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It's good to see efforts at adaptation. This is an important aspect of dealing with climate change. There's simply no preventative measures that can be implemen

It's good to see efforts at adaptation. This is an important aspect of dealing with climate change. There's simply no preventative measures that can be implemented at this point. So if we can get Alaskans and the fishing industry in general to adapt to the new realities and transition them to industries more productive to conservation and carbon drawdown that will be a huge win.

ornornor 4y ago
Meanwhile, ConocoPhillips just got permission to drill out an estimated 600 million barrels over the next 30 years in Alaska. It’s very hard to not feel hopeless and pessimistic about the future.
- ChatGTP 4y ago
  Made the same comment earlier, copped the down vote but I agree, I absolutely cannot believe it. I also read they will need to artificially freeze the sea bed to make it possible, which will require a huge amount of energy and therefor emissions. Really wild.
  - wahern 4y ago
    The drilling is on land. Artificial cooling of permafrost using thermosiphons (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermosiphon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermosiphon) isn't new. For example, > 120,000 thermosyphons were built into the Trans-Alaska Pipeline’s supports in the 1970s. https://dakotafreepress.com/2021/07/11/permafrost-melting-could-break-trans-alaska-pipeline-thermosyphons-to-the-rescue/ https://dakotafreepress.com/2021/07/11/permafrost-melting-co... All of the concern about this project is fundamentally speculative. That doesn't mean the speculation is wrong, but little factoids like that about thermosiphons seem to be thrown into the mix to insinuate more substance and impending doom than can otherwise be fairly shown (at least shown in a popular news article). If coal is any indication, it's entirely possible that extraction at Willow would become unprofitable long before the lease expires.
    - namaria 4y ago
      The fact that industrial sized ground cooling is already kinda common makes me feel way worse about it, not better.
      - anarticle 4y ago
        What you have described is geothermal heating, only using less total energy due to not having to heat for human survival. This tech is also used on buildings to keep from frost heaving. https://canada.constructconnect.com/joc/news/technology/2016/09/thermosyphons-use-simple-physics-to-lick-cold-climate-challenges-1018682w https://canada.constructconnect.com/joc/news/technology/2016... It's not that big of a deal, consider the thermal difference between the ground and air. Also, consider it is not using any input energy to do it, simply the evaporation of ammonia!
        namaria 4y ago
        Net energy is the crucial difference. One generates carbon emissions to make carbon based infrastructure last longer, further generating emissions, while the other actually displaces them.
- jnmandal 4y ago
  I get where you are coming from but its best to not to frame it that way. This planet is now in flux. It will never be the same again. We are far, far past the point of preserving some sort of status quo on ecology. The Willow Oil project is located in an ecology that simple is going to be gone. Its not salvageable. We have already made that choice. Its at nearly the northern most point on earth so the type of ecosystem there would need to migrate north and theres nothing above them. So yeah that sucks. And the oil drilling project itself (the capital, labor, materials, etc) is definitely a waste of human effort -- no doubt about that. However, its hardly large enough to move the needle on carbon emissions. I mean compared to the really big forces at work that is nothing. They wont get 30 years of oil out of there, and they know it. So its just rearranging of deck chairs on the Titanic -- a project that wont meet its expectations, going into a place that was going to be massively disturbed anyways. In fact, the project may not even get built because they would need to build on permafrost and turns out that is super difficult to do properly especially when its melting. There are many reasons to be pessimistic about the future but the reality is that wether or not this drilling project goes forward does not make any difference in what the future will be like. There are however a ton of important things we can do as a society to make a better future for ourselves and those who come after us. We can do those things now, even as the death cult around fossil fuels continues its business as usual. In fact, by doing those things we make them less powerful. So while its good to recognize that things are changing irrevocably, its not like we are helpless. The important thing is to find alternatives to the status quo, find ideas that make us more resilient and then support those initiatives.
  - justanorherhack 4y ago
    "And the oil drilling project itself (the capital, labor, materials, etc) is definitely a waste of human effort -- no doubt about that." No doubt huh?
    - jnmandal 4y ago
      In 100yrs or even 1000yrs, do you think people, if they still exist, will look back and say "wow we're amazed at the hard work of those men and women who drilled the last hydrocarbons"? Chances are they will have a lot of really mean things to say instead about our reticence, and how little intact ecology we left them to work with.
- piloto_ciego 4y ago
  For what it’s worth, I have worked in the Arctic a lot, and Conoco was the most responsible business from an environmental standpoint that I’ve ever been around. I know that sounds ridiculous, but compared to many of the other actors up on the Slope, Conoco was pretty damn good. It’s still sucking hydrocarbons out of the earth, but if someone is going to do it anyway I’d rather it was Conoco than Exxon or Hillcorp.
  - wiz21c 4y ago
    They can be as clean as they want (and sure, many people have probably worked a lot to achieve that), but in the end, the oil will become CO2 and our problem will become worse.
    - moomoo11 4y ago
      Then the west should spend trillions of dollars providing clean energy production to African countries, India, and China. Will that happen? Those guys aren’t going to stop polluting so they can grow their economies and feed their people.
      - csb6 4y ago
        The U.S. produces a massive amount of emissions itself, especially considering its much smaller population compared to China and India. The U.S. government has the ability to set energy policy (e.g. not allowing new oil exploration, phasing out use of fossil fuels), which could reduce global emissions significantly. The U.S. can’t control what China and India’s energy policies are (although it certainly can greatly influence world energy markets), but it can control its own energy policy and should do that. That the U.S. is not is just making things worse.
      - sangnoir 4y ago
        The US is the worst polluter in the world on a per-capita basis, and leads Africa by quite some margin.
        4y ago
- eCa 4y ago
  > estimated 600 million barrels over the next 30 years This doesn’t help: This project will cover six days of current global consumption.
  - red-iron-pine 4y ago
    Tbh, it sounds like we don't need more oil, we need less people.
    - giraffe_lady 4y ago
      What are you going to do with them? Why do you jump to this straight over "less fossil fuel consumption?"
    - dontlaugh 4y ago
      Per capita oil consumption is drastically different across countries. We don’t need less people, we need less conspicuous and unnecessary consumption by the few.
- throwawaylinux 4y ago
  Hopefully I can make you feel a little better about that project: Saudi Arabia alone extracts 10 million barrels of oil every day.
- SkyPuncher 4y ago
  Saving for retirement does not mean doing nothing fun until you retire. The world is in a transition. That transition needs to happen. However, two things are currently true: * There is a huge demand for oil. Having friendly control (compared to hostile nations) over that flow is likely beneficial to many people in the world. * Even with more electric vehicles, petro is used in many every day products. It will still be needed.
- gwbrooks 4y ago
  Six hundred million barrels is one week's worth of global oil production. Spread over 30 years. It's OK to be concerned about the future -- hell, I am. But a lot of hopelessness these days is an the after-effect of doomscrolling through headlines and fitting them into our current biases. Training your brain to let every contra-worldview headline release T H E B A D C H E M I C A L S is a tough way to get through life.
  - 11235813213455 4y ago
    exactly, the best we can do is act at our scale, reduce our footprint, ideally under 2T CO2eq/year
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
pif 4y ago
This, 1000 times! Let's stop pretending we can reverse history, and let's use knowledge and science to adapt preventively to the changes we can foresee.
- alehlopeh 4y ago
  Let’s stop pretending there’s an “us” that even makes these decisions.

ornornor 4y ago

Meanwhile, ConocoPhillips just got permission to drill out an estimated 600 million barrels over the next 30 years in Alaska. It’s very hard to not feel hopeless and pessimistic about the future.

ChatGTP 4y ago
Made the same comment earlier, copped the down vote but I agree, I absolutely cannot believe it. I also read they will need to artificially freeze the sea bed to make it possible, which will require a huge amount of energy and therefor emissions. Really wild.
- wahern 4y ago
  The drilling is on land. Artificial cooling of permafrost using thermosiphons (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermosiphon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermosiphon) isn't new. For example, > 120,000 thermosyphons were built into the Trans-Alaska Pipeline’s supports in the 1970s. https://dakotafreepress.com/2021/07/11/permafrost-melting-could-break-trans-alaska-pipeline-thermosyphons-to-the-rescue/ https://dakotafreepress.com/2021/07/11/permafrost-melting-co... All of the concern about this project is fundamentally speculative. That doesn't mean the speculation is wrong, but little factoids like that about thermosiphons seem to be thrown into the mix to insinuate more substance and impending doom than can otherwise be fairly shown (at least shown in a popular news article). If coal is any indication, it's entirely possible that extraction at Willow would become unprofitable long before the lease expires.
  - namaria 4y ago
    The fact that industrial sized ground cooling is already kinda common makes me feel way worse about it, not better.
    - anarticle 4y ago
      What you have described is geothermal heating, only using less total energy due to not having to heat for human survival. This tech is also used on buildings to keep from frost heaving. https://canada.constructconnect.com/joc/news/technology/2016/09/thermosyphons-use-simple-physics-to-lick-cold-climate-challenges-1018682w https://canada.constructconnect.com/joc/news/technology/2016... It's not that big of a deal, consider the thermal difference between the ground and air. Also, consider it is not using any input energy to do it, simply the evaporation of ammonia!
      - namaria 4y ago
        Net energy is the crucial difference. One generates carbon emissions to make carbon based infrastructure last longer, further generating emissions, while the other actually displaces them.
jnmandal 4y ago
I get where you are coming from but its best to not to frame it that way. This planet is now in flux. It will never be the same again. We are far, far past the point of preserving some sort of status quo on ecology. The Willow Oil project is located in an ecology that simple is going to be gone. Its not salvageable. We have already made that choice. Its at nearly the northern most point on earth so the type of ecosystem there would need to migrate north and theres nothing above them. So yeah that sucks. And the oil drilling project itself (the capital, labor, materials, etc) is definitely a waste of human effort -- no doubt about that. However, its hardly large enough to move the needle on carbon emissions. I mean compared to the really big forces at work that is nothing. They wont get 30 years of oil out of there, and they know it. So its just rearranging of deck chairs on the Titanic -- a project that wont meet its expectations, going into a place that was going to be massively disturbed anyways. In fact, the project may not even get built because they would need to build on permafrost and turns out that is super difficult to do properly especially when its melting. There are many reasons to be pessimistic about the future but the reality is that wether or not this drilling project goes forward does not make any difference in what the future will be like. There are however a ton of important things we can do as a society to make a better future for ourselves and those who come after us. We can do those things now, even as the death cult around fossil fuels continues its business as usual. In fact, by doing those things we make them less powerful. So while its good to recognize that things are changing irrevocably, its not like we are helpless. The important thing is to find alternatives to the status quo, find ideas that make us more resilient and then support those initiatives.
- justanorherhack 4y ago
  "And the oil drilling project itself (the capital, labor, materials, etc) is definitely a waste of human effort -- no doubt about that." No doubt huh?
  - jnmandal 4y ago
    In 100yrs or even 1000yrs, do you think people, if they still exist, will look back and say "wow we're amazed at the hard work of those men and women who drilled the last hydrocarbons"? Chances are they will have a lot of really mean things to say instead about our reticence, and how little intact ecology we left them to work with.
piloto_ciego 4y ago
For what it’s worth, I have worked in the Arctic a lot, and Conoco was the most responsible business from an environmental standpoint that I’ve ever been around. I know that sounds ridiculous, but compared to many of the other actors up on the Slope, Conoco was pretty damn good. It’s still sucking hydrocarbons out of the earth, but if someone is going to do it anyway I’d rather it was Conoco than Exxon or Hillcorp.
- wiz21c 4y ago
  They can be as clean as they want (and sure, many people have probably worked a lot to achieve that), but in the end, the oil will become CO2 and our problem will become worse.
  - moomoo11 4y ago
    Then the west should spend trillions of dollars providing clean energy production to African countries, India, and China. Will that happen? Those guys aren’t going to stop polluting so they can grow their economies and feed their people.
    - csb6 4y ago
      The U.S. produces a massive amount of emissions itself, especially considering its much smaller population compared to China and India. The U.S. government has the ability to set energy policy (e.g. not allowing new oil exploration, phasing out use of fossil fuels), which could reduce global emissions significantly. The U.S. can’t control what China and India’s energy policies are (although it certainly can greatly influence world energy markets), but it can control its own energy policy and should do that. That the U.S. is not is just making things worse.
    - sangnoir 4y ago
      The US is the worst polluter in the world on a per-capita basis, and leads Africa by quite some margin.
      - 4y ago
eCa 4y ago
> estimated 600 million barrels over the next 30 years This doesn’t help: This project will cover six days of current global consumption.
- red-iron-pine 4y ago
  Tbh, it sounds like we don't need more oil, we need less people.
  - giraffe_lady 4y ago
    What are you going to do with them? Why do you jump to this straight over "less fossil fuel consumption?"
  - dontlaugh 4y ago
    Per capita oil consumption is drastically different across countries. We don’t need less people, we need less conspicuous and unnecessary consumption by the few.
throwawaylinux 4y ago
Hopefully I can make you feel a little better about that project: Saudi Arabia alone extracts 10 million barrels of oil every day.
SkyPuncher 4y ago
Saving for retirement does not mean doing nothing fun until you retire. The world is in a transition. That transition needs to happen. However, two things are currently true: * There is a huge demand for oil. Having friendly control (compared to hostile nations) over that flow is likely beneficial to many people in the world. * Even with more electric vehicles, petro is used in many every day products. It will still be needed.
gwbrooks 4y ago
Six hundred million barrels is one week's worth of global oil production. Spread over 30 years. It's OK to be concerned about the future -- hell, I am. But a lot of hopelessness these days is an the after-effect of doomscrolling through headlines and fitting them into our current biases. Training your brain to let every contra-worldview headline release T H E B A D C H E M I C A L S is a tough way to get through life.
- 11235813213455 4y ago
  exactly, the best we can do is act at our scale, reduce our footprint, ideally under 2T CO2eq/year

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

pif 4y ago

This, 1000 times! Let's stop pretending we can reverse history, and let's use knowledge and science to adapt preventively to the changes we can foresee.

alehlopeh 4y ago
Let’s stop pretending there’s an “us” that even makes these decisions.