02-01 Arctic vs. Antarctic
New shipping lanes, new cruise destinations, new wealth, quirky penguins.If you are interested in the future, you want to follow events in the Arctic and the Antarctic. The photo of the two poles shows the Antarctic as a monster land mass surrounded by sea ice in the winter. The Arctic, on the other hand, is…
02-02 Windy Denmark
Hearing aids and the largest wind turbine in the world. Quirky Denmark. This is Bernie Sanders country where people have public health care and education paid for by the state. And, Bernie, don’t forget to tell Americans about their 25% sales tax, and the electricity tax used to subsidize wind power. And, you can see…
02-03 Qaqortoq
Greenland is a global winner. Mackerel and Bluefin tuna in their waters. Tourists love Qaqortoq. It was a cruise ship visit to southern Greenland in 2009. With Inuit speaking English and two other languages. Inuit working in retail. Inuit married to Danes. Innuit growing vegetables. Innuit enjoying a new fish source-mackerel. It was one surprise…
02-04 The Northeast Passage
New Arctic shipping lanes around Russia will change the global balance of power I’ve always wanted to go to “Chetyryokhstollbevoyy Island” north of Russia in the Arctic. So quirky. It is a cruise stop in the Northeast Passage. And cruising here during the summer months will soon attract the same kind of tourist numbers that…
02-05 Iceland Glaciers
Iceland is losing a billion tons of ice per year. Glaciers are disappearing. But Iceland is a climate winner. Tourism and fishing are booming. In Greenland they were talking about schools of mackerel that were showing up in the warmer Greenland waters. But in Iceland they were talking about shrinking glaciers.And there is something like…
02-06 Sweden and Bioenergy
Energy from wood chips. In Sweden it is bigger than hydro and nuclear. The secret is taxing fossil fuels. It was a surprise touring Stockholm in the 1990s to see our guide take a cup and scoop up some water from the harbour and drink it. She boasted that protecting the environment is part of…
02-07 Russia and Geopolitics
An explosion in agriculture. Natural gas from Siberia via the Northeast Passage. Climate change ensures Russia’s superpower status. It is easy to suggest that Arctic nations will be climate winners. Areas opened-up for agriculture, reduced spending on heating, and an explosion of resource development. And with these changes come major shifts in population and property…
02-08 Permafrost
The Arctic permafrost is melting. And the decomposition of organic material is sending carbon into the atmosphere. Here are three cities in Russia you probably did not know were there: Yakutsk, Salekhard and Norlisk. The photo is a main street of one of these communities. But the story is that these are cities are built…
02-09 The Nordic Region
Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Iceland and Finland will become fossil fuel free welfare states. It’s their consensus political culture. My interest in visiting the Nordic countries over the years was trying to understand how they were able to work together so effectively. And on what we call tough issues like taxation and climate change. The map…
02-10 The Northwest Passage
President Reagan and PM Mulroney? Yes. President Trump and PM Trudeau? No. An agreement is needed to create a new Arctic trade route. The Canadian North is all about politics. A warming, quirky climate. A development explosion. A cruise destination. And wonderful people. It is made up of three Canadian Territories, The Yukon, The Northwest…
02-11 Glacial Lakes
Formed by melting glaciers, glacial lakes are growing in number and size. They pose a future threat. Hard to believe that the Great Lakes of North America are the world’s largest glacial lakes. Formed during the ice age. Glaciers as they melt leave huge depressions in the earth, which fill with water.The updated story from…
02-12 Hawaii
Climate change could destroy the Hawaiian Islands, one of the most beautiful places on earth. The famous beaches on Waikiki are threatened by rising sea levels. And their massive coral reefs are threatened by warming, acidic oceans. The Hawaiian Islands are the exposed peaks of a great underwater mountain range. There are eight fairly large…
02-13 The Amazon Rainforest
The world’s largest rainforest and largest river. Providing 20% of the world’s oxygen. Under attack from natural and unnatural forest fires, illegal logging and deforestation. .There are something like 390 billion trees in Brazil’s Amazon Rainforest. And each year about 7 billion trees are cut down. It is an enormous area the size of India…