At the AGU, the world's largest annual physical science conference, a diverse quartet of scientists set out this morning to launch a discussion about the future of polar bears, and the possibility of a refuge for them in northern Canada and Greenland, where ice experts think sea ice, which is crucial to the balance between polar bears and ringed seals, will last into the next century.
The team, which includes a marine biologist, a climatologist, and an ice expert, stressed that this was only a first step towards preserving the polar bear.
"This is a conversation that has to include native peoples…our intent is to begin tthat conversation," said Robert Newton, an oceanographer.
The team of scientists added that a recent USGS study by Steven Amstrup, predicting that ice would remain in the summer in the Arctic until at least 2040, if greenhouse gas emissions were reduced in the next twenty years, meant that the best way to save the polar bear was to begin emissions reductions now.
"Our research offers a very promising, hopeful message, but it's also an incentive for mitigating greenhouse emissions," Cecilia Bitz told ScienceDaily.
At the press conference, New York Times writer Andrew Revkin asked a hard-headed question: Why should we care about the polar bear?
Newton pointed out that as a scientist, large attention-catching species such as the polar bear were arguably less important to the environment as a whole than the tiny benthic organisms in the water — but that's not the point.
"As a citizen when you see these bears, which in fundamental ways are not that different from us, all of us have an emotional response and even for some people a spiritual response, so it’s an important question and raises issues for people that wouldn’t other wise be raised," Newton said.
Sometimes the hardest questions provoke the best answers.
Kit Stolz 