Arctic Will Be Open For Shipping In Ten Years

The Catlin Arctic Survey has just been finished, and they found the arctic ice to be thinner than expected. The ice flows they found were only about 1.8 meters thick and were composed of "first year ice" (formed during the last winter and easily melted). Even when the ice between the flows were included in the measurement, the average ice depth was only 4.8 meters.

For shippers this is good news, because it means the Arctic Ocean will probably be ice-free enough to be open for shipping within about 10 years. It will mean shorter summer shipping routes and greater access to northern oil and gas reserves.

Professor Peter Wadhams, from the University of Cambridge, said, "The Catlin Arctic Survey data supports the new consensus view -- based on seasonal variation of ice extent and thickness, changes in temperature, winds and especially ice composition -- that the Arctic will be ice-free in summer within about 20 years, and much of that decrease will be happening within 10 years. That means you'll be able to treat the Arctic as if it were essentially an open sea in the summer and have transport across the Arctic Ocean."

But this so-called good news is accompanied by bad news that probably will make us wish the ice was back. In the longer-term, losing the permanent ice will probably result in accelerating warming, changing patterns of circulation in the oceans and atmosphere, and have as yet unknown effect on ecosystems through acidification of waters.

This is all a result of mankind pumping vast and continuing amounts of CO2 into the air, causing global climate change (or global warming as it is usually called). The summer Arctic Ocean shipping lanes will be one of the very few positive effects of this global change.

Sadly this will be accompanied by higher ocean levels, serious droughts and other ecological disasters. The melting of the permanent northern (and southern) ice should be taken as a warning that we are in the process of doing serious damage to our environment.

The problem now is not in accepting the fact that we are doing damage to the environment. Most people believe we must stop dumping CO2 into the air. The problem is that most people and political leaders seem to think we have plenty of time to deal with the problem.

We are already approaching 400ppm of CO2 in the air. Where is the tipping point (the point beyond which we cannot stop serious ecological damage)? And how soon will we be there? We may well be a lot closer than most people think.

It's time we showed some urgency, and demanded that our politicians do the same.