Arctic Sea Ice Practically Gone - TODAY:
University of Manitoba's Mr. David Barber just returned from an expedition to the Beaufort Sea, instead of finding hundred's of miles of 50cm thick ice - he found "rotten ice" in a recent interview Mr. Barber said:
"From a practical perspective, if you want ship across the pole, you're concerned about multiyear sea ice. You're not concerned about this rotten stuff we were doing 13 knots though. I would argue that, from a practical perspective, we almost have a seasonally ice-free Arctic now, because multiyear sea ice is the barrier to the use and development of the Arctic."
Researchers and scientists have been travelling to the arctic and Siberia to monitor temperatures of the sea, rising ocean levels, methane release. Recently ships passed through this north passage - the first time ever.
Until 2003, concentrations of methane had remained relatively stable in the Arctic Ocean and the atmosphere north of Siberia. But then they began to rise. This summer, scientists taking part in the six-week International Siberian Shelf Study discovered numerous areas, spread over thousands of square miles, where large quantities of methane — a gas with 20-times the heat-trapping power of carbon dioxide — rose from the once-frozen seabed floor.
These “methane chimneys” sometimes contained concentrations of the gas 100 times higher than background levels and were so large that clouds of gas bubbles were detected "rising up through the water column," Orjan Gustafsson of the Department of Applied Environmental Science at Stockholm University and the co-leader of the expedition, said in an interview. There was no doubt, he said, that the methane was coming from sub-sea permafrost, indicating that the sea bottom might be melting and freeing up this potent greenhouse gas.
In recent years, climate scientists have been concerned about a so-called “methane time bomb” on land, which would be detonated when warming Arctic temperatures melt permafrost and cause frozen vegetation in peat bogs and other areas to decay, releasing methane and carbon dioxide. Now come fears of a methane time bomb, part two, this one bursting from the sea floor of the shallow Arctic continental shelf. The Arctic sea floor contains a rich, decayed layer of vegetation from earlier eras when the continental shelf was not underwater.
So here it is, we are at critical tipping points NOW. It is not 50 years, 20 years, 10 years or even 2 years time - we are witnessing the collapse of the ice now. We must change our ways.
According to the World Watch report, factory farming produces over 50% of the world's Green house gases. Warming the planet. Dr. Pachauri, Chief of the United Nations IPCC noted that the largest contributor to global warming is factory farming. And has noted that the quickest and easiest way we can stop global warming is to lead a plant based diet.
Thank you Mr. Barber, Dr. Pachauri, World Watch and all NASA scientist and researchers for your messages. May our world heed the call to change and lead a plant based diet to save our Home. It is that simple. By a adopting a Vegan diet, we can be world savers. Be Love - Be Peace - Be VEGAN.
