Wednesday, February 27, 2008

heh - look at that, it's almost March

I'm a deliquent. I know.

I ran across this article just now about how the Inuit village of Kivalina in Alaska is suing Exxon Mobil and 8 other oil/energy companies for contributing to the global warming that is causing their village to erode into the ocean (it used to be protected by sea ice, but the sea ice shows up later & leaves earlier every year). It'll be interesting to see how this plays out.

Apparently, there are federally generated documents (Army Corps of Engineers & the General Accounting Office) outlining the damage done to the village by global warming, so maybe it's not as much as long shot as you might initially believe.

It's a pretty interesting article, which I think everyone should read, but I am reluctant to repeat too much of it. The grounds for the lawsuit are pretty interesting - conspiracy to mislead the public about the causes and consequences of global warming and on the basis of public nuisance.

Wiki page about the village. Apparently the lawsuit was filed on Feb. 26 of this year.