Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Al Gore, Phone Home

I had to double-check the date of this story, from Maktoob Business:

Gore beats climate change drum in Dubai

Al Gore was beating the climate change drum again on Tuesday, this time in Dubai, as the former U.S. vice president warned global warming will create “hundreds of millions of climate refugees”.

“Each one metre of sea level rise is associated with 100 million climate refugees in the world,” the Nobel laureate told a business forum in Dubai, which could see its famous man-made islands disappear under the waves if his predictions prove true.

“The North Pole ice cap is 40 percent gone already and could be completely and totally gone in the winter months in the next 5 to 10 years,” he warned....MORE
Although Maktoob.com is a pretty big internet service provider, I don't know their business reporting and couldn't find another source for the quote*.

Coincidentally the U.K.'s Met Office put out a press release earlier this month that reads in part:
The decline in Arctic summer sea ice

...Modelling of Arctic sea ice by the Met Office Hadley Centre climate model shows that ice invariably recovers from extreme events, and that the long-term trend of reduction is robust — with the first ice-free summer expected to occur between 2060 and 2080. It is unlikely that the Arctic will experience ice-free summers by 2020....
Don't go scaring me like that, Al.
The UAE's Khaleej Times had this quote:
“I personally believe that solving the climate crisis is the biggest single business opportunity in the history of the world,” Al Gore said.
Abu Dhabi's The National also covered the speech, without mention of the ice-free in winter quote.
The official website made mention of both Mr. Gore's Webby and Grammy awards.