Word: polarizing
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...concern that Atlantic cod will encroach in the east and compete with the smaller Arctic cod, which have thrived in frigid climates with their special proteins that prevent freezing of the blood. Meanwhile, the retracting ice makes it harder for ringed seals to find breeding grounds and for polar bears to hunt...
...That means food isn't always there even when the Inuit can travel. Wildlife may well be less adaptable to extreme changes than humans are. When polar bears can't find prey, there are few alternatives; the bears burn their own fat, releasing into their systems the contaminants stored there--pesticides and other industrial chemicals that accumulate in cool Arctic waters and build up in the food chain. Other animals are also in trouble. In February, in what should have been midwinter in the far north, Nunavut's capital city, Iqaluit, was a balmy 5*noneC and rainy. When...
...reasons the loss of the planet's ice cover is accelerating is that as the poles' bright white surface shrinks, it changes the relationship of Earth and the sun. Polar ice is so reflective that 90% of the sunlight that strikes it simply bounces back into space, taking much of its energy with it. Ocean water does just the opposite, absorbing 90% of the energy it receives. The more energy it retains, the warmer it gets, with the result that each mile of ice that melts vanishes faster than the mile that preceded...
...risk as melting permafrost pours mud into rivers, burying the gravel the fish need for spawning. Small animals such as bushy-tailed wood rats, alpine chipmunks and piņon mice are being chased upslope by rising temperatures, following the path of the fleeing trees. And with sea ice vanishing, polar bears--prodigious swimmers but not inexhaustible ones--are starting to turn up drowned. "There will be no polar ice by 2060," says Larry Schweiger, president of the National Wildlife Federation. "Somewhere along that path, the polar bear drops...
...fires release still more carbon into the atmosphere, fewer plants survive to convert CO2 into oxygen, and scorched soil absorbs more heat and retains less water, increasing droughts ?Plants take in CO2 ?Fires release carbon ?Less carbon absorbed ?Soil dries out RISING TEMPERATURES MELT POLAR ICE AND PERMAFROST THAWING OUT The North Pole may be seasonally ice free by 2050. Melting permafrost will release vast amounts of trapped carbon into the air LESS ICE MEANS MORE HEAT WHICH MEANS LESS ICE SPEEDING UP Ice reflects nearly all the sun's energy that hits...