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What happens in Siberia (and Canada and Alaska) has everything to do with climate change. It will be the most affected region in the world and is already heavil

What happens in Siberia (and Canada and Alaska) has everything to do with climate change. It will be the most affected region in the world and is already heavily impacted by warming. The Arctic is projected to be sea ice-free in the summer within 15 years, which represents an absolutely enormous change. It will be very fair to pin the coming fires and methane releases on climate change. Geopolitically, Arctic countries are going to receive big benefits on balance from climate change, including new land use options, new oil and gas exploration and new commercial shipping routes. Source: worked on Arctic land and ocean conservation for 3 years.

beambot 5y ago
> new oil and gas exploration Ugh... Positive feedback loops.
- jillesvangurp 5y ago
  Only as long as the stuff is still worth something. Carbon taxes and alternatives could make this a lot less profitable over time. The Russian economy is very sensitive to the price of oil and gas. If demand collapses, prices go down below the point where exploiting these resources is cost effective. The problem is that that is true for everybody else too. That's why prices are high currently because the same is true in Texas where expensive fracking only makes sense as long as prices are very high because fracking is expensive. Which is why everybody else (including Russia that can produce cheaper) is pressured to limit supply. Occasionally, one country (Russia last year) decides to start dumping oil on the market and panic kicks in. It's the one geopolitical tool Russia has left and they wield it well. That's why the baltic gas pipeline is a big deal as well. The Germans built that to not get pressured into buying expensive US liquid gas while they (slowly) untangle their domestic infrastructure from natural gas. However, that's going to take decades but Russia's behavior is bringing a sense of urgency for getting that done. The good news is that high prices make renewables much more attractive and high price volatility makes oil/gas investments a lot more risky and unpredictable. With prices swinging between too high and too low, Investors have been voting with their money for a while now and moving their wealth elsewhere. Russia can't help of being part of the solution here by basically acting against everybody else, they accelerate the demise of oil/gas, cause price instability, and cause their main customers to question the wisdom of their dependence on Russian resources. The last decades of this industry in demise are going to be ugly though.
techrat 5y ago
> Geopolitically, Arctic countries are going to receive big benefits on balance from climate change, including new land use options, new oil and gas exploration and new commercial shipping routes. And now we have exactly why Russia has been considerably invested in spreading Climate Change denialism with their twitter and facebook bot farms. Their entire economy is already dependent on oil exports and they're sitting on a largely inaccessible landmass full of it.
- emodendroket 5y ago
  I'd say it probably has to do with the more mundane reasons like having an extractive economy than outright welcoming global warming because they're banking on settling Siberia, but they're in pretty good company there.
- Teever 5y ago
  Russia spreads climate change disinfo because it destabilizes liberal democracies more than it destabilizes the economic interests of Russian oligarchs. Those oligarchs aren't playing any sort of long game -- they're psychopaths who don't care what happens to anything once they're dead. If they actually cared about the long term standing of Russia they wouldn't have raided the country of trillions of dollars and left their people and military in a permanently desperate state.

beambot 5y ago

> new oil and gas exploration Ugh... Positive feedback loops.

jillesvangurp 5y ago
Only as long as the stuff is still worth something. Carbon taxes and alternatives could make this a lot less profitable over time. The Russian economy is very sensitive to the price of oil and gas. If demand collapses, prices go down below the point where exploiting these resources is cost effective. The problem is that that is true for everybody else too. That's why prices are high currently because the same is true in Texas where expensive fracking only makes sense as long as prices are very high because fracking is expensive. Which is why everybody else (including Russia that can produce cheaper) is pressured to limit supply. Occasionally, one country (Russia last year) decides to start dumping oil on the market and panic kicks in. It's the one geopolitical tool Russia has left and they wield it well. That's why the baltic gas pipeline is a big deal as well. The Germans built that to not get pressured into buying expensive US liquid gas while they (slowly) untangle their domestic infrastructure from natural gas. However, that's going to take decades but Russia's behavior is bringing a sense of urgency for getting that done. The good news is that high prices make renewables much more attractive and high price volatility makes oil/gas investments a lot more risky and unpredictable. With prices swinging between too high and too low, Investors have been voting with their money for a while now and moving their wealth elsewhere. Russia can't help of being part of the solution here by basically acting against everybody else, they accelerate the demise of oil/gas, cause price instability, and cause their main customers to question the wisdom of their dependence on Russian resources. The last decades of this industry in demise are going to be ugly though.

techrat 5y ago

> Geopolitically, Arctic countries are going to receive big benefits on balance from climate change, including new land use options, new oil and gas exploration and new commercial shipping routes. And now we have exactly why Russia has been considerably invested in spreading Climate Change denialism with their twitter and facebook bot farms. Their entire economy is already dependent on oil exports and they're sitting on a largely inaccessible landmass full of it.

emodendroket 5y ago
I'd say it probably has to do with the more mundane reasons like having an extractive economy than outright welcoming global warming because they're banking on settling Siberia, but they're in pretty good company there.
Teever 5y ago
Russia spreads climate change disinfo because it destabilizes liberal democracies more than it destabilizes the economic interests of Russian oligarchs. Those oligarchs aren't playing any sort of long game -- they're psychopaths who don't care what happens to anything once they're dead. If they actually cared about the long term standing of Russia they wouldn't have raided the country of trillions of dollars and left their people and military in a permanently desperate state.