From the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies James Cook University
“Evil twin” threatens world’s oceans, scientists warn
The rise in human emissions of carbon dioxide is driving fundamental and dangerous changes in the chemistry and ecosystems of the world’s oceans, international marine scientists warned today.
“Ocean conditions are already more extreme than those experienced by marine organisms and ecosystems for millions of years,” the researchers say in the latest issue of the journal Trends in Ecology and Evolution (TREE).
“This emphasises the urgent need to adopt policies that drastically reduce CO2 emissions.”
Ocean acidification, which the researchers call the ‘evil twin of global warming’, is caused when the CO2 emitted by human activity, mainly burning fossil fuels, dissolves into the oceans. It is happening independently of, but in combination with, global warming.
“Evidence gathered by scientists around the world over the last few years suggests that ocean acidification could represent an equal – or perhaps even greater threat – to the biology of our planet than global warming,” co-author Professor Ove Hoegh-Guldberg of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies and The University of Queensland says.
More than 30% of the CO2 released from burning fossil fuels, cement production, deforestation and other human activities goes straight into the oceans, turning them gradually more acidic.
“The resulting acidification will impact many forms of sea life, especially organisms whose shells or skeletons are made from calcium carbonate, like corals and shellfish. It may interfere with the reproduction of plankton species which are a vital part of the food web on which fish and all other sea life depend,” he adds.
The scientists say there is now persuasive evidence that mass extinctions in past Earth history, like the “Great Dying” of 251 million years ago and another wipeout 55 million years ago, were accompanied by ocean acidification, which may have delivered the deathblow to many species that were unable to cope with it.
“These past periods can serve as great lessons of what we can expect in the future, if we continue to push the acidity the ocean even further” said lead author, Dr. Carles Pelejero, from ICREA and the Marine Science Institute of CSIC in Barcelona, Spain.
“Given the impacts we see in the fossil record, there is no question about the need to immediately reduce the rate at which we are emitting carbon dioxide in the atmosphere,” he said further.
“Today, the surface waters of the oceans have already acidified by an average of 0.1 pH units from pre-industrial levels, and we are seeing signs of its impact even in the deep oceans”, said co-author Dr. Eva Calvo, from the Marine Science Institute of CSIC in Barcelona, Spain.
“Future acidification depends on how much CO2 humans emit from here on – but by the year 2100 various projections indicate that the oceans will have acidified by a further 0.3 to 0.4 pH units, which is more than many organisms like corals can stand”, Prof. Hoegh-Guldberg says.
“This will create conditions not seen on Earth for at least 40 million years”.
“These changes are taking place at rates as much as 100 times faster than they ever have over the last tens of millions of years” Prof. Hoegh-Guldberg says.
Under such circumstances “Conditions are likely to become very hostile for calcifying species in the north Atlantic and Pacific over the next decade and in the Southern Ocean over the next few decades,” the researchers warn.
Besides directly impacting on the fishing industry and its contribution to the human food supply at a time when global food demand is doubling, a major die-off in the oceans would affect birds and many land species and change the biology of Earth as a whole profoundly, Prof. Hoegh-Guldberg adds.
Palaeo-perspectives on ocean acidification by Carles Pelejero, Eva Calvo and Ove Hoegh-Guldberg is published in the latest issue of the journal Trends in Ecology and Evolution (TREE), number 1232.
Didn’t Jane Lubchenko do an experiment to show that corals can grow in ordinary tap water, so long as you dye it blue and don’t chill it with dry ice ?
Have they any idea of the amount of acid dumped by the great smokers on the mid ocean ridges? They release water with a pH as low as 2.8 and still have abundant life around them.
Aren’t they neglecting the buffering action of dissolved bases in the sea water? As I understand it, correct me if I am wrong, if the water becomes more acid, some of the carbonic acid will decompose back to carbon dioxide and water, moving back towards the original balance. We are playing here with a complex soup, not a classroom experiment with distilled water. Can someone please paint a clearer picture than I can?
Absolute BS. Marine PH has NOT budged at all. These guys are either morons or more likely liars.
Absolute BS.
How can a very weak acid like carbonic acid (H2CO3) react with calcium carbonate (CaCO3), the stuff which corals etc. are mostly made off? It is just not chemically possible.
Also, if you do the maths: if all the carbon dioxide produced by man was absorbed by the oceans – which it isn’t, then it would take 50 years to increase the oceans’ CO2 content by one part per million.
Even our ’eminent climate scientists’ Patchi and Gore wouldn’t spout such garbage – or, silly me – would they?
Ocean acidification, if it occurs on a global basis, is caused by gigantic amounts of sulphuric acid laden volcanic ash from flow basalt lavas erupting over tens of thousands of years – in these instances, many thousands of square kilometres of the planet’s surface are buried under several kilometres of lava. Now that’s real climate change!
Like similar comments in earlier posts: ” I smell a big, fat, juicy grant.”
Ove has been predicting disaster for coral reefs for some years now due to mmgw and ocean acidity, particularly in the Great Barrier Reef and Coral Sea. His predictions have been consistently wrong, the GBR is still thriving and the only reef in trouble is near Brisbane , where the sea/air temperatures are cooler.
The stupidy is stupefying
And there was me thinking that anthropogenic CO2 stayed in the atmosphere for hundreds of years.
These guys obviously didn’t get the memo from Yale Environment 360. They remain stuck in the old paradigm.
hunter (08:52:34) :
They are asserting bald faced lies. Why?
Because the global warming scare has stopped working and they need to wind up the next one in plenty of time. Why else?
Ed Murphy (08:57:07) :
They haven’t yet figured out how to blame volcanoes, earthquakes and asteroid impacts on human activity.
Give them time, and they’ll be wanting to sacrifice to the Gods. They’re just about halfway there in a natural progression. This is what happens when man trades the knowledge of how the world really works for shamanistic fearmongering. It’s all about control.
0.1 pH compared to a hundred years ago! I would seriously question any average pH reading that was +/- 0.1 taken today and the fact he concludes an ocean pH average in this range is about as suspect as an average global temperature. pH measurement is highly dependent on how much CO2 was driven off prior to measurement as well as a host of instrument and calibration variables. The pH can also change far more than this value as the result of the switch in the chemistry of photosynthesis between day and night Perhaps Dr. Cook should also look at EPAs range of “acceptable values” in the lab the certification process for pH.
It is relevant that Dr. Cook brings back the acidification issue– computer models proved the acid rain “crisis”. The models demanded we control SO2 to restore the pH of our rivers and lakes. We controlled SO2 however 20 years later there was no significant improvement in pH. Why? Because the models incorrectly assumed a titration process of acidity caused by acid rain when in reality the majority of the acid input was dissolved organic acids from biological processes. Ironically, the failure of pH improvement is now blamed on global warming speeding up these biological processes. The NAPAP report on acid rain actually said the acid rain theory was wrong– and for there efforts Dr Kulp was removed as the director and Ed Krug smeared and blacklisted by EPA. EPA also refused to release the NAPAP’s report until after Congress passed the acid rain legislation and Congress never asked for the report. Climate Change is Acid Rain Redux.
It is outrageous to compare the Permian extinction and the associated ocean acidification to anything happening now. The end of the Permian (his 251MYA reference) saw the largest flood basalt eruption in earth’s history spewing out material that covered some 2 million square kilometers. And along with it massive amounts of SO2 and H2S– the Permian most likely had far more to do with H2SO4 than CO2- and we are comparing loadings into the atmosphere that are orders of magnitude apart. Some “scientists” clearly have no shame.
Manufacture a threat. Then tax people that work to provide a solution.
Joe Romm was ranting on this some time back. He had some fat research that made the claims. For some strange reason, the article had nothing about the Ph of the ocean. When I asked what the ph factor was, the question was deleted.
Volcanoes. Limestone run off calciuum carbonate contact. There are many factors that can influence the alkaline ph factor.
Being or containing an acid; of a solution having an excess of hydrogen atoms (having a pH of less than 7) ”
As ocean temps rise, the oceans give off more CO2.
Like they say, the anti science mis informers have to write stufff for their adherents also.
Again we have projections so far in the future that there is no accountability. No present evidence, only conjecture of disaster.
hunter (08:52:34) :
They are asserting bald faced lies. Why?
The same reasons all the *other* politicians do — because they can.
As I understand it, the atmospheric CO2/ocean system is in equilibrium, and the CO2 is held in the water as bicarbonate, not carbonic acid. More CO2 in the ocean will INCREASDE pH, not reduce it. If the oceans, for some reason, DO get less alkaline, calcium carbonate will react & form bicarbonate, maintaining the equilibrrium. I’m certainly not an expert, but Dennis Nikols is right – they need to brush up on their chemistry.
“More than 30% of the CO2 released from burning fossil fuels, cement production, deforestation and other human activities goes straight into the oceans, turning them gradually more acidic.”
Oh yeah? Where do they get THAT little liestistic from? Are there signposts all over the place “This way to the ocean”?
stephen richards (08:41:22) :
Same old trick. Acidification when they mean less alkaline.
Yeah, it’s not a straight line, it’s more like a parabola, so getting less alkaline is not the same as getting more acidic. Go “below” 7 and the ratio reverses from that “above” 7.
What is interesting, or sad, is that the idiots, er, “scientists,” that keep saying “acidification” know that it is not true.
Mark
The ignorance of some of the commenters here is staggering. Increased acidification is a problem not to fish but to the tiny organisms that build calcium-based shells (and seqester CO2 in the process as the carbon in their shells sinks to the bottom when they die). As the acidification goes on, the ocean may lose some of its potential as a carbon sink. This has happened befoe in the distant past. You people ought to be ashamed of your knee-jerk groupthink.
“Ocean conditions are already more extreme than those experienced by marine organisms and ecosystems for millions of years,” What liars they are. They have no clue, this is opinion and speculation. Geocarb III shows this to be wrong.
““This will create conditions not seen on Earth for at least 40 million years”.” You’re kidding!
It is sad how little these people know about marine biology as well as the CO2 history in the atmosphere. CO2 was much higher even as recently as the 1940s.
““These changes are taking place at rates as much as 100 times faster than they ever have over the last tens of millions of years” Prof. Hoegh-Guldberg says.”
Very unlikely, but there is no way that this can be established – more opinion and speculation.
Marine organisms are much more tolerant of pH than these alarmists would like us to think. For the coralline ecosystems, CO2 is food for both photosynthesis and coral building. Any acidity from CO2 will have no effect on the solubility of calcium carbonate as a product of an equilibrium cannot affect its own equilibrium.
What these clowns ignore is that only an outside source of acidity, such as hydrochloric acid, can affect the extended equilibrium from CO2 to carbonic acid to carbonate to calcium carbonate. And seawater in the tropics is supersaturated with calcium carbonate, so additional CO2 will necessarily promote cementation/precipitation.
Also, the oceans have a historical pH range and they are still well within that range. I defy these alarmists to show the effects “even in the deep oceans” – there are too many other, larger factors. Furthermore, the oceans comprise a complex buffer system that will resist the changes they fantasize about.
Doing experiments on distilled water does not realistically emulate ocean water. And doing experiments on ocean water does not emulate ocean water with its organisms. Photosynthesis is an alkalizing process which can change the ocean’s pH by several units during a day. With this reality and more CO2, we can conclude two things” (1) most marine organisms can tolerate a surprisingly wide range of pH and (2) added CO2 makes them metabolically stronger and more tolerant of pH changes.
To claim that a 0.1 pH unit change has already caused detectable changes in the oceans’ marine life begs the question of how they separate the effects of such a small change in such a variable pH environment from the pH noise caused by all other processes, including living organisms, and also separating this small effect from all of the other parameters that have mostly greater effects. I find their conclusion entirely unacceptable.
This is like the concept of thirdhand smoke – the idea that coming home from having been in a room with smoke, i. e., smoke on your clothing, is enough to raise the risk of lung cancer in your children. There is no way that the effects of such a small, negligible factor can be separated from all of the other variables in human lives and activities.
The Cliffs of Dover were built by coral building during time with much higher CO2 than now.
This is another case of grasping at straws, trying to save the cap and trade/tax movement by finding another fear or disaster to promote.
Life is much more durable and adaptable – wait! – they left that part out. Organisms adapt! Of course, they say that these changes are occurring faster than ever to rule out adaption but CO2 rose faster in the 1930s and 1940s than it is today.
Their garbage never ends. We just have to keep spraying to cancel out the odor.
It’s DeVito not DaVito.
We are becoming more acidified from global warmers, our patience is about to blow out, baking soda (btw sodium bicarbonate) does not work anymore…The next global warmer I see……
Suggests, could and perhaps all in the same sentence. I suggest that this could, perhaps, be the most weasely statement seen in a while.
“Evidence gathered by scientists around the world over the last few years suggests that ocean acidification could represent an equal – or perhaps even greater threat – to the biology of our planet than global warming,” co-author Professor Ove Hoegh-Guldberg of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies and The University of Queensland says.
Amazing when they need it to justify a theory, the CAGW crowd claim that CO2 hangs around for centuries, while on the other hand they also claim that CO2 is building up in the Oceans and they claim “acification”.
Is it possible they could have it both ways?
Muratic acid, oxacilic acid or hydrochloric acid work to get the algae and moss off my boat’s bottom. If the oceans go all acidic, I won’t need to use acid.
Did I add to the ocean acidity when i rinsed off the acid and it went into the water?
We need to pin these people down. Every time I try, they back peddle and call it a scenario instead of a solid prediction.
My favorite Obama economist is named
Rosie Scenario PhD.
“CORAL-GATE”:
read:
http://hidethedecline.eu/pages/posts/corals-and-the-great-barrier-reef-43.php
K.R. Frank Lansner