Canada Invades Canada

In the most aggressive move in 3o years to reclaim godforsaken arctic nowheres, Canada is invading itself as part of campaign against Denmark, and oh lord, us, over ownership over Arctic waters and the Northwest Passage, which we apparantly are considering international waters. The HMCS Shawinigan and HMCS Glace Bay are docked at Churchill, and the HMCS Fredericton is on the way.



Looking at a map, the Northwest Passage is in international waters in the same way the Mississippi appears to be. First, this is all very funny. Second, what's driving it is bloody depressing. From the Telegraph:

(Canada's) scramble for the Arctic is a consequence of global warming and the retreat of the polar ice. This has raised the prospect of once-inaccessible areas becoming available for oil and mineral extraction. It has also revived the dream of a "North-West Passage" for shipping, linking the Atlantic and Pacific. Amid diplomatic arguments over territorial rights, Canada's defence minister recently clambered on to a frozen rock, tiny Hans Island, triggering protests from Denmark.

Yeesh. Here's the cycle, and it might explain some things. One of the charming effects of Global Warming is that the arctic pack ice is melting, opening up huge areas of the Canadian and Russian Arctic to more oil exploitation (somelike like 25% of the world's reserves I saw somewhere), which allows for more oil burning, which, you get the idea.

You see, it's not a brewing global catastrophy that might devastate the earth and the human race through environmental chaos and starvation, it's really just another excellent business opportunity, kind of like my planned Wisconsin fruit shriveling business.

Last month's Scientific American has some stuff on atmospheric carbon extraction. I hope it works, but it feels more like one of those Popular Science schemes to commute using inexpensive uranium-powered plywood submersible blimps.