Archive » Aaron Gray-Block

Blanketing Greenland’s glaciers against the melt could buy us time

Aaron Gray-Block — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 12:56:26 +0000

In a race against time, American glaciologist and Nobel prize winner Jason Box is thinking big by proposing to cover Greenland’s coastal strip with a blanket to prevent its receding glaciers from melting into the ocean.

The technology has already been applied on a smaller scale in the Austrian Alps by ski resorts using a material designed by Dutch synthetics company TenCate, which says its TopTex material is intended to protect snow and ice against the sun’s solar rays.

“The material reflects solar rays so that their heat doesn’t penetrate the cloth and its texture ensures that snow doesn’t slip away,” TenCate says on its website. It adds using the cloth minimises the possibility of avalanches.

Box and experts from the Byrd Polar Research Center have already covered an area of 8,000 square metres in Greenland with 31 rolls of TenCate’s polypropylene fabric.

TenCate says researchers will collect the results of the study on August 25 and, if they prove positive, Box wants to cover Greenland’s coastal strip, about equal in size to Britain, to minimise rising sea levels and coastal flooding.

While the idea might seem like a desperate, last-ditch bid to protect Greenland’s glaciers while failing to tackle the cause of the melt to which greater effort should be placed, Box says the alternative may be worse.

Two of the largest glaciers in Greenland are at risk of disintegrating, with NASA satellite images suggesting a third of the Petermann glacier could soon break off, he says.

“I’ve got a vision that could save the planet,” Box says on a Discovery channel video. “It is going to be expensive, but when you consider the cost of re-engineering our coastlines this may actually be cheaper.”

The ‘blanket’ solution could therefore buy the globe some vital time.

The question is; who would pay for it?

(Images: top a fjord behind the town of Ilulissat in Greenland August 16, 2007, middle: An iceberg reflected in the calm ocean at the mouth of teh Jakobshavn ice fjord near Ilulisassat, May 15, 2007. Both by Bob Strong/Reuters)

Check Out Line: Apparel apathy endures

Aaron Gray-Block — Fri, 15 May 2009 16:39:54 +0000

By Nicole Maestri

Check out the ongoing struggle to sell clothes to recession weary Americans.

J.C. Penney and Abercrombie & Fitch both reported quarterly results that show consumers are still cutting back on non-essential items, with Penney also warning profit for the year would be worse than analysts expected.

Consumers have been hammered by the recession, mounting job losses and credit worries, and it appears they are sticking to shopping lists for groceries and other essentials, rejecting unnecessary purchases and seeking deep discounts.

While the conviction to buy only what they need has hit sales for department stores like Penney, consumers' desire for bargains has battered Abercrombie, which has stubbornly kept prices higher than rivals, other than discounting clearance items.

"With a challenging economic environment, the consumer continues to show a reluctance to spend on premium brands; a price consciousness dictating shopping habits unlike anything I have ever seen," said Abercrombie Chief Executive Mike Jeffries, a retail industry veteran.

The teen clothing retailer posted a first-quarter loss wider than Wall Street's expectations, and in an abrupt change, said it is conducting a strategic review of its struggling Ruehl chain.

Meanwhile, Penney posted an in-line quarterly profit, but forecast second-quarter and full year results below analysts' expectations.

"We expect consumer spending and mall traffic to remain weak, which will be particularly evident against tough comparisons in the second quarter," CEO Mike Ullman said.

Also in the basket:

Kohl's, Nordstrom beat forecasts, raise 2009 views

H&M April sales rebound boosts recovery hopes

Target pilot pays employees to monitor health

(Photo: Reuters)

Sue world leaders $1 billion for global warming?

Aaron Gray-Block — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 16:19:19 +0000

In a global stunt, a U.S. environmental activist is poised to lodge a $1 billion damages class action lawsuit at the International Criminal Court (ICC) against all world leaders for failing to prevent global warming.

Activist and blogger Dan Bloom says he will sue world leaders for "intent to commit manslaughter against future generations of human beings by allowing murderous amounts of fossil fuels to be harvested, burned and sent into the atmosphere as CO2".

He intends to lodge the lawsuit in the week starting Sunday, Dec. 6.

The prosecutor's office at the ICC, the world's first permanent court (pictured below right) for war crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity, says it is allowed to receive information on crimes that may fall within the court's jurisdiction from any source.

"Such information does not per se trigger a judicial proceeding," the prosecutor's office hastened to add.

The question is: will or should the prosecutor take on the case?

One might argue in defence that world leaders are in fact trying to impose climate-saving measures. In Vienna last year, almost all rich nations agreed to consider cuts in greenhouse emissions of 25-40 percent below 1990 levels by 2020. Talks on a new climate treaty will be held in Poznan, Poland, from Dec. 1-12.

Rajendra Pachauri, head of the U.N. Climate Panel, says the cuts are needed to limit temperature increase to 2 degrees Celsius, an amount seen by the EU, some other nations and many environmentalists as a threshold for "dangerous" climate change.

Granted then that there is growing consensus that climate change poses a real threat, is it not only world leaders who are failing to prevent global warming?

Perhaps the global collective of individuals, governments and industry is to blame and the ICC lawsuit a valid publicity stunt in the constant battle to raise awareness and prompt action?

Because it's action we need -- and now, right?