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A farewell to ice
39,272 views |
Peter Wadhams |
TEDxUHasselt
• March 2018
September 2017 has smashed multiple climate records, being the hottest September ever recorded in the past 137 years of modern record-tracking. Despite many counterstatements of the human influences on global warming, its life threatening effects can no longer be ignored. The Arctic ice is rapidly retreating and trends are indicating that soon we will face ice-free central arctics in the summer. Due to the ever-increasing carbon emission that is collecting at the atmosphere, the latter is regrettably just a fraction of this calamitous puzzle. The growing heat is causing the Siberian permafrost to melt, additionally releasing large quantities of methane gas into the atmosphere which reinforces the global warming effect. According to prof. dr. Peter Wadhams of the University of Cambridge and author of A Farewell to Ice, innovative technologies are becoming increasingly relevant to timely shun this apocalypse. As humans remain incapable of changing their habits and practices as has been evidenced by our intensely developing society of the past decades, breaching this vicious cycle and achieving the 2°C climate goal of the Paris Agreement requires a true moonshot approach. Is assistance from technology truly imperative to save our planet? And if so, how far are we from a breakthrough in climate-saving technologies?