"I Heart Global Warming" - Current's "Vanguard" Special Report

If there's one place on Earth where climate change is being celebrated, it just might be Greenland.

The giant island, which is actually a semi-autonomous county of Denmark, just moved a giant step closer to full independence, thanks in part to global warming. Over 76 percent of Greenlanders voted in favor of a referendum that moves the island toward full independence. They have global warming to thank.

Greenland had been colonized by Denmark for hundreds of years and that relationship has largely stood still, since the frigid temperatures and icy terrain have prevented a real economy from developing.

But today, that ice is melting at unprecedented rates and it's revealing treasures - oil, gas, minerals - that, by some measures, may make Greenlanders among the richest people in the world. The promise of resource wealth has emboldened Greenlanders to cut the colonial cord - and the generous $US 600 million annual check from Denmark (that's $10,000 for each of Greenland's 56,000 people).

Sure, global warming may spell catastrophe for the planet, but today, we can celebrate it. Cheers to global warming!

-Adam Yamaguchi, "Vanguard" Correspondent

Adam Yamaguchi is a producer for the award-winning "Vanguard" unit of Current TV journalists. "Vanguard" airs every Wednesday at 10 p.m. ET/PT. "Vanguard" pods are also available on Current.com/Vanguard.

Comments

[fumes]

enjoy the weather greenland your time has come!

[Michale32086]

One of the MANY benefits of a warming planet..

Unfortunately, we are now heading into a cooling trend that's going to last about 30 years.

Probably the rest of my life...

Michale.....

[Jane]

Greenland was settled at the end of the tenth century by Icelanders, not Danes. It was discovered by Eric the Red, whose son, Leif Ericsson, went on to discover the Western Hemisphere. After spending some time in Greenland, which was then benefitting from the Medieval Warm Period, Eric went back to Iceland and persuaded three shiploads of Icelanders from the northwest (which was very volcanic and less hospitable that the rest of Iceland) to go to settle on the west coast of Greenland. Eventually there were two Norse settlements that lived in uneasy peace with the local population that was itself unsettled and migratory until (probably) the early fifteenth century. There were stone houses, an archbishopric, a convent, and a cathedral. The Norse Greenlanders had sheep and cows and horses (though they were small). They wore wool clothing. They went into decline at the end of the Medieval Warm period, but they were probably polished off by English pirate/sailors from the north of England at the beginning of the fifteenth century. The Danes did not claim Greenland until the eighteenth century, and Danish claims to Greenland have to do with political ups and downs in Scandinavia, not with the early colonization.

[bannorhill]

So Greenland had global warming from 984 to the 1400's and we are just now getting back to similar temperatures now.