Well-financed warmist James Astill writes a schizophrenic article on the Arctic: Claims the polar bear is struggling; calls a 5 F average temperature "relatively sultry"; admits that there is "still plenty of sea ice"; only 4 million of Earth's 6,840 million people live there

The melting north - James Astill - The Economist

Greenland, the world’s biggest island, is six times the size of Germany. Yet it has a population of just 57,000, mostly Inuit scattered in tiny coastal settlements. In the whole of the Arctic—roughly defined as the Arctic Circle and a narrow margin to the south (see map)—there are barely 4m people, around half of whom live in a few cheerless post-Soviet cities such as Murmansk and Magadan. In most of the rest, including much of Siberia, northern Alaska, northern Canada, Greenland and northern Scandinavia, there is hardly anyone.

...There is no serious doubt about the basic cause of the warming. It is, in the Arctic as everywhere, the result of an increase in heat-trapping atmospheric gases, mainly carbon dioxide released when fossil fuels are burned.

That keeps the average annual temperature for the high Arctic (the northernmost fringes of land and the sea beyond) at a relatively sultry -15°C; much of the rest is close to melting-point for much of the year. Even modest warming can therefore have a dramatic effect on the region’s ecosystems. The Antarctic is also warming, but with an average annual temperature of -57°C it will take more than a few hot summers for this to become obvious.
...The efficient north-south mixing of air may also play a part in the Arctic’s amplified warming. The winds that rush northwards carry pollutants, including soot from European and Asian smokestacks, which has a powerful warming effect over snow....High-Arctic species, including the polar bear, are struggling.

...These new Arctic industries will not emerge overnight. There is still plenty of sea ice to make the north exceptionally tough and expensive to work in; 24-hour-a-day winter darkness and Arctic cyclones make it tougher still.

Flashback: THE ECONOMIST’S JAMES ASTILL WINS $75,000 GRANTHAM PRIZE

NARRAGANSETT, RI — September 30, 2011 /PRNewswire/ — Metcalf Institute for Marine & Environmental Reporting presented The Grantham Prize for Excellence in Reporting on the Environment to James Astill of The Economist at the 2011 Grantham Prize Awards Ceremony. Astill received US$75,000 for “The World’s Lungs: Forests, and How to Save Them,” a commanding 8-part special report on the state of global forests and the rising threats they face from human exploitation and climate change.