Our guest on Ecotopia was Kieran Mulvaney, who has written a book titled Arctic Passages, published by Island Press.  Kieran is the author of several books and myriad articles on environmental and other topics. He has traveled widely on all seven continents and most of the seven seas. An environmental activist, he has led trips to confront whalers in both the Antarctic and Arctic. He’s been active with Greenpeace and is the co-founder of the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society. Arctic Passages describes the history of efforts to traverse the top of the world via the mythical and real Northwest and Northeast passages and focuses on international competition to control those waters as climate change shrinks the Arctic ice packs. In addition to the historical and political stories, he shared with us his view of how global warming is affecting wildlife, from phytoplankton to animals like polar bears and the caribou. Kieran also observes that unless the world gets the climate under control, discussion of what to do with and about the Arctic are largely irrelevant.