Importance of Arctic sea in climate cycle highlighted
Philip Sutton, co-author with David Spratt, of the book Climate Code Red recently gave a presentation on climate change in the faculty. Philip highlighted the global importance of the Arctic sea ice in the overall operations of the world’s climate cycle, the unprecedented rate at which it is melting and the critical impacts this has on climate change.
Philip confirmed that the Arctic sea ice offers a highly reflective surface which redirects most of the sun’s rays out of the atmosphere. However, increasing sea temperatures and the rapid melting of the Arctic ice mean that the reflective properties of the ice are diminishing.
We are now looking at a situation where, over the past 30 years, the coverage of old ice has decreased by around 80% and has been replaced with new thin ice and at this trajectory it appears quite feasible that there will be no summer Arctic sea ice in three to five years. This in turn will lead to the melting of the permafrosts which have the potential of releasing huge amounts of methane and Co2 that has been frozen and trapped for ages, the anticipated consequences are not good for life on earth.
According to Phillip events in the Arctic in the northern summer of 2007 have profound consequences for climate policy. Because we are primarily guided by the need to advocate actions that are capable of fully solving the problem, we can only conclude from the available evidence that if we are to stop global warming becoming “dangerous”, it is not a question of how much higher will be OK, but rather by how much we need to lower the existing temperature if we are to return our planet to the safe-climate zone.
Please consider the analogy, if planet earth was a human patient, the Arctic sea ice
represents the brain and the North Atlantic Oscillation the central nervous system, then
the patient’s condition is critical and deteriorating.
This information has been drawn from the speaker’s presentation and Climate Code
Red: the case for a sustainability emergency. For more information and a sneak preview
of the June 2008 publication Climate Code Red: the case for emergency action,
visit http://www.climatecodered.net/
The BusEco Sustainability site offers staff resources for understanding climate change
and sustainability and integrating this into course curriculum
http://www.buseco.monash.edu.au/sustainability/
Photo: Philip Sutton highlighted the global importance of the Arctic sea.
