The latest update from explorer/environmentalist Will Steger comes from Earth Day (this past Sunday) on Baffin Island in the Canadian Arctic. As you might remember from our previous posts, Steger is leading a team of three other explorers and educators and four native Inuits on a four-month-long, dog-sled expedition across the island.

Listen to Steger’s Earth Day audio update:

“This is basically Ground Zero for global warming. It’s being played out to a large degree in the sea ice. As the ocean warms from the carbon dioxide blanket effect heating the globe, heat goes into the ocean. Because of this, we’re getting later freeze-ups.”

Steger says the local culture is really starting to feel the effects because the Inuits rely so much on the ice as a means of transportation and as their hunting platform.

But Steger points out there is hope. He says even the little decisions we make everyday can make a change… energy efficient light bulbs, using less power, etc. He says, however, the time to act is now, because there might be less than 10 years before the effects are felt worldwide.

“Some of the native people up here say ‘Global warming is affecting us here, but what people in the South don’t realize, it will soon affect (them)’ ”

The expedition and its educational efforts are being supported by the ethanol industry through the Ethanol Promotion and Information Council and Fagen Inc.

See Steger’s Earth Day video here.