Veronika Wild

  The Impact of Climate Change on Biodiversity THE ARCTIC Polar Bears Who can forget the widely circulated image of a polar bear trapped on an icefloe with neither prey nor land, nor even another ice floe in sight. Although Polar Bears can swim short distances, it takes five times as much energy as simply shuffling across the ice. Although polar bear numbers have improved in some regions – largely as a result of the ban on unregulated hunting in the 1970s, numbers generally are either  static or in decline. For the most part, shorter winters and warmer summers mean a shorter hunting season and poor condition which in turn leads to lower reproductive success. Some Polar Bears have taken to scavenging in settlements in order to get enough food. Ringed Seals which are staple of the Polar Bear’s diet, are also facing threats due to climate change and sea ice loss because they depend on sea ice for resting, breeding, and pupping in snow dens on the ice. Shrinking and th...

-Image by Copilot   What Do We Mean by the Cryosphere? Just to recap, the Cryosphere refers to all frozen water on Earth — snow, sea ice, lake and river ice, glaciers, ice caps, ice sheets, permafrost, and ice shelves. It forms a major component of the Earth system, strongly influencing climate, oceans, ecosystems and the global energy balance. Although frozen water appears across the globe, the Polar Regions contain its largest and most climate-critical components. I have had to split the Polar section into two parts as well, so watch out for Part II shortly. If you thought things were looking bad in the Alps, the rate of warming in Polar Regions is even faster — closer to three to four times faster than the global average. As one researcher remarked in a journal article, the words "glacially slow" have taken on a new meaning. If we hear little about these changes, it's most likely because because polar regions are vast, remote and seemingly indestructible. T...

  -Image by Copilot For this post I am using Australia as an example. While the challenges described here are shared by fuel-dependent nations everywhere, Australia represents a particularly acute case — one of the most geographically isolated countries on earth, almost entirely dependent on shipping and aviation for both imports and exports. Tasmania sharpens that picture even more. An island’s island - dependent on ferries, flights and a supply chain that stretches even further. It is a preview of what vulnerability really looks like. How We Got Here After World War II, many countries were determined never again to be vulnerable — not just with respect to fuel, but also food and the basic materials needed to produce manufactured goods. This usually led to government subsidies to farmers and the stockpiling of large quantities of commodities such as Germany's "butter mountains," and France's "wine lakes." Australia had guaranteed prices for wool - the gov...