Why Was There Tension at This Year’s Meeting?

Japan and other countries like Norway and Iceland are currently killing whales, despite dangerously low numbers for certain species. This has triggered significant disapproval from countries like Australia, who are vehemently opposed to whaling. Japan claims that they kill approximately 1,000 whales each year for scientific purposes. Many countries and environmentalists view this explanation as a blatant lie. They think Japan simply wants to kill whales so that they can sell and eat the meat (Iceland and Norway just want to sell it to Japan it seems). Angered by international criticism of their whaling practices, Japan has threatened to withdraw as a member nation of the International Whaling Commission, barring the condition that countries agree to allow sustainable whaling of abundant whale species.

What Were the Outcomes of This Year’s Meeting?

After this week’s meeting, it seems hard to think of there being much success to talk about. Things got off to a good start as Chile announced that they were initiating a permanent ban on whaling. A proposal by several Latin American countries to create a South Atlantic Whale Sanctuary was unfortunately withdrawn at the urging of people like William Hogarth. The only other major events were

1. a vote that barely blocked Greenland from hunting 10 more humpback whales per year. 36 member nations voted against the proposal, and 29 voted for it.
2. the creation of sub-set of member nations to work on building consensus on contentious issues over the next year.

After the meeting, Reuters ran an article with the title: “Whales lose, Japan wins as whaling meeting ends.” The article includes various quotes of people involved in the meeting, and basically confirms this author’s suspicion that the meeting was largely a bust. AFP quoted William Hogarth as saying he was “very pleased” with the outcome of the meeting. His effort to build consensus at the meeting by doing nothing was, in fact, an incredibly stupid strategy. Japan’s representative was quoted after the meeting as saying “the world is witnessing the death of an international organization.” If Japan is not going to get on board the Hogarth Good Will Express, then what’s the point?

I personally am not opposed to finding a sustainable whaling solution that seeks some middle ground. Perhaps there are some species of whales that are abundant enough to allow for a minimal, token amount of whaling. Having a meeting where nothing of importance is discussed though, in my mind is just plain stupid. Hopefully William Hogarth has lost his chance at chairing any more of the International Whaling Commission’s meetings.

Next year’s International Whaling Commission meeting will be held in Portugal, and hopefully Portugal will announce a permanent ban on Hogarth chairing any more meetings.

Read More about the Meeting in Chile, and Issues Concerning Whales:

• Chile Declares Permanent Ban on Whaling, Japan Pressured to Follow Suit

• Greenpeace Versus Japan: Killing Not Necessary for Whale Research

• Scientists Use GPS to Spy on Whale Watch Tours, Uncover Ugly Secret

Photo Credit: Allan Ferguson on Flickr under a Creative Commons license

This report adds weight to a growing number of reports and findings that are pointing to 2008’s summer as a turning point for the Arctic region; one where there could be no sea-ice at all.

According to the WWF’s report (PDF); “Recently observed changes are happening at rates significantly faster than predicted” by the 2005 Arctic Climate Impact Assessment (ACIA) and last year’s report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

This has led many experts to believe that we are close to a “tipping point,” where if something is not done immediately, sudden and irreversible changes could take place.

Mark Serreze, of the US National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) is similarly wary of the next summer to hit the Northern Hemisphere, saying that “The set-up for this summer is disturbing.”

In a New Scientist article, Serreze notes that, though the ice has expanded to a size greater this March than March 07, it is made up primarily of very young ice, and on average, is declining by 44,000 km² per year (see graph to left).This is essentially just as bad as there being less ice growth, young ice is not able to withstand the rigors cast upon it during a summer that older ice is.

“There is this thin first-year ice even at the North Pole at the moment,” says Serreze. “This raises the spectre – the possibility that you could become ice free at the North Pole this year.”

Despite all reports though – and be wary of anything you hear in the popular media – a North Pole without sea ice is not in itself significant. To scientists, Serreze notes, “this is just another point on the globe” The worrying point is the lack of multi-year ice buildup.

For example, on average, each year around half of the first year ice formed between September and March, melts during the summer. Or, looking at it from the other side, half stays around for another year. In 2007, almost all of that first year ice disappeared.

Worse for summer ’08 is the fact that the atmospheric phenomenon known as the Arctic oscillation kicked in to its “positive” phase during this past winter. The AO is known to generate winds which push multi-year ice out of the Arctic, and along the east coast of Greenland.

All in all, unless we acquire ourselves a “cooler, more cyclonic pattern” these next few months, we’re going to lose a lot of that ice.

Graph courtesy of NSIDC

More from the GO Network

Younger Sea Ice Bad for Planet

Link 1:  http://cires.colorado.edu/science/groups/steffen/greenland/melt2005/

More recently there has been a flurry of activity in the media, spurred on by a comment or two from James Hansen, (GISS), alleging recent alarming increase in the rate of melting, but most of it being in vague terms, with some saying double the rate and some triple, relative to something not elucidated.

One of the sources of this seems to be the following November 2007 release from NASA:

Link 2: http://www.nasa.gov/vision/earth/environment/greenland_recordhigh.html

Here is the Intro’ for that release:    “A new NASA-supported study reports that 2007 marked an overall rise in the melting trend over the entire [sic] Greenland ice sheet and, remarkably, melting in high-altitude areas was greater than ever at 150 percent more than average…”

This seems a very strange way of putting it….for instance in 2002; a declared record high; it was simply stated as the highest since 1991 ….simple! (Later, and similarly, 2005 became legend as higher than 2002, but the data says no!)

“Tragically” though, 2007 was a notably LOWER melt, than in seven major previous years over two prior decades, depending on source thus: {1987}, {1991}, 1997, 1998, 2002, 2004 and 2005; {for 1987 & 1991, see link1 graph}; for the other years, see link 2 graph.

In other words, the 2007 “alarming” recent melting, although more than that in 2006, was actually typical of 1987, twenty years ago!

Of course, the “disappointing” number for 2007 does not make exciting news, so rather than say it was a flop, they found that it was better to say it was higher than the average from 1988 to 2006.

(Why average from1988!? Uh? Maybe because there was a statistical “benefit” in choosing 1998 - 2006, i.e. 1987 was avoided as a high melt year and 2006 was a low melt year?…. very convenient!)

They also failed to mention that there was a well instrumented warmer period in Greenland, especially 1920-1930, that should be compared with today, concerning melt potential. However melt data in those warmer times is not available; find more at:

http://bobfj.greenoptions.com/

Funny business this; why don’t they talk straight to us mortals!

There's no need to rehash what we already know. The Arctic is melting. It's a fact that we are going to have to come to grips with. Shipping lanes are being changed, animals and natives are being displaced, and ice is disappearing faster than my friends when I attempt to swing the conversation away from bodily functions to politics.

So it's no surprise to see five of the nations likely to be hardest hit up north — Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Norway and Iceland — come together and issue a cry for help.

"The Arctic and the world cannot wait any longer," environmental ministers from the five nations said in a joint statement after talks in Oslo. "The climate is hurtling towards a turning point after which irreversible processes will have been set in motion."

Facts: As climate change skepticism has developed into a full-blown industry, a number of myths have filtered out about historical patterns of warming and cooling: just mention the "Little Ice Age" or the "Medieval Warm Period" to your favorite skeptic, and let 'em go...

As a history buff, I always found today's myth fascinating. As Coby Beck at Grist notes, Viking leader Eric the Red gave Greenland its name not because it was lush and green, but because he wanted folks back home to think it was:

Greenland was called Greenland by Erik the Red (was he red?), who was in exile and wanted to attract people to a new colony. He thought you should give a land a good name so people would want to go there! It likely was a bit warmer when he landed for the first time than it was when the last settlers starved due to a number of factors -- climate change, or at least some bad weather, a major one.

But it was never lush, and their existence was always harsh and meager, especially due to the Viking's disdain for other peoples and ways of living. They attempted to live a European lifestyle in an arctic climate, side by side with Inuit who easily outlasted them. They starved surrounded by oceans and yet never ate fish! (Note: this was not a typical European behavior, and is a bit of a mystery to this day.)