The world’s marine ecosystems risk being severely damaged by ocean acidification unless there are dramatic cuts in CO2 emissions, warn scientists.
The researchers warn that ocean acidification, which they refer to as “the other CO2 problem”, could make most regions of the ocean inhospitable to coral reefs by 2050, if atmospheric CO2 levels continue to increase.
This does indeed sound alarming, until you consider that corals became common in the oceans during the Ordovician Era – nearly 500 million years ago – when atmospheric CO2 levels were about 10X greater than they are today. (One might also note in the graph below that there was an ice age during the late Ordovician and early Silurian with CO2 levels 10X higher than current levels, and the correlation between CO2 and temperature is essentially nil throughout the Phanerozoic.)
Perhaps corals are not so tough as they used to be? In 1954, the US detonated the world’s largest nuclear weapon at Bikini Island in the South Pacific. The bomb was equivalent to 30 billion pounds of TNT, vapourised three islands, and raised water temperatures to 55,000 degrees. Yet half a century of rising CO2 later, the corals at Bikini are thriving. Another drop in pH of 0.075 will likely have less impact on the corals than a thermonuclear blast. The corals might even survive a rise in ocean temperatures of half a degree, since they flourished at times when the earth’s temperature was 10C higher than the present.
Glenn
Do you think “acidification” means “to make more acidic”? If so, is a ph of 8 acidic or not? Is 8 more acidic than 9? Does a drop from 9 to 8 signify an increase in *acidity*?
No, that’s not what it means. Acidification is the process of becoming acidic. And no, that does not mean it actually has to become acidic.
TallBloke,
And I’m sorry you are the willing dupe of propagandists Robert…Regardless of the ‘correctness’ of terminology, the aim of science’s pronouncements to the public should always be to inform and educate, not mislead. Sadly, the agenda of the alarmista is to do just that.
This is just nonsense. Clearly, the BBC piece is shoddy journalism (specifically the title “Acid Oceans”), but the word acidification was not created as propaganda. Frankly, this is a dumb argument.
George E. Smith (19:55:13) : So just where has it been tried out; growing Corals in acid that is.
And it can’t be just any acid. The ‘logic flaw’ in the acidification argument is that it’s the hydronium that matters. If I may ‘tag on’ to your point:
To the organism, the carbon dioxide is food. Put in a common pH adjusting mineral acid like sulphuric or hydrochloric in your test and show the coral die, so what? Attack by Cl- does not ‘make their day’. Put in CO2 + HCO3- instead and they will eat it spitting out O2 in the process and the electron that gives it the “-” is absorbed by neutralization with an H+ in making H2O.
The more carbonate there is the more ‘things grow’ and the less H+ is left. Unless you can ‘spike’ the pH instantly to the lethal range or use a toxic negative ion, life is good with carbon dioxide and carbonate. This is why the corals in the tank grow better with added CO2.
Sidebar: There is a bit that needs to be considered about carbon dioxide vs carbonic acid. MOST (by far) of the CO2 in the ocean will be dissolved, it will not be forming hydronium ions as carbonic acid. From the wiki:
Carbon dioxide dissolved in water is in equilibrium with carbonic acid:
CO2 + H2O ⇌ H2CO3
The hydration equilibrium constant at 25°C is Kh= 1.70×10−3: hence, the majority of the carbon dioxide is not converted into carbonic acid and stays as CO2 molecules. In the absence of a catalyst, the equilibrium is reached quite slowly. The rate constants are 0.039 s−1 for the forward reaction (CO2 + H2O → H2CO3) and 23 s−1 for the reverse reaction (H2CO3 → CO2 + H2O
This means that the naive calculations of pH based on straight mass done by some folks above are just that, naive. They need adjustment for the fact that most of the CO2 stays CO2 and makes no hydronium ions, thus no change in the ‘pressure of hydrogen’ pH.
Sidebar2: Then there is the fact that living systems use CO2 chemistry as a buffer (yes, CO2 is a buffer in blood… again from the wiki):
Role of carbonic acid in blood
Carbonic acid is an intermediate step in the transport of CO2 out of the body via respiratory gas exchange. The hydration reaction of CO2 is generally very slow in the absence of a catalyst, but red blood cells contain carbonic anhydrase which both increases the reaction rate and disassociates a hydrogen ion (H+) from the resulting carbonic acid, leaving bicarbonate (HCO3-) dissolved in the blood plasma. This catalysed reaction is reversed in the lungs, where it converts the bicarbonate back into CO2 and allows it to be expelled.
Carbonic acid also plays a very important role as a buffer in mammalian blood. The equilibrium between carbon dioxide and carbonic acid is very important for controlling the acidity of body fluids, and the carbonic anhydrase increases the reaction rate by a factor of nearly a billion to keep the fluids at a stable pH.
Now the wiki talks about mammalian blood, but do yah think maybe an organism that bases it’s whole structure around a carbonate skeleton might have a decently evolved carbonate metabolism? Maybe?
http://www.jbc.org/cgi/content/abstract/283/37/25475
Oh golly, I guess it does… and almost the same enzyme too… (Clue #1!)
So these corals that we’re all worked up about take the solution of CO2 and deliberately turn it into HCO3- to use it (i.e. react it with Ca+ to make a skeleton). Gee, they don’t seem to be very scared of raising the carbonate forming reaction rate by billions of times and raising the level inside there bodies! (Clue #2).
Life likes and depends on CO2 and expects high levels of carbonate inside the body. It is a fundamental factor in the metabolism of living things from primitive plants and corals all the way up to mammals. The enzyme systems evolved very early in the process. It is not a horrible toxin, it is a fundamental building block of all life at the cellular and enzyme level.
With insufficient carbonate, we, and corals, die. We have deliberate systems inside our body to make more ‘acid’ from CO2 as a way of preventing the pH shifting too much to the alkaline side and we excrete as waste products compounds like urea that turn to ammonia. (Clue #3)
These folks: http://oceanacidification.wordpress.com/2008/08/05/coral-calcification-responds-to-seawater-acidification-a-working-hypothesis-towards-a-physiological-mechanism/
postulate that since the corals grew better with HCO3- but not so well in ‘acidified’ water that maybe, just maybe it was because the acidification used drove the CO2 reaction away from having HCO3- available to the corals. More CO2 makes the corals grow better (tested in a pH range from 7.6 to 8.2 btw… corals don’t just up and die at pH 8.0) but more non CO2 acidification slowed the corals. So just don’t dump sulphuric acid in the ocean and add more CO2 if you want to grow great corals… (Clue #4)
Everything in this process says that we (corals and humans) evolved in a world with plenty of CO2 and want more, but do not particularly want a more alkaline world (and try at every turn to keep our metabolism from becoming alkaline). The pH of blood is about 7.4 (Clue #5)
Take a few minutes to think about the clues and string them together. Now ask yourself: Do I really think a move of 0.1 pH toward a less alkaline environment, especially by a mechanism that raises HCO3- availability, would be harmful to corals?
papertiger (08:50:34) :
http://www.publish.csiro.au/?act=view_file&file_id=MF99078.pdf
Climate change, coral bleaching and the future of the world™s coral reefs
Ove Hoegh-Guldberg
Thanks!
I do not accept “coral bleaching” as being the result of either CO2 or warming: click
As we can see, while CO2 rises, the planet’s temperature is falling. Yet the worldwide “coral bleaching” scare is blamed on higher temperatures.
[charts source] [scroll down; this is a great page with lots of good info.]
And it is unreasonable to attribute “coral bleaching” to global warming, since much greater warming took place a thousand years ago: click
“Coral bleaching” appears to be the next “drowning polar bears” scare. It seems that fatigue would set in from the alarmists constant arm-waving over natural events like this.
AGW
Climate Change
Melting Glaciers
Melting Ice Caps
Melting Sea Ice
Ocean Acidification
Human induced CO2
Runaway Global Temperatures
Drowning Polar Bears
Coral Bleaching
Hurricanes
Kaiser Penguins
The list of subjects taken hostage by the AGW doctrine are endless.
The red line running through all the horror stories is for humanity to cut back on CO2 emissions at any price.
But who speaks for the plants and the trees?
http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/8110
Allen,
The saturation point of CaCO3 (which controls the ability of sea creatures to precipitate aragonite shells) is a chemical property and has nothing to do with biology. You aren’t being so clever as you think you are.
A good explanation of how buffering works in the ocean from Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocean_acidification
Leaving aside direct biological effects, it is expected that ocean acidification in the future will lead to a significant decrease in the burial of carbonate sediments for several centuries, and even the dissolution of existing carbonate sediments.[28] This will cause an elevation of ocean alkalinity, leading to the enhancement of the ocean as a reservoir for CO2 with moderate (and potentially beneficial) implications for climate change as more CO2 leaves the atmosphere for the ocean.[29]
Bob Coats (10:57:15)
Yes, and one can extend that somewhat further in a pertinent direction.
precipitated carbonates (e.g. Ca++ carbonate) are also in equilibrium with dissolved carbonate (as you indicated). How does this relate to ocean chemistry and biochemistry? Much of the precipitated carbonate is in sediments on the ocean floor. On 1000’s of years timescale involved in deep ocean mixing this sedimented carbonate can help “buffer” the loss of dissolved carbonate from acidification of the surface layers, and it’s thought to do just that during periods of slow CO2 buildup or other acidification events in the deep past. However on the short term (100’s of years) it’s poorly effective, because the oceans don’t mix quickly enough.
Is there a source of precipitated carbonate in the oceans? Yes there is. Corals, shells and exoskeletal parts of sea animals that “fix” carbonate as integral parts of their structures. What happens if the oceans acidify faster than deep ocean mixing can buffer the loss of aqueous carbonate? Those animals/corals start to leach their “fixed” carbonate back into solution.
Incidentally, the Royal Society did a report on ocean acidification due to greenhouse gas emissions and the consequences which can be downloaded as a pdf from here:
http://royalsociety.org/document.asp?id=3249
One more point. Consider how the oceans are continuously bombarded with rainwater at pH 5.2 or less, yet they steadily maintain a pH greater than 8. The simple-minded models which automatically correlate carbonic acid formation with lower pH are clearly deficient. It is carbonic acid which makes rainwater acidic.
Robert S (11:03:35) :
Acidification is the process of becoming acidic. And no, that does not mean it actually has to become acidic.
Really? How interesting! Would that be from the AGWers reference guide or the Climate Catastrophe encyclopedia?
So, it’s the process that’s important then, regardless of what actual state is attained? So, if you cool water down the process would be called freezing, or if you warm it, boiling? Or, when I heat my house to keep the vicious arctic cold away, I am actually burning it? I think I see now. So, this is why, in AGWer land, a .7C rise in temp over the course of a century is described as a planet that is on fire. It is all becoming extraordinarily clear now.
Neven (20:19:08) : Are they the same shellfish as today’s shellfish?
Depending on which time periods, in many cases, yes. Evolution has been going on for a long time and still happens today, so in theory you could say that a razor clam of today is not the same as a razor clam from a million years ago, but in fact most of our metabolic processes were laid down at the beginning of life and stay substantially unchanged. We find almost the same enzyme promoting the production of carbonic acid from CO2 in us as we find in corals, for example. Corals and humans last shared a common ancestor rather a long time ago…
Did these corals and other shellfish in the distant past have to cope with a rate of change that is a hundred times bigger than natural variability? If so, how did they do?
The problem with the ‘rate of change’ argument is that the pH changes seasonally by several 0.1 pH units. It also changes between day and night (especially at the ‘skin’ of the coral) as the algae shift from consuming CO2 to emitting it. The problem is not that 0.1/century is a fast rate of change, but that it is an almost immeasurable change in a system with such larger, faster, changes happening daily and seasonally.
This is the problem with averages of averages of averages… they hide more than they reveal. They tell us to panic over a hypothetical centuries long trend that might not even exist but to ignore far larger variations in shorter time periods. The ‘unprecedented rate of change’ evaporates as soon as you remove the veil of averaging.
I am a little late to the tread but have noticed Bill D seems to have an objection about evidence from an aquarium owner that increased CO2 aids coral growth. Apparently only “peer-reviewed” articles in selected publications are acceptable.
Perhaps this article would pass the grade?
Iglesias-Rodriguez, M. D., Halloran, P. R., Rickaby, R. E. M., Hall, I. R., Colmenero-Hidalgo, E., Gittins, J. R., Green, D. R. H., Tyrrell, T., Gibbs, S. J., von Dassow, P., Rehm, E., Armbrust, E. V. Boessenkool, K. P. 2008. Phytoplankton calcification in a high-CO2 world. Science 320:336-340.
Although the authors do not perform the experiment on corals, the data do support what Fraizer (22:11:28) was saying that increased CO2 causes larger shells.
Redneck (01:53:09) made an interesting point about the CCD (Carbonate Compensation Depth) which is the depth below which shells composed on CaCO3 dissolve. Geologists have long known that deep sea oozes are dominated by organisms built from silica, present now in the rock record as cherts, largely because the more common carbonate-forming shells dissolve in deep waters. The geologic record does show fluctuations in the depth of the CCD – whether this is caused by changes in water depth or water chemistry should be a good place to study the effects of ocean chemistry changes.
Surprised nobody has yet mentioned the studies showing sunblock is implicated in coral mortality – the delicious irony of those do-gooder ecotourists trying to save the coral reefs are in fact agents of destruction…
http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/01/sunscreens_bleaching.php
Neven (09:04:36) :
Here’s a quote from the BBC article with the inaccurate ‘Acid Oceans’-title:
“It says pH levels are changing 100 times faster than natural variability. ”
Now pray tell me, if this is true, how can creatures adapt to changes that are 100 times faster than natural variability? That would be a problem, wouldn’t it?
Only if it were true. Neven, I would suggest turning off the BBC.
Unfortunately they are largely just playing on the excellent reputation built up in prior decades. They no longer have a decent grasp of science and only a weak hold on truth in journalism. I don’t know why it happened, but it is a travesty. (I have fond memories of listening to the BBC on a tube shortwave decades ago – and the veracity they brought to the world… then.)
As pointed out in my prior posting, the ‘unprecedented change’ is a fiction based on averaging away vastly more rapid changes that corals already deal with just fine. (The mechanism is at the basis of all life, homeostasis via changing how much of which enzymes we make. This can be done in minutes, and is. Daily; corals shift from CO2 destruction to CO2 creation and back, with all the attendant acid / base shift that implies, as the sun rises and sets.)
Globalwarming causes coral bleaching? Well, I have it on good authority that it causes other things, too: click
[enjoy the ‘hot’ music!]
Steven Goddard (11:49:13) :
A good explanation of how buffering works in the ocean from Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocean_acidification
Leaving aside direct biological effects, it is expected that ocean acidification in the future will lead to a significant decrease in the burial of carbonate sediments for several centuries, and even the dissolution of existing carbonate sediments.[28] This will cause an elevation of ocean alkalinity, leading to the enhancement of the ocean as a reservoir for CO2 with moderate (and potentially beneficial) implications for climate change as more CO2 leaves the atmosphere for the ocean.[29] (your bold)
What you fail to mention, of course (either conveniently or else because your level of research really is limited to looking things up on Wikipedia) is that the full compensation effect is anticipated only after thousands of years, with the prospect of a recovery process not beginning before 2700. Read the paper, which can readily be sourced from the Wiki reference [29]:-
http://plankt.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/full/30/2/141
It’s a very good paper, making clear the near-term concerns regarding acidification.
Either your approach to research is to think that a link to Wikipedia’s gloss is good enough or else you have read this paper and chosen to misrepresent it here. Which is it?
Neven (11:13:11) : The idea that someone rather believes some guy with an aquarium (God knows what he did and if he tells the truth) than thousands of peer-reviewed papers by scientists who spend a life time studying the oceans, makes my stomach churn. Smokey, you kill all the hope I have for humanity.
It ought not. The guy doing what I like to call ‘kitchen science’ is very valuable. Like Feynman dunking a chunk of rubber in ice water at a shuttle crash enquiry, they ask the basic question that is being ignored in the 1000’s of academic studies by ‘more learned’ folks. They are the bearers of ‘common sense’ to the debate and ask the questions that were in some cases ‘educated out’ of the specialists. Where are the clothes?…
A friend just last night shared a story. He is a mensan, retired, and teaches a robotics class for fun. One of his students wanted to use a particular approach to speed determination using a laser. He did some research that turned up papers showing it could not be done; but let the girl proceed anyway (she is very very bright…). The result? A working system for speed determination. Yes, she made it work. Why? Because he chose not to tell her it could not be done, to let her take a fresh approach. Our formal system squelches that type of thinking. That is what ‘kitchen science’ brings back to the table. It ought to give you more hope for humanity, not less.
So we have a bunch of ‘peer reviewed’ papers saying CO2 will kill coral. Yet reality says ‘add CO2 and get happy coral’. I’ll take the reality, thank you, and go looking for what the paper guys missed. Time to pick up that chunk of rubber and a glass of ice water…
Simon Evans,
Try pouring some vinegar over limestone and see how long it takes for the buffering reaction to begin. It happens instantly, which is one reason why 5.2 pH rainwater can fall into the oceans continuously for hundreds of millions of years, and not lower the pH below 8.
Did you look at the Monterey Bay pH data someone linked to above? It showed pH steady or increasing during the last ten years.
Dear Foinavon and Simon Evans
You are unfortunately laboring under a false understanding of deep ocean circulation. The Royal Society did indeed say that this is a multi century process but this is not borne out by the facts.
If it is such a long process why is Tritium from 1950 and 1960’s Atomic testing in the Pacific currently being detected in the deep water of the North Atlantic ?
There is only one answer the mixing process is obviously much more rapid than it has been assumed to be. And if that’s the case the entire ocean acidification house of cards falls down.
And with rapid mixing the upwelling of Calcium Carbonate to the surface will negate any “acidification” the buffering mechanism will continue to do its job.
I remain to be convinced there has been any drop at all, en masse.
If ever there was a perfect scenario for “producing” something reputed to be data, this is it.
From an objective standpoint, the task of monitoring ocean pH in any meaningful sense is a MSA / Gage R and R nightmare. But of course, from the standpoint of “proving” so called “disastrous” ppCO2 (and ergo, ocean acidification) it is the most tempting ever.
CO2 caused by AGW is magic CO2.
When the oceans get warmer, more, not less CO2 is uptaken.
And AGW CO2, unlike the billions of years of CO2 in the past, cuases acids that only attacks living things, but never gets neutralized, sort of like acid blood in cheesy scifi movies.
And AGW scientists are magic, too:
They can determine clear and present signals from changes far less than the accuracy of the equipment in use, AGW scientists can look at a graph that is shwoing no change, and find in it the AGW signal tha shows the apocalypse is at hand..
CORAL CAN’T SURVIVE EXTREME COLD?
Yes, I know they aren’t the same coral, but it’s to show that there is diversity, and almost certainly a lot more than the warmers want to admit is there. The Earth WILL survive. Even they and the harm they seek to do in the name of “saving the planet” too will pass.
Chemical balderdash from Eric, foinavon, RC, and Bob Coates.
The equations I gave apply irrespective of any other contributions such as solid CaCO3. Obviously (well, certainly to any chemist with half a brain) if calcium carbonate dissolves there is more carbonate in the system, not less. You cannot create more bicarbonate without also creating more carbonate because of the equilibrium I gave above in equation (1).
I repeat, the only way CO2 can cause a reduction in carbonate is by carbonate being taken out of the water – eg by creation of MORE shells, coral, fishbone etc.
The rest of the blather above is just that – total ignorance of basic solution chemistry.
@RobertS
“Acidification is the process of becoming acidic. And no, that does not mean it actually has to become acidic.”
Wrong. Adding acid to a buffer above pH 7 is called “TITRATION,” not “acidification.” If you stop at 7, you have “neutralized” the solution, not “acidified” it. It is only “acidified” once you bring the pH below 7.
In order to “acidify” the ocean, you would have to add a bolus of acid sufficient to change the pH from basic to acidic. In the case where the ocean pH is being reduced, by whatever means, it would be proper to say “reducing the alkalinity,” not “acidification.” Sorry, but they do deliberately misuse the word in order to deceive, as is done in this modern age of doublespeak on many other occasions (like Leftists calling themselves “Liberals” when they are, in the extreme, much closer to fascists, who are about as far from “liberal” as one can get.)
Also, I have given references above to show that the pH of the ocean varies widely from location to location, as well is with temperature and depth.
Simon Evans (12:25:44) :
Either your approach to research is to think that a link to Wikipedia’s gloss is good enough or else you have read this paper and chosen to misrepresent it here. Which is it?
Logic error of false dichotomy.
He, like me, may simply like to use Wikipedia because it is available to everyone, typically written in a style readable by most, has no copyright infringement risks, and is a good cause to support. Unless their content is wrong, there is no reason to avoid them. (Though, yes, you do have to keep a check on the quality; their AGW content is seriously flawed… but you seem to know that judging from your attitude about Wiki 😉
You also assert that his providing a readable wiki explanation of things is equivalent to a ‘research’ behavour (and further seem to assert that reading peer reviewed papers is research but anything else is not…). Lighten up! Some of us here are more interested in learning what’s really going on in a readable way than we are about “Pedagogy Wars, Part V, Revenge of the Peers!”
RE: Frediano (10:42:01) :
accuracy, precision, resolution, and most of all, uncertainty and significance.
——–
Yep! My thoughts as well. If ever there was a branch of science in need of Quality 101, climate science, as well as, investigators in other natural sciences crafting their hypothesis based on its tenets, are it. Talk about Gage R & R and either they start running like vampires from a cross, or, immediately resort to ad hom.
Bill D, I have in a previous life as a research chemist published science in peer reviewed journals and taught and been taught at graduate level.
As you mention there are many ways of recording and disseminating scientific information and research, both public and private. Writing books, creating databases, maintaining archives are some others.
In business, what matters is what works and what is true. That is the sole consideration. Formal journal peer review adds very little value if any to that equation.