrinking,” said Richard Armstrong, a colleague of Serreze’s. “We estimate that between 1961 and 2005 melting glaciers raised global sea levels by 20mm.”
That’s less than an inch – but represents the meltwater from only 4% of the world’s glaciers. Even those amounts are tiny compared with the Greenland ice sheet. It contains enough water to raise global sea levels by 23ft and it too is showing signs of instability.
Some researchers believe the loss of the Arctic ice cap could have profound effects on Greenland and the surrounding Arctic lands. “We can’t be certain of the exact impacts but if temperatures rise then that melts ice and permafrost over a wide area,” said Serreze.
Further south, Europe’s mountain ranges such as the Alps are already feeling the heat. About 9% of the 666 Alpine ski areas are classed as marginal and the 2C global temperature rise predicted by 2050 will put another 200 out of business. For its part, Britain can expect a warmer climate and more extremes in weather events (see panel).
At the other end of the earth, the Antarctic is relatively stable in comparison with its northern equivalent. Most of its ice is insulated by the cold Antarctic circumpolar current that keeps warm water away from its ice sheet. While some melting is occurring, the Eastern ice sheet – which accounts for about 85% of Antarctica’s ice – may even be growing, according to scientists.
In Britain, researchers at the Met Office’s Hadley Centre are more cautious than Holland in predicting how fast the Arctic ice cap will vanish – but accept it is likely to disappear.
“There is a lot of short-term variation so it could grow back for a while,” said Vicky Pope, head of climate change advice.
“The important thing is the long-term trend, which is for temperatures to rise and ice to decline. We know that it is likely to go. What we are discussing is how long it will take.”
Those who have explored the ice cap on foot have noticed the difference.
“The conditions have changed incredibly since I did my solo expedition in 2003,” said the British explorer Pen Hadow. “I have spoken to people up there this year, and the condition of the ice is much, much worse. That is only five years, which is extraordinary.”
He is organising an Arctic survey for next year to assess the problems, but the question is whether the damage is already done. “The projections are rushing towards us at high speed,” he said.
Additional reporting: Holly Watt
Losing an ice cap – what does it mean?
Destruction of wildlife
The Arctic is home to unique wildlife such as the polar bear, Arctic fox, walrus and a variety of marine mammals such as the narwhal. All are declining.
Slowing of the gulf stream
The vast ocean current that gives Britain its temperate climate is powered partly by the cooling and sinking of water under the Arctic ice shelves as they regrow each winter. Recently, however, the shelves have been smaller and thinner than in the past and there are signs the gulf stream is slowing. Such a process could radically change European climates.
A warmer Britain
Britain is cooled by winds that carry Arctic air southwards – so a warmer Arctic would mean a warmer Britain. In some ways Britain might benefit from this, with farmers able to grow a wider range of crops, seaside holidays becoming more attractive and outdoor life taking off. Scotland could be a particular beneficiary.
More storms
The same warming is likely to make summers hotter and drier and winters wetter and a lot stormier. The risk of a true hurricane hitting the UK – now once every 300 years – is likely to increase along with the frequency of other storms.
Squelchy Siberia
The steppes of western Siberia – once made of rock-hard permafrost – are starting to squelch. The region – the size of France and Germany combined – has experienced one of the fastest rates of warming in the world and is now 3C above normal. Western Siberia is full of peat and other organic matter that could release billions of tonnes of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere if they thaw.
The Global Terrestrial Network for Permafrost has found a similar warming trend throughout the permafrost zones of Alaska, Norway and northern Canada.
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