Sunday, October 19, 2008

The Environment: Autumn Arctic temperatures hit record high.


Arctic autumn temperature hits record high


It is rather alarming. Average (I assume) Arctic temperatures are 5 degrees celsius higher than the historical (I assume, what's written was "normal") average. To put it in perspective, this is approximately the size of Singapore's day/night temperature variation (32/27).

What the news article does not address though, is "What does it mean where the Arctic (or the world) is concerned?". How significant is this change? I sense some alarm bells ringing in the article in the form of statements like:

This year, for the first time a scientific expedition was able to navigate the fabled Northwest Passage linking the Atlantic and the Pacific oceans along Arctic waters bordering Russia and North America because they were free of ice, the German institute Alfred Wegener announced Friday.


Or is it that nobody knows?

2 comments:

Unknown said...

It's more like nobody cares.
(or at least nobody in a position of authority and power cares)

Chee Wai Lee said...

Which is kinda sad.

In any case, I'm finding it pretty frustrating trying to find any source of information that distills the facts. The latest article on a similar topic leaves much to be desired:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7700387.stm

Now, I'm curious if any polling has been conducted on Singaporeans about how much they care about global warming (and how much they know about it).