Just imagine. Dining at the Burj Al Arab flagship Al Mahara restaurant in Dubai, delighting in your Wagyu Carpaccio appetizer while sipping a $10,000 martini in a glass of Swarovski crystal that has been served on the rocks with ice mined from the melting Svartisen glacier in Norway's polar circle. Can't imagine it? Me either.
Svartisen is mainland Europe's lowest lying glacier and it is located in Norway. The name comes from two elements, Svard meaning black, and isen meaning ice. The ancient ice is not black, however, but dark blue and turquoise.
Extracting the ice will require specially developed heavy and robust mechanical/hydraulic equipment for use atop the glacier and the ice blocks will be removed and flown by helicopter to a Oslo warehouse where it will be distributed to the worlds most exclusive and luxurious restaurants and bars in Dubai, London and New York.
The ice cube is said to audibly crack in pieces once alcohol is poured over it and the "ice cubes hiss and pop as they melt—they practically sing to you while you sip". The cube melts slower then regular ice and is said to taste like mineral water so that the cocktail will never taste diluted.
The company marketing this ice, Svaice, quotes it's founder Geir Olsen.
If you thought you knew what an ice cube could do for you, think again! SVAICE is creating a fantastic experience for those who are lucky enough to find it. Our product is 100 per cent natural, more than a thousand years old and very luxurious. We guarantee goose bumps and a memorable moment for those who can find it.
Yes indeed , the filthy rich have it made. In addition to potential access to glacial ice cubes for their vodka, they also are able to access some other pretty amazing perks.
I suppose that removing ice from Svartisen is not a big surprise and that bigger environmental crimes occur on a daily basis from those who profit from environmental degradation, climate change and human misery. But I just find it galling. For example, let's take a look at the Koch Brothers who own our House of Representatives and Senate: "The Political Economy Research Institute ranks Koch Industries as the fourteenth worst air polluter in the U.S. in their Toxic Release Inventory, above oil giants like BP, Shell and Chevron and large coal utilities like American Electric Power and Duke Energy. CARMA reports that Koch releases about 200,000 tons of atmospheric carbon dioxide annually."
Two chlorine dioxide chemical leaks from a Koch-owned cellulose facility in Taylor County Florida in May, 2014.
• Subsidiaries of Koch Carbon have accumulated massive piles of petroleum coke in U.S. cities like Detroit and Chicago, where the toxic dust has blown into peoples' homes from a 5-story-tall pile of petcoke. Petcoke is a byproduct of refining tar sands that is usually burned like coal. Petcoke, which is more carbon-intensive than coal, is typically exported and burned in other countries with little to no air or climate regulations. While Detroit's mayor ordered Koch to move its petcoke pile, Chicago regulators and politicians have not acted with the same urgency despite sustained local protests from community members, nurses, and threats of lawsuits from environmental groups. In response, Koch claims it will add protections to its unlined pile, which could take two years.
• Facing "enormous" cleanup costs for soil and groundwater contamination and high crude oil prices, Flint Hills announced in 2014 that it would permanently close its North Pole refinery outside of Fairbanks, Alaska. Koch blames contamination on the refinery's previous owner, Williams Companies.
• Ongoing releases of benzene and other chemicals from Koch's oil refinery in Corpus Christi, Texas, where refinery communities experience high rates of illnesses.
• Hundreds of thousands of pounds of toxic chemical contamination from Koch-owned Georgia-Pacific facility in Crossett, Arkansas, as reported in 2011.
• In 2009, the US Justice Department and EPA announced in 2009 that Koch Industries' Invista subsidiary would pay a $1.7 million penalty and spend $500 million to fix environmental violations at facilities in seven states, in an agreement with the US EPA and Department of Justice.
• In May 2001, Koch Industries paid $25 million to settle with the US Government over a long-standing suit brought by Bill Koch - one of the brothers bought out in 1983 - for the company's long-standing practice of illegally removing oil from federal and Indian lands.
• In late 2000, the company was charged with covering up the illegal releases of 91 tons of the known carcinogen benzene from its refinery in Corpus Christi. Initially facing a 97-count indictment and potential fines of $350 million, Koch cut a deal with then-Attorney General John Ashcroft to drop all major charges in exchange for a guilty plea for falsifying documents, and a $20 million settlement.
• In 2000, the EPA fined Koch Industries $30 million for its role in 300 oil spills that resulted in more than three million gallons of crude oil leaking into ponds, lakes, streams and coastal waters.
• In 1999 a Koch subsidiary pleaded guilty to charges that it had negligently allowed aviation fuel to leak into waters near the Mississippi River from its refinery in Rosemount, Minnesota, and that it had illegally dumped a million gallons of high-ammonia wastewater onto the ground and into the Mississippi.
•Koch's negligence toward environmental safety has led to tragic losses of life. In 1996, a rusty Koch pipeline leaked flammable butane near a Texas residential neighborhood. Warned by the smell of gas, two teenagers drove their truck toward the nearest payphone to call for help, but they never made it. Sparks from their truck ignited the gas cloud and the two burned alive. The National Transportation Safety Board determined that "the probable cause of this accident was the failure of Koch to adequately protect its pipeline from corrosion" and the ineffectiveness of Koch's program to educate local residents about how to respond during a pipeline leak.
Environmental impacts to Svartisen glacier as noted by Glacier Hub.
But SVAICE’s plans have drawn sharp criticism from environmentalists, who are not thrilled at the idea of mining a melting glacier to support an energy-intensive and emissions-heavy shipping business. Sigurd Enge, an advisor on Arctic issues for environmental NGO The Bellona Foundation, told Norway’s The Local that a full environmental impact assessment should be required to see how the mining operation will affect the condition of the glacier. Enge also noted that it will require a lot of energy just to keep the product cold as it is shipped around the globe. The World Wildlife Fund’s Secretary General in Norway, Nina Jensen, also spoke to The Local about the project.
“It seems very strange that the government should provide support to mine Svartisen when we know that it is shrinking because of climate change,” she told the publication. “I do not think it is right to create short-term jobs by eating up the last parts of a glacier which is about to disappear.”
Photograph by Jim Richardson, National Geographic
Svalbard Global Seed Vault as noted by National Geographic.
But crop varieties are already vanishing at an astonishing pace for more mundane reasons, from shifting local weather patterns to disuse by farmers adopting new hybrids. The vault represents a chance to save as many as possible.
"I'd say doomsday is happening everyday for crop varieties," said Cary Fowler, executive director of the Global Crop Diversity Trust, which helps manage the facility. "Lots of people think that this vault is waiting for doomsday before we use it. But it's really a backup plan for seeds and crops. We are losing seed diversity every day and this is the insurance policy for that."
Even a seemingly simple crop, such as wheat, may have 200,000 different varieties. And each variety has a suite of individual traits that determine how it fares in high or low temperatures, during droughts, or against certain diseases or pests.
"Even conservative projections of changing climate now indicate that by mid-century huge areas of some countries, in Africa for example, will be experiencing climates that are unlike any that have existed since the beginning of agriculture in those countries," Fowler explained.
Svartisen is cracking the mystery of how Glaciers move.
Iverson wants to know what puts the brakes on glaciers. "Why don't they catastrophically slide down a mountain, like an ice cube on a inclined sheet of glass?" he asked.
The idea has been that bumps in the bedrock hold glaciers back, explained Thomas Hooyer, a glacial geologist at the Wisconsin Geological and Natural History Survey and part of Iverson's team.
But from their unique worm's-eye view, the scientists discovered another force at work: friction.
What they discovered was that the debris in the "dirty" ice at the glacier's base acts much like sandpaper to slow the huge masses of ice—and the amount of friction is up to 20 times greater than was previously thought.
"What we learned was that friction between the debris in the ice and underlying bedrock was the dominant factor holding ice back—which will have to be factored into efforts to predict glacier movements," Iverson said.
Some glaciers sit on bedrock, like Svartisen, but others—including the faster-moving Antarctic glaciers—rest atop gritty sediment called till that is usually saturated with water that is under high pressure. One idea is that these "soft bedded" glaciers move by shearing the sediment away.
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We're getting nervous about the long-term health of the ice sheets, Alley said. "There's worries about both poles. We're not yet hitting the panic button, but we want to allow people to make wise decisions."
Those decisions could include the construction of seawalls or adaptive coastal zoning to protect from flooding.
But scientists don't yet know enough about ice sheets to make accurate predictions. "We are reasonably confident that we can do a better job than we are now of predicting the future," Alley said.
Iverson sees glaciers as one of the forces changing world weather. He mentioned the fast-moving Laurentide Ice Sheet as an example.
About 14,000 years ago, it ripped through the U.S. Midwest before retreating northward. It changed the amount of fresh water in the ocean and disrupted the flow of rivers: Many drained into the Gulf of Mexico instead of the North Atlantic.
"I'm sure that had a huge affect on global heat in the atmosphere," he said. "Glaciers don't just respond to changes in climate. They also cause it."
Incredible footage filmed from within a glacier reveals the discovery of water pockets which help glaciers flow easily. Timelapse photography illustrates the extraordinary power of ice as chamber chissled out by scientists closes up in just three days.
A special thank you to Glacier Hub for their link to the Svartisen ice cube story.