No More Cheapskates at the Missing Rink

As most of the developed world seems to be skating on thin ice – at least financially-speaking – the physical world appears to be mirroring that otherwise figurative paradigm. The glimmer of a navigable Northwest Passage has now become a reality. “The unprecedented rate of Arctic sea ice melt [in June and July of 2012] has led to the Parry Channel of the fabled Northwest Channel becoming mainly ice-free by early August… The greatest extent of summertime melting in the region usually doesn’t occur until about mid-September… Climate change has allowed for far more Arctic sea to melt over the past decade, with the Northwest Passage opening up and becoming navigable in early September 2007 for the first time in 125,000 years.” EarthWeek.com, August 10^th.

Even as moments of bitter cold have embraced parts of the United States, such phenomena are nothing more than a momentary southward bend of cold air – a  phenomenon known as sudden stratospheric warming – bringing frost from the Canadian north.. “The stratosphere is located between 6 miles and 30 miles above the ground. Often when this [anomaly] occurs, it forces cold air to build in the lowest layer of the atmosphere then to drive southward.” Weather.aol.com.

We all know that the overall vectors are providing higher levels of average global temperatures than we have experienced in recorded history. We know about the storm surges, increased ferocity of hurricanes and typhoons, rising ocean tides, migration of nasty insects to places that are not prepared for the onslaught, flooding in some areas with deep and sustained drought in others, the loss of habitat for so many species, the loss of structures and useable land by the shore, even the increased volcanic activity resulting from the change in sea pressure on the earth’s crust, etc, etc.

But then there are the little things that come out of left field. So many American, Canadian, Scandinavian, and Russian families hose down their backyards every winter for junior to don his/her hockey togs and play the puck. Ponds, lakes and rivers freeze, and kids by the thousands figure-skate and scrimmage in mini-hockey wars until the thaw. OK, the freeze comes later now and the thaw a bit earlier every year. But winter is often the blessing that allows more than a few Canadian hockey rinks to save money, making the sport a bit more affordable to communities without a lot of cash, by turning off the expensive refrigeration systems required for the rest of the year. Some rinks didn’t need cooling systems at all.

“It has been too warm for December hockey in the Arctic, the latest sign that climate change is altering the environment and the way people live — especially in the far north, where the effects of rising temperatures are most pronounced…  Nine of the 14 villages in Nunavik, a region in northernmost Quebec, have installed cooling systems at community arenas within the last five years…  In Canada’s Nunavut Territory, towns including Arviat, Igloolik, Sanikiluaq and Repulse Bay have resorted to cooling systems. A system is also being installed at the community arena in Cape Dorset, a hamlet of 1,400 just 150 miles south of the Arctic Circle… “‘We used to have natural ice in the arena in October, but that hasn’t happened for a long time,’ said Mike Hayward, a Cape Dorset town official. Now the ice isn’t fit for hockey until mid-January, he said. That is why a cooling system is being installed in the building.

“The Canadian environmental ministry reports that the country is warming more than twice as fast as the world as a whole, with annual average temperatures in Canada up about 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit since 1948. The warming in winter is even faster, almost 6 degrees Fahrenheit over the same period, and scientists have documented a substantially shorter outdoor skating season as a result…  A study published last year by climate scientists at McGill and Concordia universities in Montreal warned that natural ice for skating could disappear from southern Alberta and British Columbia by midcentury and be significantly diminished throughout the rest of the country.” New York Times, January 4^th.  Canada may pick up some more farmland in the process, and the Russians are celebrating the warming trend. It seems like such a little inconvenience… for some… but for the rest of us…

I’m Peter Dekom, and it will be in the aggregation of consequences that we fully appreciate what our callous disregard for the environment has done to us.