How can anyone, in their right mind, think that the ice melting in the Arctic is a good thing?

Question

The news today spoke of a new passage that has opened (melted on its own) in the Arctic & several countries are rushing to take advantage of it. Going to put up a fuel station for ships, new mining ventures, new route for world shipping, the list goes on. No one sees the dire results from all this melting.

Answer 1

and a silly little teen aged girl has unique insight into the perils of global warming? well, you don't. so what if all the ice in the arctic disappears? it won't affect sea levels, because there is no land under it. antarctica is getting more ice all the time. it all evens out. grow up and worry about something important

Answer 2

Silver lining to the cloud.

The trade route from China and Japan to Europe will be cut by 5000 miles, reducing shipping costs and making Europe just as dependent on cheap Chinese goods as the USA is.

Canada is already claiming the Northwest Passage and plans on taxing each ship that uses it. Of course, the rest of the world is arguing with that plan. Canada is also building a new military base up there to enforce their views. Should be interesting.

Canada, Russia, The USA and a few other nations are already claiming the ocean shelf up there for fishing, mineral and oil exploration. More conflicts that should prove interesting.

Lastly, if the Atlantic conveyor closes down due to all the ice melting, Europe could have another ice age. That should be very interesting.

As the Chinese say, "May you live in interesting times."

Answer 3

The people now repeating the claim here are telling you more effectively than I ever could. The reason is simple. The situation is complicated, as Trevor points out, and by selecting your data you can reduce it to a soundbite that suggests that climate scientists can be ignored, on the grounds that they were wrong in the past. People who buy that argument are not likely to change their minds about it; that would mean admitting their own fallibility. By the time you've explained that (a) they didn't say that, (b) actions taken materially change things, and (c) we have actually learned something since the 1970s, you are beginning to sound defensive, which is all the Singers, Rohrabachers and Inhofes of this world really need. Even so, I don't understand Flossie.She keeps on bringing this up. Early in the 1970s, Lamb thought cooling was a problem. Later, as we all learned more, he changed his mind. Shock, horror! A scientist changing his mind in the face of changing situations and new evidence! Flossie, one gathers, would never do a thing like that! Clean air acts on both sides of the Atlantic reduced global dimming, precisely as expected, and as was certainly necessary (I remember the great London fog of 1952) And one thing that was obviously true in 1970, was that we didn't understand climate well enough, and needed to learn more. Apparently, Eric has a problem with that.

Answer 4

Dragon, I wish you would have provided a link, because even though the summer arctic sea ice coverage is at minimal level (since 1978), I do not believe this reduction spells doom for the arctic environment, if you will notice in the link provided, the arctic sea ice from Greenland to Canada is still firmly in place, it is more than likely that ocean coupling from the pacific to the arctic sea is causing a retreat of the ice primarily between Alaska and Russia. The ice will almost certainly freeze back within a month or so. The circle of life in the Arctic is dependent on a certain amount of reduction of sea ice over the summer months. You may also take note of an alarming cool water mass approaching the British Isles.

http://www.osdpd.noaa.gov/PSB/EPS/SST/data/anomnight.9.13.2007.gif

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Answer 5

New trade routes, access to minerals....

When anything dies, even a planet, the scavengers benifit at least for awhile.

Melting ice opens Northwest Passage



The McClure Strait in the Canadian Arctic has been fully open since early August [ESA]


The Northwest Passage, the previously impassable shortcut between Europe and Asia in the Canadian Arctic, has now opened due to the shrinking of Arctic sea ice.

The European Space Agency (ESA) has said that sea ice has shrunk in the Arctic to its lowest level since satellite measurements began 30 years ago.

Leif Toudal Pedersen of the Danish National Space Centre said: "We have seen the ice-covered area drop to just around three million square kilometres, which is about one million square kilometres less than the previous minima of 2005 and 2006."

"There has been a reduction of the ice cover over the last 10 years of about 100,000 square km per year on average, so a drop of one million square km in just one year is extreme."

A shipping route through the Northwest Passage in the Canadian Arctic is viewed as a cheaper option to the Panama Canal for many shippers.

The most direct route of the Northwest Passage across northern Canada is now "fully navigable", while the so-called Northeast Passage along the Siberian coast "remains only partially blocked," ESA said.

While the Northeast Passage remained partially blocked, it may open sooner than expected, Pedersen said.

Sensitive region

Scientists working with the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) have warned that the Arctic is one of the most vulnerable areas for global warming, and some have predicted that the Arctic will be ice free by 2040.

Most experts say global warming is happening about twice as fast in the Arctic as elsewhere on the planet.


The orange line is said to indicate that the most direct route of
the Northwest Passage is open [ESA]
In August, William Chapman, a US Arctic specialist of the University of Illinois Champaign-Urbana, said that Arctic sea ice cover had already plunged to the lowest levels measured, 30 days before the normal point of the annual minimum.

The accelerated melting of Arctic ice is being driven by a phenomenon called albedo.

Albedo involves the reflectivity of light, as the ice sea has a bright surface, the majority of solar energy that strikes it is reflected back into space.

When sea ice melts, the dark-coloured ocean surface is exposed. Solar energy is then absorbed by the sea rather than reflected, so the oceans get warmer and temperatures rise, thus making it more difficult for new ice to form.

The dramatic loss of sea ice over the past few years has prompted competition among countries bordering the Arctic Ocean over navigation routes and the rights to its mineral-rich seabed

Answer 6

If Japan, Taiwan, Singapore and Calcuta are on the way under sea then China automatically becomes strongest economic power although losing Sanghai, Hongkong and some plain lands. It doesnt matter China likes ice melting or not.

Answer 7

If all of the ice on this planet should melt, then the water level would rise about 250 feet. Then after that the earth would be forced into another ice age.
It takes global warming to set up the motions for an ice age.
To me, that don't sound to good.

Answer 8

It might be an idea to look at who is claiming it's a good thing. You'll find primarily that it's global warming skeptics and deniers.

This is just the latest in a long line of baseless, inconsistent arguments put forward by certain skeptics in an attempt to play down the effects of global warming.

A couple of years ago many of these same people stated the world was cooling, in the face of incontrovertible evidence they quietly changed their argument to stating the world was neither warming or cooling. After falling flat on their faces again they relectuantly admitted the world was warming but claimed it was due to natural cycles.

Rather than admit there's a problem and face up to the consequences, there are many skeptics who try to divert attention away from the real issues. Claiming global warming is beneficial is one such tactic, it's the same ploy that has been unsuccessfully used many times before.

There are advantages to the opening up of the Northwest Passage but in the larger scheme of things it's dwarfed by the negative effects of global warming.

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EDIT: TO ALFRATTA

You're very good at digging holes and falling headlong into them. You only have to look at the Q and A's on this forum to see the inconsistency in the arguments put forward by the skeptics (or will you now claim that Yahoo employs a team of people to doctor the answers).

For the record - there was no global cooling scare. This issue has been raised over and over again. Despite repeated requests, the skeptics who raise this point have consistently failed to come up with any credible evidence to support their claim. There's a simple reason why they can't find such evidence - it never existed.

Interesting that you have the audacity and hypocrisy to accuse me of intellectual dishonesty and deception. Every statement I have provided on Answers can be backed up by hard scientific evidence, I'd challenge you to do the same with any of your answers.

If you like, you can pick any of my answers and I'll validate every statement made; you have to do the same for your answers. Are you up for the challenge?

Answer 9

Why do some people think that any change in weather or ice sheets have to be a bad thing. Let us not forget all of UK and most of America was UNDER a ice sheet in the past!! Was it's melting a bad thing??
good luck

Answer 10

Don't be mad its the way of nature its a good thing more jobs, more money, better life for people.If you and others thank its so bad unplug ,sell the car, move in to a tent and rub sticks together .No cant do that that makes carbon so go chew on some weeds, no that's destroying the Eco system,what will you do?