An interesting question has arisen. Is it OK to pollute the Arctic Sea so long as the quest is “noble”? The Catlin Arctic Ice Survey likes to promote their trek as having a low carbon footprint because they are walking on the ice, rather than doing the more efficient flying ice survey (such has already been done), or driving to the north pole with vehicles.
What we don’t see much of from Catlin is how much fuel it takes to support their walking endeavor. They have to get resupplied by aircraft. And, because they have to get “rescued” at some point, refueling is needed for that too since the planes can’t make the flight on one tank. They have to leave a fuel cache on the sea ice.
So what happens to the empty fuel barrels? Or even worse, what happens to full barrels?
WUWT reader Richard Henry Lee writes:
On 26 April at http://www.catlinarcticsurvey.com/from_the_ice.aspx, the report was:
Yesterday, the plane took off from Resolute Bay, flew north for 3 hours to the weather station at Eureka. The CAS support team hopped off, the pilots re-fuelled and then flew out onto the Arctic Ocean, in order to cache fuel in advance of tomorrow’s flight out to the Ice Team. Once sufficient fuel had been cached, the pilots then flew back to Eureka where they spent the night.
On 3 May, they report:
From a logistical point of view, the main area of consistently bad weather at the moment is over the mid-way refuelling point, rather than at the team’s location or at Resolute. That being the case, the pilots at KBA and the London-based Ops team are currently looking at the possibility of putting in a new fuel cache, so that the aircraft can take a slightly more circuitous route to the team if necessary, in effect bypassing the original refuelling point. The possibility of an airdrop is also now being considered.
So it appears that the original fuel cache is out there on the ice and they are planning to store a new fuel cache because of the weather.
So, what will happen to the old fuel cache that they cannot get to due to bad weather?
If just left there, it would eventually get into the ocean, I presume.
Yes just what does happen to those fuel drums? That is the inconvenient question.
It seems that if they leave them on the ice, empty or full, Catlin may join the ranks of Arctic polluters.
Gary: Please elucidate what all these letters represent, or provide a link, for us illiterates
Thanks!
We are raising a generation of children who know science does not reveal objective scientific facts, and if a scientist is lucky enough to be working in a politically-sensitive field, government grant money will flow like a tsunami if he adopts the correct beliefs and makes sure his results support them.
Skeptic Tank (09:49:13) : “The road to the North Pole is paved with good intentions.”
and apparently oil drums as well.
hangzen (10:39:50) :
I was a student at Carnegie-Mellon Univ when the very first Earth Day happening happened. (I still have the Whole Earth Catalog I bought there.) Several tents and an inflatable bubble or two were set up in the morning. In the late afternoon a major thunderstorm with heavy winds roared through blowing down the tents rolling the bubble, and soaking the grass. So we had not so many pizza boxes, but the ruts left by the trucks and other vehicles lasted quite a while longer!
On topic: If they put an ice measuring buoy on the ice by the fuel drums then perhaps people could find them next year for the 2010 boondoggle.
Kath (13:25:14) :
Okay folks, stop using the Internet. According to the Grauniad “news”paper:
“Web providers must limit internet’s carbon footprint, say experts
Pots and kettles! I’m sure a paper copy of the Grauniad has a bigger ‘footprint’ than my reading its website. There are some good comments below the article – like suggesting the newspaper return to typewriters and hot metal, and blaming Al Gore for inventing the Internet… 🙂
Jack
OT = Off Topic :]
There will be unintended consequences from practically everything. How’s about the disaster of summarily dispatching Yucca Mountain.
We need more engineers and less politicians making decisions. Engineers know how to balance competing variables to make the best trade-offs. Engineers never would have pulled a costly publicity stunt like this when there are much more effective, safer and cleaner ways to measure ice thickness.
enduser (11:56:09) :
“Ever hear of the “Glacier Girl”? That is the p-38 fighter that was part of the “Lost Squadron” that was forced down in Greenland in 1942.”
Here is an account of the recovery of the Glacier Girl from beneath 268 feet of ice that covered her after she came down (with the rest of the squadron) on top of the Greenland Ice Cap.
enduser (11:56:09) :
Perhaps slightly OT.
Ever hear of the “Glacier Girl”? That is the p-38 fighter that was part of the “Lost Squadron” that was forced down in Greenland in 1942.
http://p38assn.org/glacier-girl-recovery.htm
Well, well Dr. Box explain how this plane got buried under 268 feet of ice (2,680 feet of snow!) if the sheet has been melting and thinning for 50 years. It had also moved about a mile from its original location by glacial flow. This should give a pretty good explanation for Dr. Box’s alarming outflow of ice from Greenland into the sea. Since 1942, this 1 mile of flow of an ice sheet 3 km thick would make (very rough calculation based on average of length and width of Greenland and say 3km thick of ice) a volume of about 10,000 cubic km of ice that flowed into the sea (and was replaced). Anyone care to make a more careful calculation? And turning our attention to Antarctica ice cap here is another image of ice accumulation on antarctica. This is a giant crane that was used to put up some towers a few decades ago: WUWT?
file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Compaq_Owner/My%20Documents/My%20Pictures/Growing_Antarctic_Ice_Sheet.jpg
E.M.
“And that is how AGW will be falsified. One friend, one farmers coffee shop, one ski bum, one football stadium, one Mom & Dad at a time…”
“And The Truth Shall Set You Free”.
E.M….the problem with this theory is that a whole bunch of farmers, ski bums and Moms and Dads were all against the AIG bailout, the bank bailOUTS, and the automakers bailouts. They still happened. Approval rating for congress, which really means for our government, is somewhere around 15%, depending on which poll you read. Some have it lower than that. Is there any change to congress in sight?…No.
It will take much more than just John and Jane Q. Public not believing in it, and it will take much more than just impact on their wallets…UNLESS…
…there’s a “tipping point” 🙂
Which is what I hope to live long enough to see.
JimB
I really hope it is not avgas. Here is the link to avgas properties on Shell website. It still contains lead, tetra ethyl lead. It might evaporate very fast in he tropics but considering the frigid temperature in the artic circle, the evaporation rate may not be as fast as what crosspatch anticipated.
Sorry the link to Shell oil is at
http://www.shell.com/static/au-en/downloads/aviation/avgas100ll.pdf
OT,
Anthony, I’ve seen your surfacestation report:
http://heliogenic.blogspot.com/2009/05/major-report-by-anthony-watts-on-junk.html
Great job, congratulations.
I recall that corrosion slows at reduced temperatures. Those drums may be there a long time, a memorial to…what?
Just emailed to Borek Air’s head office:
Question for Kenn Borek Air re the Catlin Expedition
Are you flying for the Catlin Expedition, as has been reported?
There is speculation (see below) that fuel drums will be abandoned on the Arctic ice due to flights supporting this expedition’s activities.
I am a longtime admirer of Kenn Borek Air’s polar achievements and thought you might want to comment on this question before it goes any further.
You can comment directly on the blogsite.
Regards, Allan MacRae
I have not kept a record but if memory serves I believe the Catliners are drifting away from the pole now due to being tentbound. From the latest from the ice:
Total distance travelled 397.81 km
Average daily distance 6.12 km
Estimated distance to North Pole 526.7 km
Time on ICE 65 days
Lubos Motl (09:42:11) :
Needless to say, leaders of dictatorships never feel the urge to apply the “general” rules to themselves. It’s the whole point of the green movement that low-quality individuals who haven’t achieved anything good and haven’t done anything good for others (or the Earth) are promoted to special people with special rights, just for being loyal to the ideology.
Much like the hierarchy of the communist party was allowed to enjoy the advantages of capitalism and wealth, the hierarchy of green bigots is “allowed” (by their rules) to contaminate the Arctic Ocean or anything else. It’s up to the rest of us to make sure that the rules of these immoral people won’t control any country or any ocean.
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Excellent points Lubos,
In July 1989, I went on a business trip through Checkpoint Charlie into East Germany during the last months of the Communist regime. The Berlin Wall fell later that year, on November 9.
Canadians had been fed the Big Lie by our socialist NDP Party leaders (and some of their Liberal Party fellow-travelers) that East Germany was the “Workers Paradise”.
Some paradise! Raw untreated sewage flowed into every river. Factories poured smoke into the sky and all sorts of pollutants into rivers and streams. Two-stroke Trabant automobiles spewed white oily smoke, so much that you could not see the car you were passing until you were beside it! Rail transportation systems were similarly backward. Industrial design in electrics and electronics had not progressed much past WW2 standards. Some old buildings still showed the scars of WW2. New buildings were covered with rivers of rust, probably since the steel re-bar was placed too close to the concrete surface. In every respect, East Germany was horrid.
But the East German leaders and their secret police toadies lived the good life…
I’ve also been to Castro’s Cuba, and it’s not much different. People are generally poor and even hungry. Lot’s of doctors, but no medicines. But life is good for the elite…
… I wrote this just in case there was any remaining doubt.
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E.M.Smith et al, re higher heating bills due to colder and longer winters.
Not likely to happen soon, if at all, IMHO. Worldwide natural gas trading, in the form of LNG, has commenced in a big way. This drives down the price of natural gas (currently around $3.5 per million cubic feet).
Food shortages, and higher food prices, yes, I can see that.
Thanks to ExxonMobil and QatarGas, also ExxonMobil and Sakhalin Island, and a few other LNG exporters, we are in for a long spell of low-priced natural gas and lower heating bills. There are additional LNG plants due to start up later this year. This low price for natural gas will last for a very long time.
Bring on the cold. Turn on the gas. Stay toasty and warm.
look at the ice chart, it is WAY higher than all of the years 2002-2008!!!!!
A little OT:
Has anyone been keeping track of the expedition daily locations lately? About a month ago, they were moving 10 steps forward during the day and 8 steps back due to the southward drifting ice (really poor planning).
Since they have been hunkered down in their tents for about a week, restricting their food intake to 1000 calories a day, have they been drifting southward that entire time?
jack mosevich (15:04:42) :
Gary: Please elucidate what all these letters represent, or provide a link, for us illiterates
http://www.acronymfinder.com/
Gary: see my post above at 17:21:46
Do we know for sure that they’re using fuel drums? My (admittedly very limited) experience with remote site logistics has been that fuel these days is usually stored in bladders made of Hypalon, or something similar. Drain the thing, and it could probably be folded up and flown out without too much trouble.
UNLESS…
…there’s a “tipping point” 🙂
You rang?
There will be a tipping point, it’s called December 2009 and what follows.
Keep your eye on the S. Hemisphere’s winter.
With the Sun doing as badly as it currently is, the next N. Hemisphere’s winter will be worse.
It’s a slow ratchet down, but each tick of the pall brings ever deepening cold.
The headlines will read: “Disaster in Alasker” and “Cyrogenic Freeze hits the Yukon”.
I read this last night and was astonished at the garbage it contained. They claim that servers are requiring more power, etc.. etc.., what a bunch of hogwash. In my company, we have recently built out a brand new data center, it has 3 times the number of servers, perhaps 1000x the computing power, and runs on approximately 1/100th the power and resources as the old one. Now, someone tell me how that has increased our energy usage and carbon footprint. Anyone that knows even one smidge of anything about the IT industry clearly knows that today’s servers and technology require far less energy than every before. Additionally, they cite Google as this huge energy waster, however, Google is one of the most green and energy self-sufficient companies in the world. Who ever wrote this garbage, either has not one stinking clue about anything, or is blaintently lying to get a response and/or ratings. Pure and complete hogwash it is!
cool