Posted on 07/11/2012 8:47:00 AM PDT by neverdem
Evidence of the dire condition of coral reefs around the world is being presented in abundance at the 12th International Coral Reef Symposium that got underway yesterday in Cairns, Australia. And scientists are calling for action to stop the losses: More than 2500 marine researchers and managers at the conference and around the world have signed a Consensus Statement on Climate Change and Coral Reefs that calls on "all governments to ensure the future of coral reefs, through global action to reduce the emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, and via improved local protection of coral reefs."
The need for action is self-evident to the community. "The huge declines in live coral cover that people have been talking about are real and increasingly well documented," Jeremy Jackson, professor emeritus of oceanography at Scripps Institution of Oceanography in San Diego, California, said at a press briefing. He noted that in the Caribbean, live coral cover has declined from 50% to 60% of reefs in the early 1970s, to around 5% to 10% today. Even on Australia's Great Barrier Reef, probably the world's most well-protected, live coral cover has decreased from 40% of the area to 20% over the last 50 years.
The causes are well known: overfishing, habitat destruction, sedimentation, pollution, and, increasingly, climate change. Warmer ocean waters mean increased bleaching; and the oceans are becoming more acidic, which weakens coral skeletons. "There are no climate skeptics among coral reef scientists or coral reef managers because we've been measuring the impact of climate change since about the 1980s," said Terry Hughes, who studies the links between reefs and local communities at James Cook University in Townsville, Australia.
Addressing climate change will take time. Meanwhile, there is hope in local action. "We know from observation and experience that in places where protective actions have been taken, the coral reefs are in better shape," Jackson said. Protecting reefs from human activities makes them more resilient to bleaching and naturally occurring disruptions such as typhoons and will buy time "while we come to grips with the (world's) carbon dioxide addiction," said Stephen Palumbi, a marine biologist at Stanford University in Palo Alto, California.
The scientists banded together because "a statement from a single scientist may not be enough to generate the political and leadership changes we need for saving coral reefs," Palumbi said. He and a small group of like-minded researchers started work on the statement 2 years ago in anticipation of having it adopted at the symposium. Of course, "the statement is just the beginning," he said, adding that the 2500 signing scientists need to engage political and community leaders "to help us by taking on the science and turning it into political action."
We have another "scientific consensus" on our hands!
All you peasants shut up and get in line to those ovens.
“Call for Action” = “Call for $$$$$$$$$$$”
Gee.... ships have been dragging anchors through coral reefs for, well ever since the first boat was made.
You would think it would all be gone by now.
Any Indian or Chinese “scientists” there?
Saw an NGO video awhile ago where they claimed that because of a huge sea level DROP, the Great Barrier Reef was completely exposed for a great period of time and died completely.
YET, today there is a very much alive Great Barrier Reef. Go figure.
How did the corral get there in the first place. Man had nothing to do with it. Man has nothing to do with it now. This is another scam just like the AGW/IPCC CO2 scam. It’s how socialist democrats make their living. They show corral reefs in decline, they don’t show where new corral in growing.
Same way these frauds report on the polar ice caps. They show one side has receded. They ignore the other side that is growing.
When I was in Key West this winter, the locals were as pleased as punch about the coral. The coral had stopped dying and was spawning! So the coral is adapting.
I heard it was the lion fish destroying the reef.
It’s always something.
Out of my well of ignaorance, I ask: How does an elevated atmospheric CO2 level adversely affect coral growth?
The biggest red flag for such things is that when any problem or potential problem is noted, a *real* environmentalist will say, “Okay, let’s make more”; but the agenda driven fakes will always say, “Let’s make everybody do with less!”
Importantly, *only* the “Okay, let’s make more” solution ever works, because it is honestly trying to solve a problem. The “Let’s make everybody do with less” crowd are not really concerned with the problem, and are indifferent to whether it is solved at all. They want government rationing and control as an end in itself.
A great recent example of this was when someone noticed that the “arable ocean” off the west coast was pretty much devoid of life for numerous reasons. The “do with less” scoundrels decreed that there must be an end to fishing and most use of coastal waters, calling for massive government regulation.
Real environmentalists, on the other hand, about a dozen of them who scuba dived, got together a bunch of empty cut bleach bottles with string tied to them and bricks, and put runners of giant sea kelp in each one. Then they planted them at just the right depth offshore.
Kelp grows at a fantastic rate when it gets established, and soon there were thick beds of kelp up and down the coast. And shortly thereafter, the kelp beds were full of all kinds of sea life. Problem solved. Without government involvement or regulation, or high taxes.
In the case of coral reef, it is now known that coral is attracted to undersea cable with a tiny current running through it, and clusters around it and grows at a much faster rate than normal.
So make an offshore grid of cable, with its ends running onshore, and run a small current through it. Before long you have the makings of an inexpensive coral reef where there was none. Problem solved.
As acids go, it's weak acid, i.e. it doesn't completely dissociate into positive and negative ions, as opposed to strong acids like nitric and sulpuric.
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