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The Arctic Is Warming Four Times Faster Than the Rest of the World
- Fervicus 5y agoI would recommend the book Apocalypse Never by Michael Shellenberger. It's an interesting read where the author talks about how environmental alarmism hurts us and makes us focus on the wrong things and the importance of nuclear.
- jcadam 5y agoI am happy to report that winters up here in the sub-arctic part of Alaska are cold AF. Winter even arrived a bit early this year.
- defterGoose 5y agoObligatory "weather isn't climate" quote. We've got tornadoes happening outside tornado alley outside of tornado season. See, I can do it too.
- bijant 5y agoThe arctic is too damn cold anyways. It’s great if we can finally go there without freezing to death.
- nopenopenopeno 5y agoNo more beating around the bush. We need publicly funded nuclear power. (because the private sector won’t do it themselves)
- beamatronic 5y agoWe can’t even wear masks. We can’t even agree to enforce the rule of law.
- jahnu 5y agoThat this ultra simple thing to wear a mask meets such resistance really shook me up. It's a minority of people but it's a much bigger, louder, and powerful minority than I ever would have expected. Still, I remain hopeful as to be otherwise would leave me in despair.
- eldaisfish 5y agoThere's good reason to be hopeful. A democratic government is bound by duty to act in the interest of the common good. Just as there are clowns who refuse to wear masks, there are those who will oppose nuclear power. A government building a nuclear power station is orders of magnitude more likely than an entire population complying with a mask mandate. It is unfortunate that too many democratic governments are consumed by political bribery and pressure groups rather than doing what is in everyone's interest.
- beamatronic 5y agoThere is no “bound by duty” any more. Only selfish actors.
- mostertoaster 5y agoOh I don’t know if it is a minority who “don’t want to wear a mask”. It is definitely a minority who just refuse to wear them, despite the government forcing them too. My guess is a majority of people would be glad to see mask mandates go away, and a minority is willing to speak. Though I’m weak and just wear a mask when asked though I don’t like it. I appreciate those who just refuse. The strange minority is those who desire this awful hell we’ve enacted with our covid response.
- starik36 5y agoNot sure why you are getting down voted. What you said is absolutely the case. I wear a mask when I am asked or there is a mandate, but I find it annoying at the very least.
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- vkou 5y agoBoth the public and the private sector (depending on what power generation in your jurisdiction looks like) will do it if we started taxing carbon.
- nopenopenopeno 5y agoA public sector that requires a profit is not a public sector. To your point, we probably need democracy first, but the idea that money can’t be found without siphoning it from the essential workforce that drives to work (or drives for work) and increasingly lives pay check to pay check is just nonsense.
- BobbyJo 5y ago> idea that money can’t be found without siphoning it from the growing essential workforce that drives to work (or drives for work) and lives pay check to pay check is just nonsense. I have to disagree. Rich people have money, working class people have productivity. Money doesn't create things, it just moves them around. Everything done by the government necessarily displaces productive resources from workers. If we take x% of the workforce and have them building reactors instead of Y, there will be less of Y to go around, and the rich will employ money to make sure their portion of Y is unaffected.
- vkou 5y agoCrown corporations exist as a counterpoint to your claim. They are often not strictly required to be profitable, but are expected to be.
- gbasin 5y agoMy understanding is that most of the cost is driven by outdated and draconian compliance requirements (created by public/government agencies). For example, safety requirements that don't have a threshold but instead require reducing risk "as much as possible" which is equivalent to 0 profit.
- jahnu 5y agoIf we could summon the political will to do that we could already summon the political will to transfer subsidies that go to fossil fuels to renewables instead and that would mostly end the need for nuclear. *slight edit for clarity
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- mostertoaster 5y agoHow confident are you that if all the money that went to renewables would not have been better spent simply increasing our efficiencies with fossil fuels? Do you feel like this is something we have the power to stop? I feel it is a runaway train, that will just run out of steam in a few hundred/thousand years. I mean I don’t like to be wasteful, and we shouldn’t pollute the earth for the hell of it, but I’m just like what are we gonna do? What if all those politicians selling the story of renewables, had lots of investments in those companies? Would you still trust that story, that this will somehow stop climate change, and not just pad their bank accounts? Maybe I’m just cynical in this area, and it is easy to just look around and say I’m not as bad as most people, but I just can’t think politicians forcing renewables is a good thing.
- throw1234651234 5y agoRenewables are a feel-good hippy joke (the irony, since nuclear is more environmentally friendly). Including a random source in case you ask for it - there are also cost/energy comparisons available if you google around. "System costs for nuclear power (as well as coal and gas-fired generation) are very much lower than for intermittent renewables." https://world-nuclear.org/information-library/economic-aspects/economics-of-nuclear-power.aspx https://world-nuclear.org/information-library/economic-aspec...
- eldaisfish 5y agorenewables are not a joke. Please don't minimise their contributions in the past two decades. The better way to characterise the problem is that renewables are intermittent - a problem for which we do not currently have a large-scale solution. One solution is to use a non-polluting technology that currently works - nuclear power - while we buy ourselves time to build out and develop renewable capacity.
- jillesvangurp 5y agoIf nuclear can compete on price; sure why not. But it seems it has some issues with that. That's why the private sector is a bit hands off on this front. There is no shortage of alternatives with more lucrative returns on investment (i.e. non negative ones). And plenty of those alternatives are doing great in terms of funding, growth, and cost. Hundreds of GW of wind and solar came online during the last two years or so. Most of the projections for this market from only a few years ago were completely wrong and this growth has caught more than a few governments by surprise and prompted quite a few of them to move forward earlier announced dates to clean up the grids in their country. E.g. the UK is now talking about 2030 for this. There might be one new nuclear plant coming online in that time frame and possibly a few more might get built. But it's peanuts compared to renewables. At this point it seems more like an expensive vanity project for politicians than a practical solution to supplying energy. Most of the challenges are actually not adding capacity but balancing the grid and moving energy around. Energy storage and cables basically. Grid infrastructure is where public spending needs to happen. There are a lot of countries that are actually slowing down renewable energy deployments because their grids just can't keep up. Most of the time when you see a wind mill not spinning it's not because it's broken but because it's been turned off because the grid can't handle the over supply. Kind of embarrassing for the companies involved. All that expensive kit and they can't handle the output. Expensive nuclear plants that you can't turn off and on on demand are part of the problem here; not the solution. Mostly the hard choice grid providers have to make is turning wind turbines off or shutting down e.g. a gas plant. They both cost money whether they produce or not. Some grid providers even have occasional negative rates because of this: they literally pay consumers to consume more electricity. It's preferable to temporarily reducing capacity at great cost. That's why grid batteries are so hot right now. IMHO current generations of nuclear technology are a bit of a dead end in terms of cost. But maybe somebody figures out a 10x improvement. Worth some public spending. Fusion is actually getting some traction lately and it seems that is starting to attract some serious money and there have been some breakthroughs reported recently.
- shakezula 5y agoNuclear can't compete on price because it's not subsidized and it's (deliberately or not) a legal and compliance nightmare, not to mention the NIMBY problems it brings. But if nuclear was getting even a fraction of the money that fossil fuels receives, we would be carbon neutral right now. You harp on costs, but energy is _always_ expensive, and there is nothing, not even renewables, that will provide the amount of energy that we will need in the coming years anywhere near quickly or efficiently enough. Nuclear will get cheaper like every other industry does once we create the actual market for it. Right now, we just have decades old reactors on shoestring budgets and scientific studies because _we didn't properly fund it_. Electric cars alone are predicted to nearly double our energy grid requirements in the next few decades[1]. We're not moving anywhere nearly fast enough with renewables to account for the growth from those vehicles alone. [1] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-weather-grids-autos-insight/ev-rollout-will-require-huge-investments-in-strained-u-s-power-grids-idUSKBN2AX18Y https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-weather-grids-autos-i...
- ativzzz 5y agoLangdon Winner [1] argues that nuclear power is authoritarian in nature due to factors like requiring long-term, centralized planning to realize and is infeasible in democratic governments. He argues that solar power is more democratized and is more fitting to a democracy. [1] https://www.cc.gatech.edu/~beki/cs4001/Winner.pdf https://www.cc.gatech.edu/~beki/cs4001/Winner.pdf
- whiddershins 5y agoThe private sector would do it in a heartbeat if we eased the regulatory burden, which is almost certainly irrationally restrictive.
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- tsoukase 5y agoRaising -30C is "easier" than raising +30C
- treespace8 5y agoI didn't see any measurements in the article. What is the warming rate? Why wasn't it included?
- mrjangles 5y ago>But that figure, found in scientific studies, advocacy reports, the popular press, and even the 2021 U.N. climate assessment, is incorrect So my understanding is that linking papers that claim the IPCC is wrong makes you a science denier, or am I confused about how the rules work?
- black6 5y agoYou're only confused about how they work today because they changed from yesterday and are most assuredly different than what they will be tomorrow.
- mostertoaster 5y agoWe’ve always been at war with Eurasia. Wikipedia told me so.
- DangitBobby 5y agoWhat were the rules yesterday and what are they today?
- _jal 5y agoSince you're apparently such a free-thinking rebel, why would you care?
- fallingknife 5y agoYou are confused about how the rules work. You are only a "science denier" if you say that global warming will be less severe than the IPCC.
- emodendroket 5y agoCan't wait till we start settling the Arctic.
- scotth 5y agoCan't tell if this is a joke — the arctic is floating ice, not land.
- bijant 5y agoThere is quite a lot of land within the arctic circle. If it continues to warm up it will become more conductive to human settlements and agriculture. hn is a place where most people see the upsides of change, I don’t understand why so few here admit the benefits of climate change.
- mym1990 5y agoCertainly any large scale change will bring benefits for some groups and problems for others, but at a net level it is hard to see the benefits outweighing the costs for climate change. But all of those things are so hard to model and this article is one of the many pieces that points to that. Curious questions though: If the Arctic region becomes habitable, who presides over it? Will it just become a haven for the rich? Can it be used as a model to figure out how to settle other planets?
- emodendroket 5y agoI was kidding.
- forgatmigej 5y agoYou might be thinking of the Arctic Ocean. As far as I know, the Arctic is the area enclosed by the northern polar circle. It includes land, and some of your favorite countries are partly inside the polar circle
- scotth 5y agoAh, I stand corrected.
- i_love_music 5y agoHonest question - how do you all cope with this? Do you ignore it because it is painful? Do you donate to environmental groups like the EDF or NRDC? Did you quit your tech/advertising job to work on renewable energy? I personally have been donating to environmental groups, but it feels like a cop-out. I'm using money to pay-away some of my guilt and my unwillingness to put more substantial effort towards such an important cause as this. It weighs on me daily though. So honestly, how do you all cope? For those of you who have had the willingness/bravery to go "all-in", how did you do it? I'm addicted to my comfortable, wealthy lifestyle as a software engineer and I'm ashamed of it.
- Apofis 5y agoI'm honestly greatly disappointed that the Academic Establishment is pandering to politics this hard that they are underplaying their own results. It's horrific. They did the same thing with COVID. This sort of behavior will be the end of us all and is highly unscientific and unethical. They are literally getting people killed.
- kfarr 5y agoIMHO the #1 thing you can do is not use a car and help others not use cars, including working to get the infrastructure necessary in urban, suburban and rural contexts to make that possible. That is what I put my energy into on a local level.
- eldaisfish 5y agoWe really need to stop placing the burden on the individual. You and I not using cars or minimising our use may help but cars are a necessity of life for many. This is true in urban and rural contexts alike. What we should be doing is getting governments to band together and penalise industrial-scale polluters. It would do more good to take shipping and trucking electric than for you to rely on public transit and for me to drive one fewer kilometre.
- nickff 5y agoIndustrial-scale polluters are often catering to consumer-level demand. Clamping down on industry may be easier, but it will restrict the consumer (either via reduced selection or increased prices). Individual-level voluntary action has the benefits of being more flexible and less tyrannical.
- mostertoaster 5y agoEh. Maybe I’ll invest in real estate in Greenland, as it might turn more green. As long as air quality remains ok where I live, I don’t really care about the climate warming, and I feel it is something put into motion long ago, that our stupid “carbon credits” won’t do a damn thing to stop. If it gets really bad, well, human agency is a marvelous thing. The last thing we need is politicians with investments in “green” technology forcing us to use “green” technology. (Same goes for those with investments in fossil fuels, shouldn’t be forced to use those either)
- Heliga 5y ago>As long as air quality remains ok where I live, I don’t really care about the climate warming, and I feel it is something put into motion long ago, that our stupid “carbon credits” won’t do a damn thing to stop. >If it gets really bad, well, human agency is a marvelous thing. Don't take this the wrong way, but this reads as you're happy to ignore the problem because 'f you, I got mine'. Does that summarize your position fairly or unfairly? >The last thing we need is politicians with investments in “green” technology forcing us to use “green” technology. (Same goes for those with investments in fossil fuels, shouldn’t be forced to use those either) Ahh, so much for that human agency that you were so pleased with a moment ago.
- defterGoose 5y agoWhaddya mean? This guy clearly has an oil well, refinery, and gas station in his backyard.
- gremloni 5y agoSo fuck everyone else as long as I’m okay. You’re the exact kind of person that comes begging and unprepared when it finally effects you.
- dang 5y agoWe've banned this account for repeatedly and egregiously violating the site guidelines. You can't do that here. If you don't want to be banned, you're welcome to email hn@ycombinator.com and give us reason to believe that you'll follow the rules in the future. They're here: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.
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- anonymousisme 5y agoI know this will likely get modded down, but how is this report any more credible than all the others (for other places) that say exactly the same thing? How credible are any of these reports, if they all conflict with one another? Citation: https://youtu.be/YUV8U3yBJ6U https://youtu.be/YUV8U3yBJ6U
- greycol 5y agoAs an example lets pretend a majority of reports say a vehicle is moving forward and going to hit someone but the reports differ on the speed. Someone puts out a video with the vehicle moving backwards and an object in the video falling upwards. The correct response is you don't say "ha! all the reports are wrong, no one will be hit" because of the video. Even when a report says the vehicle is moving slightly to the left when moving forward is contradicted by a report saying the vehicle is moving to the right while going forward does not mean you dismiss both reports and assume that the vehicle is moving backwards or stopped. If you don't want to expend the effort to evaluate the reports within the context of the greater body of work yourself that's fine (and absolutely sane) what's not a great idea is then going on to ignore the majority of experts on the subject saying this is happening and it is a problem. Also your citation is poor. It's from someone who doesn't even understand partial pressures of gas (as evidinced by his claims CO2 participates out of the air in Antartica! He even sticks to that claim after having multiple people (including climate change skeptics) try to explain this basic principle to him) and a quick google search shows actual analysis on many of his other claims and debunks them.
- b3nji 5y ago"Mark Serreze, director of the U.S. National Snow and Ice Data Center, also welcomes the new analysis but points out that Arctic amplification is never a fixed ratio. As the researchers showed, the time span used to calculate the rate matters, as does the latitude and season—amplification is far larger in the winter. Serreze adds that Arctic warming has always been more uncertain than the rest of the world, because of the spottiness of the observational records. “As a result, I’m always in favor of looking at it as a range,” he says. “Two times to four times.”"