“’The temperature at the base of the ice, and therefore the current dynamics of the Greenland ice sheet is the result of the interaction between the heat flow from the earth’s interior and the temperature changes associated with glacial cycles,’ said Irina Rogozhina who initiated IceGeoHeat. ‘We found areas where the ice melts at the base next to other areas where the base is extremely cold.’ The current climate is influenced by processes that go far back into the history of Earth: the Greenland lithosphere is 2.8 to 1.7 billion years old and is only about 70 to 80 km thick under Central Greenland. The researchers believe that the coupling of models of ice dynamics with thermo-mechanical models of the solid earth allows a more accurate view of the processes that are melting the Greenland ice.’”
Even though the occurrence of melting ice may not be preventable there are other distinct courses of action that can be taken to combat the negative impacts of melting ice whether you subscribe to a belief in global warming or not. First of all, as many scientists have already suggested, it is entirely within the realm of possibility to refreeze the Arctic area.
“Two published studies explore the possibility that a technological solution could be found to the problem of global warming melting the ice caps on the North Pole. The scientist who is lead author on both claims that ‘any significant nation’ could find the resources to carry out the operation. The only significant question, he says, is whether we should. David Keith, professor of applied physics at Harvard University, is lead author on papers published in Nature Climate Change and Environmental Research Letters which speculate as to how we could restore the polar ice. He used climate models to suggest injecting reflective particles into the atmosphere could reduce the amount of sunlight reaching the Earth, engineering a regional effect that could bring ice back to the Arctic. His paper claims that by reducing the penetration of sunlight by just 0.5 per cent it could be possible to restore the sea-ice around the North Pole back to pre-industrial era levels. His second paper suggests the whole operation could be accomplished with just a few modified Gulfstream jets, costing somewhere in the region of $8 billion a year. However, while he believes action must be taken to tackle the amount of pollution spewed into the Earth’s atmosphere, he doesn’t yet advocate the kind of action his papers suggest.”
The primary focus must be to remain cognizant of all factors that can act as a catalyst for environmental change. Whether the destruction of the ozone layer due to technological tools used by humans is responsible for global warming, or if everything is just occurring in completely natural cycles, something needs to be done on a global scale in order to prolong the health of our natural ecosystem due the overpopulation and depletion of resources on a massive level. Sadly, for humans to make the impact necessary on these things it would take a significant amount of money and the people who profit from the things destroying this planet the most are the people running the governments that control all the resources. Saving the planet is no longer just a revolutionary idea, but actually requires a revolutionary overthrow of the powers that be just to become a possibility.
Written By: Michael Blain