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Melting Arctic permafrost adds to the $300 trillion economic costs of climate change

Emissions from melting permafrost could cost $43 trillion, Science Daily September 21, Source: University of Cambridge

Summary:
New analysis of the effects of melting permafrost in the Arctic points to $43 trillion in extra economic damage by the end of the next century, on top of the more than the $300 trillion economic damage already predicted. 
New analysis of the effects of melting permafrost in the Arctic points to $43 trillion in extra economic damage by the end of the next century, on top of the more than the $300 trillion economic damage already predicted.Increased greenhouse gas emissions from the release of carbon dioxide and methane contained in the Arctic permafrost could result in $43 trillion in additional economic damage by the end of the next century, according to researchers from the University of Cambridge and the University of Colorado.

In a letter published today (21 September) in the journal Nature Climate Change, the researchers have for the first time modelled the economic impact caused by melting permafrost in the Arctic to the end of the twenty-second century, on top of the damage already predicted by climate and economic models.

The Arctic is warming at a rate which is twice the global average, due to anthropogenic, or human-caused, greenhouse gas emissions. If emissions continue to rise at their current rates, Arctic warming will lead to the widespread thawing of permafrost and the release of hundreds of billions of tonnes of methane and CO2 — about 1,700 gigatonnes of carbon are held in permafrost soils in the form of frozen organic matter.

Rising emissions will result in both economic and non-economic impacts, as well as a higher chance of catastrophic events, such as the melting of the Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets, increased flooding and extreme weather. Economic impacts directly affect a country’s gross domestic product (GDP), such as the loss of agricultural output and the additional cost of air conditioning, while non-economic impacts include effects on human health and ecosystems.

The researchers’ models predict $43 trillion in economic damage could be caused by the release of these greenhouse gases, an amount equivalent to more than half the current annual output of the global economy. This brings the total predicted impact of climate change by 2200 to $369 trillion, up from $326 trillion — an increase of 13 percent……..http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/09/150921112731.htm

September 23, 2015 Posted by | ARCTIC, climate change | Leave a comment

Barents Sea – the Arctic’s radioactive legacy of Soviet nuclear weapons testing

“The Barents Sea and the coast of Novaya Zemlya were turned into a dump for solid and liquid radioactive waste. A catastrophic situation has been created. A real threat has emerged, not only to sea mammals but everything in the ocean. The ecological and genetic consequences are unpredictable.”

Novaya Zemlya, an Arctic island twice as big as Switzerland, was cleared of its inhabitants in the 1950s to make way for nuclear weapons testing.

The frigid waters of the White and Barents seas were used as a dump for spent reactors from nuclear submarines and icebreakers.

Kara-barents_seaAt top of the world, the Soviet legacy is pollution, Baltimore Sun  April 19, 1992|By Kathy Lally | Kathy Lally,Moscow Bureau ARCHANGEL, Russia — Soviet power has disappeared here, but it has left a fatal legacy.

The march toward communism cost the people of Archangel their pure air, clean water and even the health of their children. This snowy expanse near the Arctic Circle seems fouled beyond all understanding.

The damage was thorough, unrelenting and so insidious that scientists have yet to determine its extent.

The latest victims are thousands of harp seals dying of cancer from the harm the former Soviet Union inflicted upon itself and its unsuspecting people as it moved to industrialization and superpower status. Scientists suspect that these beautiful animals with the large imploring eyes are being killed by years of irresponsible Soviet nuclear testing and dumping.

Once the seals were threatened only by hunters who club the pups to death for their luxurious, snow-white pelts. Now those that survive migrate through water so contaminated that environmentalists imagine it fairly crackles with radioactivity.

Scientists began taking blood and tissue samples from the seals two years ago, after more than a million dead starfish washed up along the White Sea coast.

They are still unsure of what killed the starfish, but the study of the seals has revealed blood pathologies consistent with long-term toxic or radioactive exposure.

“This is a problem so big and serious it goes beyond us,” says Yuri K. Timoshenko, director of the marine mammal laboratory at the Polar Scientific Research Institute here. Continue reading →

August 31, 2015 Posted by | ARCTIC, oceans | 2 Comments

Is Fukushima radiation affecting Arctic wildlife?

UNIVERSITY OF ALASKA SCIENTISTS: FUKUSHIMA RADIATION MAY BE MAKING ALASKA SEALS seal sickSICK  http://www.infowars.com/university-of-alaska-scientists-fukushima-radiation-may-be-making-alaska-seals-sick/  Washington’s Blog January 26, 2014

American sailors on the USS Reagan got really sick after having snowball fights with radioactive snow blowing off of the coasts of Fukushima. University of Alaska professors Doug Dasher, John Kelley, Gay Sheffield, and Raphaela Stimmelmayr theorize that radioactive snow might have also caused Alaska’s seals to become sick er plant resulting in a major nuclear accident that included a large release of airborne radionuclides into theenvironment.

Within five days of the accident atmospheric air masses carrying Fukushima radiation were transiting into the northern Bering and Chukchi seas. During summer 2011 it became evidentto coastal communities and wildlife management agencies that there was a novel disease outbreak occurring in several species of Arctic ice-associated seals. Gross symptoms associated with the disease included lethargy, no new hair growth, andskin lesions, with the majority of the outbreak reports occurring between the Nome and Barrow region. NOAA and USFWS declared an Alaska Northern Pinnipeds Usual Mortality Event (UME) in late winter of 2011.

The ongoing Alaska 2011 Northern Pinnipeds UME investigation continues to explore a mix of potential etiologies (infectious, endocrine, toxins, nutritious etc.), including radioactivity. Currently, the underlying etiology remains undetermined [i.e. scientists don’t yet know what caused the seals’ sickness, but they think it might have been Fukushima radiation]. We present results on gamma analysis (cesium 134 and 137) of muscle tissue from control and diseased seals, and discuss wildlife health implications from different possible routes of exposure to Fukushima fallout to ice seals.  Continue reading →

July 19, 2015 Posted by | ARCTIC, oceans | Leave a comment

Opposition in Greenland to Australian rare earths/uranium mining project

Uranium opponents look to other sectors for job growth Opponents of uranium mining in southern Greenland have put forward a list of proposals they believe can create jobs and in the process make a highly contested mine unnecessary The Arctic Journal, May 13, 2015 – By Kevin McGwin In the town of Narsaq, on Greenland’s southern tip, debate is coming to a head over whether residents can make do without a near-by mine that will create jobs, but which some fear will make the town unliveable.

The concerns come as Greenland Minerals and Energy, an Australia-based mining outfit, closes in on final approval to begin production rare earths, a mineral vital for use in modern technologies……

in order to extract rare earths, GME will also need to mine uranium as a by-product, and that has raised fears, particularly among farmers, sheep farmers and those making a living off tourism, that dust from the open-pit facility will taint the region’s soil and water, and in the process spoil the region’s image.

Instead representatives from Urani Naamik, an anti-uranium group, together with IA, the main opposition party, have put forward 17 proposals they say could help to stimulate job growth in other sectors of the economy, including agriculture, fishing and bottling of glacial meltwater.

Until 2013, mining uranium in Greenland was explicitly banned. A law change opened up the possibility for such operations to be approved, but the issue remains divisive.

“We’re told that without a mine out at Kvanefjeld, Narsaq will die. We say that Narsaq will die if the build a mine it will kill Narsaq,” Mariane Paviasen, a Urani Naamik representative, said in April…….

Another criticism of the Kvanefjeld mine is that GME intends to dump tailings, a miner’s term for unwanted material, into a lake close by the facility. Berthlesen defends the process, calling it the best way to protect the surrounding area against possible radiation from the tailings.

Urani Naamik, however, wants an independent study looking into the mine’s environmental impact to be conducted. …..http://arcticjournal.com/oil-minerals/1583/uranium-opponents-look-other-sectors-job-growth

May 16, 2015 Posted by | ARCTIC, RARE EARTHS, Uranium | Leave a comment

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