Greenlanders are enjoying global warming.
Because we are smack in the middle of an Interglacial Warming Period, our earth is naturally warming … and carbon dioxide is just along for the ride, like a tiny flea on an elephant’s back. The Ice Age cycles are the elephants in the room when it comes to global warming and cooling.
New data from the recently completed NEEM (North Greenland Eemian) ice core drilling project has discovered that the prior Interglacial Warming Period produced temperatures 14 degrees Fahrenheit (8 Celsius) warmer than today — and the seas were 20-25 feet higher than today. Yet sadly, the global warming alarmists are still in a tizzy over a 2-degree Celsius tipping-point scare. Maybe they haven’t yet heard of modern science. Large global temperature changes and associated sea level changes are completely natural. The unnatural part is claiming man is making these changes, which of course is preposterous, as the Ice Age cycles have been performing their hot & cold temperature dance for the past million years.
While scientists are still trying to understand why the Ice Ages come and go, we have new information to better explain glacier melting. Remember all the hype about rapid melting in western Antarctica? No, it wasn’t the slightly warmer air after all. The smoking gun is the discovery of 91 sub-glacial volcanoes. They can even generate heat without erupting.
Now back to Greenland and its melting ice. Did you know there are numerous geothermal sites scattered across Greenland? Some spots permit hot spring bathing year round. Bet you never heard that on PBS. Even more amazing is the discovery of more than 50 sub-glacial lakes. They are caused by an unknown combination of glacial melt-water and geothermal heating from below. Greenland sits on a hotbed of geothermal activity. Even more fascinating is growing evidence of previously unknown, underwater volcanic activity where the Mid-Atlantic and Gakkel Ridges meet — which is very close to Greenland.
Yes, geothermal activity is normally understood to be fairly constant and can’t explain rapid ice melt … but … recent studies by NASA have discovered prior episodes of unexplained rapid Greenland ice melting hundreds of years before humans ever invented carbon dioxide. These episodes of rapid melting are thought to be related to increasing frequency of earthquakes, which can open up fissures and cracks in the bedrock through which water can penetrate deep down into the crust, and then rise up as warmer water to release even more geothermal heat.
Even though global warming will take back many coastal shorelines, it will also turn the world’s largest island, and the rest of the world, into a greener land. Greenlanders are enjoying global warming. They are growing forests, planting potatoes, and expanding fishing. They are anticipating an economic boom from mineral exploration and tourism as more people settle there. Who knows, as temperatures approach those attained 1,000 years ago during the Medieval Warm Period, maybe the Vikings will once again inhabit Greenland.
Villager John Shewchuk is a frequent contributor to Villages-News.com.
