Russia Threatens to Seize Part of Supposedly Oil-Rich Arctic

Ever since the energy crisis began and evidence of global warming forced politicians around the world to consider the future more carefully, five countries have been fighting over control of an area of the world still thought to be rich with oil and natural gas: the Arctic.  This week, Russia threatened to claim part of the Arctic for themselves despite the dispute over who really owns it.  Russian president Dmitry Medvedev told a meeting of the Security Council that Russia must “finalise and adopt a federal law on the southern border of Russia’s Arctic zone”, saying it was their responsibility to their descendants to secure the country’s interests in the Arctic.

From The Telegraph:

Last August, a Russian mini-submarine carrying politicians and scientists plunged to the depths of the Arctic and claimed to plant a Russian flag to mark Moscow’s stake in the territory.

Footage of the alleged planting was widely broadcast on Russian television – but later turned out to be images taken from the Hollywood blockbuster Titanic.

Under international law, each of the five countries that lay claim to the Arctic own a 320-kilometre zone that extends north from their shores. That arrangement is up for UN review in May next year.

Vladimir Putin, now Russia’s prime minister, has said global warming is good for Russia – melting its vast icy territories to reveal previously inaccessible oil and gas reserves.

Sounds like a good old fashioned super power war is brewing… over resources.  How fun.  Russia isn’t exactly know for playing well with others, and considering that many countries are desperate for oil (despite the fact that what we should be focusing on is clean alternative energy sources), Russia’s oil-fueled power will likely continue to grow.

Link [The Telegraph]
Photo credit: Reuters

Climate Change Could Spark Wars Worldwide

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to determine that drastically changing weather patterns could promote instability around the world, especially in areas that are already dealing with conflict. Environmental groups have been saying so for years, and now U.S. spies are warning the government that global warming could lead to the collapse of governments and the creation of terrorist safe havens.

From Inside Defense, via Wired:

In addition to examining how weather could add stress to governments with a weak grip on power … the authors mulled a spectrum of second- and third-order consequences for Washington policymakers to consider — including indirect security concerns like impacts on economies, energy, social unrest and migration.

Foreign-policy concerns were also weighed, including how flooding, rising water levels or drought might create humanitarian crises. Also examined was how extreme weather events could challenge the response capabilities of governments around the world.

Though the Bush administration has done everything they could to suppress the knowledge that climate change is actually happening and will get worse, the nation’s military leaders have taken the strategic implications very seriously. Last Wednesday, leading spies testified on Capitol Hill about the report.

The panel who spoke to the House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming and the Intelligence Community Management Subcommittee included retired army generals and ‘geoengineering’ proponents along with a global warming skeptic put in place by Republicans on the Intelligence Committee, who were opposed to the report in the first place.

That’s right, Republicans are still – even after all of the information and dire predictions that have come out – denying that climate change is real. Amazing.

Link [Wired]
Photo credit: Darfur Refugees, via Wikimedia Commons

Environmentally Friendly Bombs on the Way

It sounds like the worst contradiction in terms: environmentally friendly bombs. And no, it’s not a story from the Onion this time around. Calling something green that’s designed to blow up its surroundings when it hits its target is just – well – dumb. Yet, scientists are working on a bomb that would create less environmental fallout via toxic gases and polluting debris. I guess if we’re going to slaughter people with high impact explosives, we might as well do it in a greener way.

From Yahoo News:

TNT, RDX and other explosives commonly used in military and industrial applications often generate toxic gases upon detonation that pollute the environment. Moreover, the explosives themselves are toxic and can find their way into the environment due to incomplete detonation and as unexploded ordnance. They are also extremely dangerous to handle, as they are highly sensitive to physical shock, such as hard impacts and electric sparks.

To make safer, more environmentally friendly explosives, scientists in Germany turned to a recently explored class of materials called tetrazoles. These derive most of their explosive energy from nitrogen instead of carbon as TNT and others do.

Tiny bombs were made from two promising tetrazoles with the alphabet-soup names of HBT and G2ZT. These materials proved less apt to explode accidentally than conventional explosives.

In initial experiments, G2ZT and HBT produced fewer toxic byproducts than common explosives. Still, they did generate some dangerous hydrogen cyanide gas. But mixing these compounds with oxidizers not only avoids making hydrogen cyanide, but also improved performance, Klapötke said.

While we could just, you know, stop bombing each other, considering that humans can’t seem to stop getting into deadly conflicts, that’s not likely to happen. So, it would certainly be best to try to limit the amount of environmental damage a bomb will do once it’s dropped.

Boom.

Link [Yahoo News]
Photo credit: Flickr user jaqian

Greening Up War: A Round Table Discussion on Environmentally Friendly Killin’

The Onion nails it just right- if we’re going to torture, wage war, and ethnically cleanse, it should be in a environmentally friendly way.

H/T to the big guy Jordan for dropping this link on me.

The War on Iraq is Costing $4,000 a Second, or About $120,000 in the Time It Took to Write This Headline

We’re spending over $4,000 A SECOND on the clusterfuck that is Iraq. Is anyone else pissed off about that? What. The. Fuck. How many better ways could we be spending that? How have Bush and Cheney not been impeached yet? Grrr….

Check out the entire Tom Tomorrow comic over at Salon.

Link [Tom Tomorrow on Salon]

War’s a Comin’! Alabama, Georgia and Florida Will Fight it Out Over Water

Good grief. After reading this story on water issues with Alabama, Georgia and Florida, I have this picture in my head of a bunch of Southern Senators pointing at each other and saying, “But siihhr… I say, I say, I say… I asked first!” while swinging their foppish canes around on the floor of the Senate.

Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne acknowledged Saturday that White House-brokered water negotiations among Alabama, Florida and Georgia have failed.

Without an agreement, the Army Corps of Engineers and other federal agencies will begin implementing a water-sharing plan of their own, Kempthorne said in a letter to the governors.

Regrettably, it will necessarily be a solution being directed to the states instead of our much hoped for solution coming from the states,” he wrote in the letter, released Saturday.

These three states have been negotiating this issue for over 2 decades. Yes, two decades! They’ve been fighting over water rights in the Apalachicola-Chattahoochee-Flint and the Alabama-Coosa-Tallapoosa river basins, which run south through Georgia into Alabama and the Florida panhandle.

Georgia is trying to hold back more water for the growing population in Atlanta, while Florida and Alabama are pointing fingers at Georgia saying that they didn’t do well in planning for this growth. The talks have gotten even worse over the last few days with Sonny Perdue saying that the water problems faced by Georgia are more critical than the other two states. Hmmmm…..Sonny Perdue, don’t get me started.

Being the problem solving person that I am, here’s my solution. A good ‘ol southern cock fight! The last man, er cock, standing gets the water. It’s how everything should be worked out- two chickens fighting to the death. Bock. Bock.

Link [Yahoo News]

Photo Source: USGS