Jacob Greenlee
debilitating condition is afflicting the world’s oceans right under our noses. It doesn’t have any smell or color, but millions of organisms helplessly die underwater as life seemingly goes on above the surface. Picking up a brittle shell or witnessing the decaying condition of a reef may give clues to the culprit – ocean acidification. While the full extent of the consequences of ocean acidification are yet to be discovered, what we know so far is alarming. We need urgent action to prevent the further loss of vulnerable ecosystems and their inhabitants before it’s too late.
Ocean acidification occurs when seawater directly absorbs carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, most of which is produced by fossil fuels. In fact, the ocean absorbs up to more than 25% of all human-induced carbon emissions, and already the whole ocean can’t absorb it fast enough. When carbon dioxide dissolves in ocean water, carbonic acid is formed, which then breaks down into hydrogen and bicarbonate ions. The increasing amount of hydrogen ions lowers the ocean’s pH level, a measure that indicates the ocean is getting more acidic. Since the beginning of heavy industry two centuries ago, the pH of ocean surface waters dropped by around 0.1, which while seemingly harmless, actually indicates an almost 30% increase in acidity due to the pH scale’s logarithmic measurement. The effects of acidification may be most strongly felt in organisms that rely on their shells to survive, including coccolithophores and coral reefs.
Coccolithophores are a type of phytoplankton that can form calcite shells and are part of the base of the marine food web, providing essential energy through fats and nutrients up the food chain. Like other organisms that have shells or exoskeletons to protect themselves, such as coral and mollusks like oysters, they are at risk of dying off if ocean acidification continues unchecked as their protective shells degrade and grow more brittle. Because of the increase of carbonic acid in oceans, more hydrogen ions are combining with available carbonate ions that are used to create strong shells. This decreases the total amount of carbonate available for shell-protected organisms like coccolithophores. Decreasing amounts of coccolithophores will reduce the amount of fats and nutrition transferred, potentially reducing their consumer’s populations as well. And that’s just one example; lower levels of shellfish worldwide may severely harm human communities that rely on them to survive, causing an estimated 75 million dollars of damages in the US and over one billion dollars in all of Europe.
Thankfully, there are some measures that can be taken to prevent ocean acidification from worsening. Conservation efforts such as creating marine protected areas with reduced human activity can be observed to develop methods for combating ocean acidification. Additionally, currently developing technologies may eventually be able to extract carbon directly while also maintaining blue carbon habitats for organisms such as mangrove trees and seagrasses, both of which can help to naturally store carbon that has dissolved in the ocean. Nevertheless, the best solution overall is to gradually reduce carbon emissions from all sources, a titanic yet feasible solution for the future.
A debilitating condition is afflicting the world’s oceans right under our noses. It doesn’t have any smell or color, but millions of organisms helplessly die underwater as life seemingly goes on above the surface. Picking up a brittle shell or witnessing the decaying condition of a reef may give clues to the culprit – ocean acidification. While the full extent of the consequences of ocean acidification are yet to be discovered, what we know so far is alarming. We need urgent action to prevent the further loss of vulnerable ecosystems and their inhabitants before it’s too late.
Citations
"Ocean Acidification: Time Switfly Running out to Avoid the Worst Impacts, New Report Warns," Impakter.com. https://impakter.com/ocean-aci...
"Scientists from the U.S., Mexico, and Cuba met to start combating acidification in the Gulf of Mexico," WUSF Public Media. https://wusfnews.wusf.usf.edu/...
"Ocean warming and acidification have major ramifications for marine food web," The Fish Site. https://thefishsite.com/articl...
"Ocean acidification," NOAA. https://www.noaa.gov/education...
"An Ocean Crisis in the Making," Back to Blue. https://backtoblueinitiative.c...