Melting glaciers releasing toxic stew.

[alfredo]

We thought the melting permafrost was bad news, this just compounds our worries.

http://environment.newscientist.com/article/dn13848-melting-glaciers-release-toxic-chemical-cocktail.html?DCMP=ILC-hmts&nsref=news2_head_dn13848


Decades after most countries stopped spraying DDT, frozen stores of the insecticide are now trickling out of melting Antarctic glaciers. The change means Adélie penguins have recently been exposed to the chemical, according to a new study.

The trace levels found will not harm the birds, but the presence of the chemical could be an indication that other frozen pollutants will be released because of climate change, says Heidi Geisz, a marine biologist at Virginia Institute of Marine Science in Gloucester in the US. She led a team that sampled DDT levels in the penguins.

She worries that glaciers could release an alphabet soup of chemical pollutants into the ocean, including PCBs and PBDEs – industrial chemicals that have been linked to health problems in humans.

"DDT is not the only chemical that these birds are ingesting and it is certainly not the worst," Geisz says.

[ensho]

1. kick

nt

[alfredo]

6. I'm giving my own OP a kick because I feel that people are too happy.

[yardwork]

2. Terrific.

There's a word for animals that soil their own nest.

Stupid.

And, eventually, extinct.

[alfredo]

4. There will be a massive culling of our herd. It might happen in our lifetime.

[dysfunctional press]

7. well...SOME of our lifetimes, anyway.

not so much for the cullees.

[alfredo]

14. If you are the culled, it will be rather unpleasant for a bit, but after it is

over, it's as if you never existed anyway.

[dysfunctional press]

15. pretty much the same goes for everyone- culled or not.

time always wins.

[alfredo]

16. Ralph Stanley says it best

http://youtube.com/watch?v=f60UEe2LuLw

[fed-up]

3. kick & Rec nt

[alfredo]

5. Thanks.

[lovuian]

8. the poles were toxic waste dumps

oh this is going to be ugly

[The Straight Story]

9. Ban glaciers melting

Problem solved :)

Seriously though, some good info to ponder. Reminds me of an X-Files Episode.

Thanks for posting it!

[alfredo]

10. Anyone that has watched an urban snow bank melt can visualize

what is going on.

[Kitty Herder]

11. With every new environmental nightmare that I learn about , the

more hopeless and powerless I feel. Sometimes I feel utterly fatigued under the weight of it. We're on a collision course with destruction and it seems like everything we do to help prevent it is just a tiny, clear raindrop in a great ocean of poison.

I'm sure I'm not the only one who feels that way. How do you all cope with it?

[Lorien]

12. You aren't the only one. The effects of climate change are snowballing

and we along with millions of completely innocent species will be buried under the avalanche to come.

How do I cope with it? By trying not to feel too attached to my own life, by doing what little I can to try to improve matters, and by being grateful every day that I never had children.I already went through anger and denial, now I'm in the acceptance phase.

:-(

[Kitty Herder]

13. I think I'm stuck in the anger phase.

I admire you for finding that acceptance. I'm not sure I ever will.

[alfredo]

17. Go down fighting. Get involved in your community. We need to

not just go after the polluters, we need to go after the corporations that have held our government hostage.