Tuesday, July 28, 2009
West Marine fights Ocean Acidification
I got email this morning from Randy Repass, the founder of the boating supply chain West Marine. Amazingly, it began by apologizing -- for three paragraphs -- for not being a sales pitch! But then it got to the point:
In one powerful scene, the Sea Change movie shows a science experiment where pteropods, a beautiful type of plankton, are subject to CO2 bubbled through the sea water in their tanks. CO2 and H2O make carbolic acid. As the acidity rises just a bit further than today's oceans are now, they get horribly deformed as their shells dissolve.
One of my Woods Hole scientist friends says that the precipitous decline of species diversity now underway is likely to bite us way before global climate change does. If life in the oceans have a catastrophe, the scary consequences are certain to crawl ashore. The cause -- and the cure -- are CO2, the same as climate change. We humans need to stop burning fossil fuel. Now.
The Waxman-Markey bill that just passed the house is a baby step in the right direction. Now the Senate is considering the issue. The West Marine letter suggests that you go to http://oceana.org/acid to send a letter to your senator. Good idea.
[Note on sourcing: I don't see this letter on line, so I've FTP'd the text of this important email here.]
What would you do if you knew that many species of fish and other marine life in the ocean will be gone within 30 years if levels of C02 continue increasing at their present rate?snip
Ocean Acidification is primarily caused by the burning of fossil fuels. When carbon dioxide in the atmosphere ends up in the ocean it changes the pH, making the sea acidic and less hospitable to life. Over time, C02 reduces calcium carbonate, which prevents creatures from forming shells and building reefs. In fact, existing shells will start to dissolve. Oysters and mussels will not be able to build shells. Crabs and lobsters? Your great-grandchildren may wonder what they tasted like. Carbon dioxide concentrated in the oceans is making seawater acidic.
Many of the zooplankton, small animals at the base of the food web, have skeletons that won't form in these conditions, and sea-life further up the food chain - fish, mammals and seabirds that rely on zooplankton for food will also perish. No food - no life.The letter continues
Ocean Acidification is causing irreversible loss to species and habitats, and acidification trends are happening up to ten times faster than projected. We want you to know what this means, how it affects all of us, and what we can do about it. Today, the atmospheric concentration of C02 is about 387 parts per million (ppm) and increasing at 2 ppm per year.The last two days have been a crash course for me on Ocean Acidification. I just saw this most excellent movie, A Sea Change, about it. One key fact: in November 2006, the film maker Googled "ocean acidification" and got six hits. No wonder I didn't know anything about it. I just Googled it again -- 194,000 hits.
If left unaddressed, by 2040 it is projected to be over 450 ppm, and marine scientists believe the collapse of many ocean ecosystems will be irreversible. Acidification has other physiological effects on marine life as well, including changes in reproduction, growth rates, and even respiration in fish.
In one powerful scene, the Sea Change movie shows a science experiment where pteropods, a beautiful type of plankton, are subject to CO2 bubbled through the sea water in their tanks. CO2 and H2O make carbolic acid. As the acidity rises just a bit further than today's oceans are now, they get horribly deformed as their shells dissolve.
One of my Woods Hole scientist friends says that the precipitous decline of species diversity now underway is likely to bite us way before global climate change does. If life in the oceans have a catastrophe, the scary consequences are certain to crawl ashore. The cause -- and the cure -- are CO2, the same as climate change. We humans need to stop burning fossil fuel. Now.
The Waxman-Markey bill that just passed the house is a baby step in the right direction. Now the Senate is considering the issue. The West Marine letter suggests that you go to http://oceana.org/acid to send a letter to your senator. Good idea.
[Note on sourcing: I don't see this letter on line, so I've FTP'd the text of this important email here.]
Technorati Tags: AlGore, ClimateChange, Corporations, Energy, Environment, GlobalClimateDisruption, OceanAcidification, Politics, PublicGoods, Sailing, Science
Comments:
Dr. Rob Moir of OceanRiver Institute said "I believe acidification of our oceans is actually a greater threat to our survival than is temperature or sea level rise, the conventional "global warming" threats."
meanewhile, Peak Oil is doing its best to come to the rescue.
yesterday may be the most important day of our energy lives as the IEA has finally acknowledged that
1. All the major oil fields are now in decline
2. To return to the status quo we would need to find 4, count 'em, four, Saudi Arabias that we have so far missed. And put them into service before 2030
I read years ago that we are passengers in a race between PO and climate change and we have to pray that PO wins because at least then some of us would survive.
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yesterday may be the most important day of our energy lives as the IEA has finally acknowledged that
1. All the major oil fields are now in decline
2. To return to the status quo we would need to find 4, count 'em, four, Saudi Arabias that we have so far missed. And put them into service before 2030
I read years ago that we are passengers in a race between PO and climate change and we have to pray that PO wins because at least then some of us would survive.
