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airplane called an Antonov. Forget safety – seat belts don’twork, they still smoke on board, it sets off before you areseated, the huskies share the plane with you and so do theoil barrels for the fuel at the camp!! And this is a pretty bigplane landing on an ice runway that you can’t even seeuntil the last minute!!Did I like it? Really loved it. It’s bleak and beautiful andcompletely silent. And that feeling of being right on top ofthe world when the GPS says 90 degrees is just somethingelse.But there are problems – really well publicised are the effects of global warming and year-by-yearshrinkage of the polar ice caps. Polar bears will soon be on the endangered species list because theirfood sources are dwindling as the ice melts. Fishpopulations are changing and indigenous Arctic peoplelike the Inuit are finding it increasingly hard to maintaintheir traditional way of life.I was privileged to see and experience the Arctic – Ihope the pictures give you just a little feel for it.Maia Bryant 6–1IT and the EnvironmentQ: What takes 240 kg of fossil fuels, 22 kg of chemicals and 1500 kg of waterto produce?A: A personal computerhis is based on a standard PC with a Cathode Ray Tube (CRT) monitor and weight-for-weightT is greater than for cars or fridges, which consume roughly their own weight in production. Thisenvironmental impact is offset somewhat by the fact that the running costs are less than for cars, butit is still significant. Minimising the use of electricity is clearly a good way of reducing the negativeenvironmental impact, and simply switching to Liquid Crystal Display (LCD) screens will help asthey use half the power of CRTs.Most PCs come with a plethora of power-saving features enabling the unit to ‘spin down’ harddrives, put monitors into standby mode and to ‘hibernate’. These devices were the by-product of designerstrying to avoid blackouts in places like Silicon Valley. However, considering ways of cuttingpower usage is only a very small part of what we can do to reduce the impact of IT on the environment.9