7 ms·

Iceland commemorates first glacier lost to climate change

85 points by lelf 7y ago

adrianN 7y ago
And with the worldwide loss of ice and snow, less sunlight is reflected, leading to more warming. And yet no country is doing what's necessary to prevent catastrophe.
- skilled 7y ago
  It's naive to say a 'country' is responsible for this. In the end, people like you and me have to decide what the future is going to look like. But who has time or integrity to stand up against things like climate change, right?
  - cyphar 7y ago
    The only people who have enough power to solve the problem are the leaders of a handful of countries. So, while obviously only people can solve the problem, it's only a select few people that actually can do anything about it. You or I have no more power than that which democracy affords us.
    - lazyjones 7y ago
      > You or I have no more power than that which democracy affords us. Which is very good in many ways, one of which being that we get scared too easily from headlines and tend to forget about many other pressing issues that all have to be taken care of all the time.
    - gridlockd 7y ago
      The only people who have enough power to solve the problem are the people building better technology. If you can't replace gasoline with something equally affordable, people will not accept it. Most leaders - at least in democratic countries - don't actually have a lot of power to do things that the people don't want them to do. Just look at Macron attempting to raise taxes on gasoline. He wishes he had approval ratings as "good" as those of Donald Trump. People are rioting in the streets. Now perhaps if you have a really wealthy country like Norway, you can afford to subsidize electric vehicles or renewable energy. The same won't work for other countries, especially emerging economies.
      - TeMPOraL 7y ago
        > The only people who have enough power to solve the problem are the people building better technology. Not building. Funding. The problem with technological solutions to global problems isn't lack of technology, or science. It's lack of funding for R&D, deployment and maintenance.
    - RickJWagner 7y ago
      In the end, it will be the individual who makes the final decision. And we are going to decide to be comfortable now, rather than save the current state of the planet for future generations. I am a pick-up-the-litter kind of guy, but I am not going to do without air conditioning. Leanardo DiCaprio feels passionately about climate change, but he's not giving up his private jet flights. Barack Obama feels strongly too, but he's not going to give up yacht vacations. Human nature dictates the final result. Perhaps we'd better devote our energies towards ways to deal with the inevitable. Because nobody's going to voluntarily live 100 years in the past for the benefit of those 100 years in the future.
      - cyphar 7y ago
        Only 100 companies are responsible for 71% of global emissions[1]. Individual decisions have such a vanishingly small impact on the environment that it's actually counter-productive to make this type of argument. People have a limited amount of time to spend on different aspects of their lives. If you dedicate all of your "saving the planet" time to minor personal changes, you won't have the time to do what is actually necessary -- push for political change which will actually address the problem. Yes, you aren't saying "don't try to solve the bigger problem (lack of action by governments)" but you are saying "focus on the smaller problems (what type of laundry liquid you use)" -- which would inevitably result in the bigger problems being neglected by most people. [1]: https://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2017/jul/10/100-fossil-fuel-companies-investors-responsible-71-global-emissions-cdp-study-climate-change https://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2017/jul/10...
        RickJWagner 7y ago
        The 100 companies include Shell, BP, Chevron, etc. They are only producing the means for abusing the environment-- it's the end users that are doing the damage. I suppose you could argue that if we outlawed petroleum production that it wouldn't allow the abusers anything to work with, but it would also deny the world of most of the progress made in the last 150 years.
  - ComputerGuru 7y ago
    Respectfully but very firmly disagree. It’s the role of nation-state actors to protect against exactly things like this (tragedy of the commons) where everyone is individually incentivized to act against the common good.
    - danarmak 7y ago
      Every nation is also individually incentivized to act against the common good of all nations.
      - thethirdone 7y ago
        The difference is that nations can meaningfully negotiate with each other. Individuals don't really have a way of widespread negotiation other than elected representatives.
      - ComputerGuru 7y ago
        Which is ostensibly why things like the (laughably impotent) UN exist.
      - adrianN 7y ago
        Being a leader in technology that the whole world has to deploy in the next twenty years can be an advantage.
    - TeMPOraL 7y ago
      Yes and no. Nation states resolve coordination problems of their citizens. But while being (somewhat) coordinated within, they're still in regular competition with each other. To get nation states to not themselves fall into geopolitical tragedies of the commons, you'd need a global government above all nations.
  - adrianN 7y ago
    Politicians are the ones who decide for or against a carbon tax. Politicians also decide laws where you can put wind turbines and solar panels, whether to build roads or rails, whether to allow buildings without insulation and with fossil fuel heating. If I did everything I reasonably could I might be able to produce a third of the carbon footprint of an average citizen of my country, it's literally impossible for me to go down to zero without living as a hunter-gatherer in the woods. The hunter-gatherer lifestyle doesn't feed eight billion people, so not even that is a scaleable solution.
    - frutiger 7y ago
      Perhaps if you became a politician you would get their perspective.
      - adrianN 7y ago
        If I became a politician today it would certainly take me more than ten years before I got anywhere further than my local council. By then we already used up our carbon budget.
        themaninthedark 7y ago
        "You mean, it comes from a world of lizards?" "No," said Ford, who by this time was a little more rational and coherent than he had been, having finally had the coffee forced down him, "nothing so simple. Nothing anything like so straightforward. On its world, the people are people. The leaders are lizards. The people hate the lizards and the lizards rule the people." "Odd," said Arthur, "I thought you said it was a democracy." "I did," said Ford. "It is." "So," said Arthur, hoping he wasn't sounding ridiculously obtuse, "why don't people get rid of the lizards?" "It honestly doesn't occur to them," said Ford. "They've all got the vote, so they all pretty much assume that the government they've voted in more or less approximates to the government they want." "You mean they actually vote for the lizards?" "Oh yes," said Ford with a shrug, "of course." "But," said Arthur, going for the big one again, "why?" "Because if they didn't vote for a lizard," said Ford, "the wrong lizard might get in. Things like zoning, light rail, solar and wind allowance are all very local politics. Your local council is where the change is needed.
  - close04 7y ago
    It is the responsibility of all countries, of course. The problem is that the countries most willing to do something are also the ones with the least influence over the matter. On a global scale Iceland for example can do very little to offset the trends. It takes the buy-in from the biggest countries before something meaningful can happen.
  - weliveindetail 7y ago
    https://rebellion.earth/ https://rebellion.earth/
- baxtr 7y ago
  There is so much to worry about these days, I don’t know where to start and what to do. Some examples - plastic waste, they found micro plastic in artic snow, WTF - topsoil depletion, we are going to be so many more people, we’ll need food, at the same time we lose fertile land continuously - groundwater depletion, many dry countries export water in the form of food. What happens when there is nothing left? Global warming? Yes that too...
  - scarygliders 7y ago
    Indeed there are so many things one could be concerned about.. - An asteroid could wipe out all life on Earth. - The supervolcano known as Yellowstone might erupt. Again. - Supernova gamma ray burst might hit the planet, sterilising it (and us). - A massive and catastrophic solar flare hitting Earth. - If Carl Sagan is correct, and extra-terrestrial intelligent life does exist, and they turn out to be belligerant, Earth could be attacked. - A global pandemic caused by some super-disease suddenly emerging. And this is 100% going to happen: our own life-giving star, Sol, WILL destroy the planet in a few billion years time. Also 100% going to happen; you will die at some point between now and the next 70 or less years, depending on your age, genetics, health, propensity for dangerous sports or activites, whether you look out for fast moving vehicles whilst crossing the road, whether or not an aircraft falls on you. And so on. Of course, we humans should try and keep Spaceship Earth in good running condition. Finding ways of reducing waste and keeping our environment clean and healthy is of utmost importance. As for Global Warming? This is where I trigger potential downvotes - please don't do this just because I might disagree with you, it's just not cricket old bean. I am yet to be convinced that human beings are the main cause of Global Warming. This has, despite any protestations to the contrary, not been proven. Global Warming theory is still just a theory, and just to head this one off at the pass, no, pointing out that "gravity is also just a theory" is a fallacious argument. I am yet to be convinced human beings are responsible for a changing global climate. Global Climate Change is a thing, yes, and that climate has been changing since the formation of planet Earth 4.54 ± 0.05 billion years ago. I don't think humans can possibly affect this planet in terms of /global/ Climate Change in any measurable magnitude. There are forces which affect and cause /global/ Climate Change which are vastly more powerful than us mere humans. Humans can affect their local climate for sure - a city has a different local climate compared to an equivalent area of wildland. All that tarmac and concrete does have an effect locally. But to suggest that the human race - which inhabits a small percentage of the landcover of a planet of which two thirds of its surface is water - is the main cause of Climate Change, reeks of hubris and agenda. The best thing we humans can do is to put things into perspective, deal with a dynamic, ever-changing global climate which is out of our control, try our best to keep the place tidy - we do need more effort on that front - do what we humans are great at doing which is coming up with great and new technologies (I'm looking at you, fusion power to be a workable thing within my lifetime!), and make the most of our individual limited time on this Earth by following your aspirations and fulfilling your potential.
- krona 7y ago
  What if we painted the mountain white instead?
  - adrianN 7y ago
    Check how big Greenland and the Arctic are. You'd need a lot of paint.
  - hjnilsson 7y ago
    Well, due to dust, they won't stay white for long. Good thing about snow / glaciers is they are repainted every week! Doing it for entire mountains manually would be unrealistic.
  - TeMPOraL 7y ago
    At this point, if you want to play with geoengineering, dispersing particulates into upper atmosphere and placing Sun shields in high orbit would probably be a better idea.
    - chr1 7y ago
      Using hot air balloons as sun shades would be much cheaper than satellites in high orbit. And balloons would give more flexibility as they can be used to heat the air above clouds and disperse them when needed. But most importantly they can be used to improve actual weather, so even the people that are not interested in abstract climate change would support them.
lazyjones 7y ago
Our thoughts and prayers are with this former patch of ice on the harsh island of Iceland.
FartyMcFarter 7y ago
> Sigurdsson said he feared "that nothing can be done to stop it." I've seen this claim a lot in the last few years. Good news everyone! We don't need to stop global warming anymore.
- Sharlin 7y ago
  That basically what the Trump administration is now saying.
kipqi 7y ago
This topic is to HN what bees was to Reddit. An endless stream of karma-grabbing comments that don't really add anything new to the conversation.
Inu 7y ago
A different perspective: "Björnsson describes how Ok shrank rapidly during the 20th century, as shown by its area on various maps: 38 sq. Km. in 1901, 15 in 1910, 5 in 1945, and under one Km. in 2016. Most of this was before anthropogenic warming became the dominant cause of warming. [...] If Ok died during the Medieval Warm Period, it was born again during the Little Ice Age. It may have lived and died countless times during its long life. Its latest death is another example of weather converted into propaganda." https://fabiusmaximus.com/2019/07/24/we-killed-okjokull/ https://fabiusmaximus.com/2019/07/24/we-killed-okjokull/
- Retric 7y ago
  Shrinking is not a linear process that would have continued indefinitely at 1910 temperature levels.
- lozenge 7y ago
  There was anthropogenic warming even before the first data point, and without the anthropogenic warming the glacier may have regrown in colder years, but this didn't happen.
- ldoughty 7y ago
  The events of climate change are well documented. The fact the media distorts the message, or that right wing media latches onto the 2 people in the field that are funded by oil companies doesn't really change that. Look at warning tends for the last 500 years, what has happened in the last 70 is sharper than anything seen in the past short of world-ending events like an asteroid strike or super volcano (which are admittedly sharper, but that climate effected by the event, not a slow increase by human factors) This different perspective website seems to exist to promote Amazon wish lists and affiliate links and provides barely more digging than a typical news article (some of which seems to be cherry picking statements or titles)... so I will continue to stick with the belief of 97% of scientists, most of which are not financially invested/dependent on the work they produce, that says we are having a dramatic effect.
tzs 7y ago
Suppose we manage to stop increasing the greenhouse gas levels in the atmosphere, and then even manage to lower them back to, say mid 20th century levels. Will the glaciers come back? Or does forming glaciers, as opposed to just maintaining them once formed, require another ice age?

85 points by lelf 7y ago

And with the worldwide loss of ice and snow, less sunlight is reflected, leading to more warming. And yet no country is doing what's necessary to prevent catastrophe.

skilled 7y ago
It's naive to say a 'country' is responsible for this. In the end, people like you and me have to decide what the future is going to look like. But who has time or integrity to stand up against things like climate change, right?
- cyphar 7y ago
  The only people who have enough power to solve the problem are the leaders of a handful of countries. So, while obviously only people can solve the problem, it's only a select few people that actually can do anything about it. You or I have no more power than that which democracy affords us.
  - lazyjones 7y ago
    > You or I have no more power than that which democracy affords us. Which is very good in many ways, one of which being that we get scared too easily from headlines and tend to forget about many other pressing issues that all have to be taken care of all the time.
  - gridlockd 7y ago
    The only people who have enough power to solve the problem are the people building better technology. If you can't replace gasoline with something equally affordable, people will not accept it. Most leaders - at least in democratic countries - don't actually have a lot of power to do things that the people don't want them to do. Just look at Macron attempting to raise taxes on gasoline. He wishes he had approval ratings as "good" as those of Donald Trump. People are rioting in the streets. Now perhaps if you have a really wealthy country like Norway, you can afford to subsidize electric vehicles or renewable energy. The same won't work for other countries, especially emerging economies.
    - TeMPOraL 7y ago
      > The only people who have enough power to solve the problem are the people building better technology. Not building. Funding. The problem with technological solutions to global problems isn't lack of technology, or science. It's lack of funding for R&D, deployment and maintenance.
  - RickJWagner 7y ago
    In the end, it will be the individual who makes the final decision. And we are going to decide to be comfortable now, rather than save the current state of the planet for future generations. I am a pick-up-the-litter kind of guy, but I am not going to do without air conditioning. Leanardo DiCaprio feels passionately about climate change, but he's not giving up his private jet flights. Barack Obama feels strongly too, but he's not going to give up yacht vacations. Human nature dictates the final result. Perhaps we'd better devote our energies towards ways to deal with the inevitable. Because nobody's going to voluntarily live 100 years in the past for the benefit of those 100 years in the future.
    - cyphar 7y ago
      Only 100 companies are responsible for 71% of global emissions[1]. Individual decisions have such a vanishingly small impact on the environment that it's actually counter-productive to make this type of argument. People have a limited amount of time to spend on different aspects of their lives. If you dedicate all of your "saving the planet" time to minor personal changes, you won't have the time to do what is actually necessary -- push for political change which will actually address the problem. Yes, you aren't saying "don't try to solve the bigger problem (lack of action by governments)" but you are saying "focus on the smaller problems (what type of laundry liquid you use)" -- which would inevitably result in the bigger problems being neglected by most people. [1]: https://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2017/jul/10/100-fossil-fuel-companies-investors-responsible-71-global-emissions-cdp-study-climate-change https://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2017/jul/10...
      - RickJWagner 7y ago
        The 100 companies include Shell, BP, Chevron, etc. They are only producing the means for abusing the environment-- it's the end users that are doing the damage. I suppose you could argue that if we outlawed petroleum production that it wouldn't allow the abusers anything to work with, but it would also deny the world of most of the progress made in the last 150 years.
- ComputerGuru 7y ago
  Respectfully but very firmly disagree. It’s the role of nation-state actors to protect against exactly things like this (tragedy of the commons) where everyone is individually incentivized to act against the common good.
  - danarmak 7y ago
    Every nation is also individually incentivized to act against the common good of all nations.
    - thethirdone 7y ago
      The difference is that nations can meaningfully negotiate with each other. Individuals don't really have a way of widespread negotiation other than elected representatives.
    - ComputerGuru 7y ago
      Which is ostensibly why things like the (laughably impotent) UN exist.
    - adrianN 7y ago
      Being a leader in technology that the whole world has to deploy in the next twenty years can be an advantage.
  - TeMPOraL 7y ago
    Yes and no. Nation states resolve coordination problems of their citizens. But while being (somewhat) coordinated within, they're still in regular competition with each other. To get nation states to not themselves fall into geopolitical tragedies of the commons, you'd need a global government above all nations.
- adrianN 7y ago
  Politicians are the ones who decide for or against a carbon tax. Politicians also decide laws where you can put wind turbines and solar panels, whether to build roads or rails, whether to allow buildings without insulation and with fossil fuel heating. If I did everything I reasonably could I might be able to produce a third of the carbon footprint of an average citizen of my country, it's literally impossible for me to go down to zero without living as a hunter-gatherer in the woods. The hunter-gatherer lifestyle doesn't feed eight billion people, so not even that is a scaleable solution.
  - frutiger 7y ago
    Perhaps if you became a politician you would get their perspective.
    - adrianN 7y ago
      If I became a politician today it would certainly take me more than ten years before I got anywhere further than my local council. By then we already used up our carbon budget.
      - themaninthedark 7y ago
        "You mean, it comes from a world of lizards?" "No," said Ford, who by this time was a little more rational and coherent than he had been, having finally had the coffee forced down him, "nothing so simple. Nothing anything like so straightforward. On its world, the people are people. The leaders are lizards. The people hate the lizards and the lizards rule the people." "Odd," said Arthur, "I thought you said it was a democracy." "I did," said Ford. "It is." "So," said Arthur, hoping he wasn't sounding ridiculously obtuse, "why don't people get rid of the lizards?" "It honestly doesn't occur to them," said Ford. "They've all got the vote, so they all pretty much assume that the government they've voted in more or less approximates to the government they want." "You mean they actually vote for the lizards?" "Oh yes," said Ford with a shrug, "of course." "But," said Arthur, going for the big one again, "why?" "Because if they didn't vote for a lizard," said Ford, "the wrong lizard might get in. Things like zoning, light rail, solar and wind allowance are all very local politics. Your local council is where the change is needed.
- close04 7y ago
  It is the responsibility of all countries, of course. The problem is that the countries most willing to do something are also the ones with the least influence over the matter. On a global scale Iceland for example can do very little to offset the trends. It takes the buy-in from the biggest countries before something meaningful can happen.
- weliveindetail 7y ago
  https://rebellion.earth/ https://rebellion.earth/
baxtr 7y ago
There is so much to worry about these days, I don’t know where to start and what to do. Some examples - plastic waste, they found micro plastic in artic snow, WTF - topsoil depletion, we are going to be so many more people, we’ll need food, at the same time we lose fertile land continuously - groundwater depletion, many dry countries export water in the form of food. What happens when there is nothing left? Global warming? Yes that too...
- scarygliders 7y ago
  Indeed there are so many things one could be concerned about.. - An asteroid could wipe out all life on Earth. - The supervolcano known as Yellowstone might erupt. Again. - Supernova gamma ray burst might hit the planet, sterilising it (and us). - A massive and catastrophic solar flare hitting Earth. - If Carl Sagan is correct, and extra-terrestrial intelligent life does exist, and they turn out to be belligerant, Earth could be attacked. - A global pandemic caused by some super-disease suddenly emerging. And this is 100% going to happen: our own life-giving star, Sol, WILL destroy the planet in a few billion years time. Also 100% going to happen; you will die at some point between now and the next 70 or less years, depending on your age, genetics, health, propensity for dangerous sports or activites, whether you look out for fast moving vehicles whilst crossing the road, whether or not an aircraft falls on you. And so on. Of course, we humans should try and keep Spaceship Earth in good running condition. Finding ways of reducing waste and keeping our environment clean and healthy is of utmost importance. As for Global Warming? This is where I trigger potential downvotes - please don't do this just because I might disagree with you, it's just not cricket old bean. I am yet to be convinced that human beings are the main cause of Global Warming. This has, despite any protestations to the contrary, not been proven. Global Warming theory is still just a theory, and just to head this one off at the pass, no, pointing out that "gravity is also just a theory" is a fallacious argument. I am yet to be convinced human beings are responsible for a changing global climate. Global Climate Change is a thing, yes, and that climate has been changing since the formation of planet Earth 4.54 ± 0.05 billion years ago. I don't think humans can possibly affect this planet in terms of /global/ Climate Change in any measurable magnitude. There are forces which affect and cause /global/ Climate Change which are vastly more powerful than us mere humans. Humans can affect their local climate for sure - a city has a different local climate compared to an equivalent area of wildland. All that tarmac and concrete does have an effect locally. But to suggest that the human race - which inhabits a small percentage of the landcover of a planet of which two thirds of its surface is water - is the main cause of Climate Change, reeks of hubris and agenda. The best thing we humans can do is to put things into perspective, deal with a dynamic, ever-changing global climate which is out of our control, try our best to keep the place tidy - we do need more effort on that front - do what we humans are great at doing which is coming up with great and new technologies (I'm looking at you, fusion power to be a workable thing within my lifetime!), and make the most of our individual limited time on this Earth by following your aspirations and fulfilling your potential.
krona 7y ago
What if we painted the mountain white instead?
- adrianN 7y ago
  Check how big Greenland and the Arctic are. You'd need a lot of paint.
- hjnilsson 7y ago
  Well, due to dust, they won't stay white for long. Good thing about snow / glaciers is they are repainted every week! Doing it for entire mountains manually would be unrealistic.
- TeMPOraL 7y ago
  At this point, if you want to play with geoengineering, dispersing particulates into upper atmosphere and placing Sun shields in high orbit would probably be a better idea.
  - chr1 7y ago
    Using hot air balloons as sun shades would be much cheaper than satellites in high orbit. And balloons would give more flexibility as they can be used to heat the air above clouds and disperse them when needed. But most importantly they can be used to improve actual weather, so even the people that are not interested in abstract climate change would support them.

lazyjones 7y ago

Our thoughts and prayers are with this former patch of ice on the harsh island of Iceland.

FartyMcFarter 7y ago

> Sigurdsson said he feared "that nothing can be done to stop it." I've seen this claim a lot in the last few years. Good news everyone! We don't need to stop global warming anymore.

Sharlin 7y ago
That basically what the Trump administration is now saying.

kipqi 7y ago

This topic is to HN what bees was to Reddit. An endless stream of karma-grabbing comments that don't really add anything new to the conversation.

Inu 7y ago

A different perspective: "Björnsson describes how Ok shrank rapidly during the 20th century, as shown by its area on various maps: 38 sq. Km. in 1901, 15 in 1910, 5 in 1945, and under one Km. in 2016. Most of this was before anthropogenic warming became the dominant cause of warming. [...] If Ok died during the Medieval Warm Period, it was born again during the Little Ice Age. It may have lived and died countless times during its long life. Its latest death is another example of weather converted into propaganda." https://fabiusmaximus.com/2019/07/24/we-killed-okjokull/ https://fabiusmaximus.com/2019/07/24/we-killed-okjokull/

Retric 7y ago
Shrinking is not a linear process that would have continued indefinitely at 1910 temperature levels.
lozenge 7y ago
There was anthropogenic warming even before the first data point, and without the anthropogenic warming the glacier may have regrown in colder years, but this didn't happen.
ldoughty 7y ago
The events of climate change are well documented. The fact the media distorts the message, or that right wing media latches onto the 2 people in the field that are funded by oil companies doesn't really change that. Look at warning tends for the last 500 years, what has happened in the last 70 is sharper than anything seen in the past short of world-ending events like an asteroid strike or super volcano (which are admittedly sharper, but that climate effected by the event, not a slow increase by human factors) This different perspective website seems to exist to promote Amazon wish lists and affiliate links and provides barely more digging than a typical news article (some of which seems to be cherry picking statements or titles)... so I will continue to stick with the belief of 97% of scientists, most of which are not financially invested/dependent on the work they produce, that says we are having a dramatic effect.

tzs 7y ago

Suppose we manage to stop increasing the greenhouse gas levels in the atmosphere, and then even manage to lower them back to, say mid 20th century levels. Will the glaciers come back? Or does forming glaciers, as opposed to just maintaining them once formed, require another ice age?