Posted on October 7, 2012 by Bob Berwyn

Shellfish are expected to be hit hard by ocean acidification in the coming decades.

Bob Berwyn photo.

CO2 from decaying algae blooms adds to ocean woes

By Summit Voice

SUMMIT COUNTY — Runoff from agricultural and urban areas is speeding up ocean acidification in some coastal areas, adding to the woes resulting from increased concentration of atmospheric carbon dioxide.

A new study by researchers with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the University of Georgia found that CO2 released from decaying algal blooms intensifies acidification, which is already taking a toll on shellfish populations in some areas.

Ocean acidification occurs when the ocean absorbs carbon dioxide from the atmosphere or from the breakdown of organic matter, causing a chemical reaction to make it more acidic. Species as diverse as scallops and corals are vulnerable to ocean acidification, which can affect the growth of their shells and skeletons.

The study suggests that, given current atmospheric CO2 concentrations and projected CO2 released from organic matter decay, seawater acidity could nearly double in waters with higher salinity and temperature, and could rise as much as 12 times current levels in waters with lower salinity and lower temperature.

The study found that, that, given current atmospheric CO2 concentrations and projected CO2 released from organic matter decay, seawater acidity could nearly double in waters with higher salinity and temperature, and could rise as much as 12 times current levels in waters with lower salinity and lower temperature.

NOAA’s William G. Sunda and Wei-jun Cai of the University of Georgia found that eutrophication — the production of excess algae from increased nutrients, such as, nitrogen and phosphorus — is large, often overlooked source of CO2 in coastal waters. When combined with increasing CO2 in the atmosphere, the release of CO2 from decaying organic matter is accelerating the acidification of coastal seawater.

The effects of ocean acidification on the nation’s seafood industry are seen in the Pacific Northwest oyster fishery. According to NOAA, ocean acidification is affecting oyster shell growth and reproduction, putting this multi-million dollar industry at risk. Annually, the Pacific Northwest oyster fishery contributes $84 million to $111 million to the West Coast’s economy. According to an earlier NOAA study ocean acidification could put more than 3,000 jobs in the region at risk.

Sunda and Cai used a new chemical model to predict the increase in acidity of coastal waters over a range of salinities, temperatures and atmospheric CO2 concentrations. They found that the combined interactive effects on acidity from increasing CO2 in the atmosphere and CO2 released from the breakdown of organic matter were quite complex, and varied with water temperature, salinity and with atmospheric CO2.

“These interactions have important biological implications in a warming world with increasing atmospheric CO2,” said Sunda. “The combined effects of the two acidification processes, along with increased nutrient loading of nearshore waters, are reducing the time available to coastal managers to adopt approaches to avoid or minimize harmful impacts to critical ecosystem services such as fisheries and tourism.”

These model predictions were verified with measured acidity data from the northern Gulf of Mexico and the Baltic Sea, two eutrophic coastal systems with large temperature and salinity differences, which experience large-scale algal blooms. The observed and modeled increases in acidity from eutrophication and algal decay are well within the range that can harm marine organisms.

Funding support for the research came from the National Science Foundation, NASA and NOAA. The study can be found in this month’s edition of the American Chemical Society’s Environmental Science and Technology journal.

Special thanks to Craig Quirolo

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/10/01/australia-reef-idUSL3E8L14K220121001
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Storms to starfish: Great Barrier Reef faces rapid coral loss-study

Mon Oct 1, 2012 2:59pm EDT

* Great Barrier Reef suffers unprecedented coral loss

* Study says storms, starfish, bleaching cause most damage

* Risk of rapid decline unless world adopts tough CO2 goals

By David Fogarty

SINGAPORE, Oct 2 (Reuters) – The world’s largest coral reef – under threat from Australia’s surging coal and gas shipments, climate change and a destructive starfish – is declining faster than ever and coral cover could fall to just 5 percent in the next decade, a study shows.

Researchers from the Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS) in the northeastern city of Townsville say Australia’s Great Barrier Reef has lost half of its coral in little more than a generation. And the pace of damage has picked up since 2006.

Globally, reefs are being assailed by myriad threats, particularly rising sea temperatures, increased ocean acidity and more powerful storms, but the threat to the Great Barrier Reef is even more pronounced, the AIMS study published on Tuesday found.

“In terms of geographic scale and the extent of the decline, it is unprecedented anywhere in the world,” AIMS chief John Gunn told Reuters.

AIMS scientists studied data from more than 200 individual reefs off the Queensland coast covering the period 1985-2012. They found cyclone damage caused nearly half the losses, crown-of-thorns starfish more than 40 percent and coral bleaching from spikes in sea temperatures 10 percent.

The starfish are native and prey on the reefs. But plagues are occurring much more frequently.

Ordinarily, reefs can recover within 10 to 20 years from storms, bleachings or starfish attacks but climate change impacts slow this down. Rising ocean acidification caused by seas absorbing more carbon dioxide is disrupting the ability of corals to build their calcium carbonate structures. Hotter seas stress corals still further.

Greens say the 2,000 km (1,200 mile) long reef ecosystem, the centre-piece of a multi-billion tourism industry, also faces a growing threat from shipping driven by the planned expansion of coal and liquefied natural gas projects.

Those concerns have put pressure on the authorities to figure out how to protect the fragile reef.

FALLING FAST

The researchers say the pace of coral loss has increased since 2006 and if the trend continues, coral cover could halve again by 2022, with the southern and central areas most affected.

Between 1985 and 2012, coral cover of the reef area fell from 28 percent to 13.8 percent.

“Coral cover on the reef is consistently declining, and without intervention, it will likely fall to 5 to 10 percent within the next 10 years,” say the researchers in the study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences journal. They called for tougher curbs on greenhouse gas emissions as a crucial way to stem the loss.

Shipping and new ports on the Queensland coast are another major threat, Greenpeace says.

Coal is one of Australia’s top export earners and the state of Queensland is the country’s largest coal-producer. It also has a rapidly growing coal-seam gas industry for LNG exports.

Earlier this year, Greenpeace estimated port expansion could more than triple Queensland’s coal export capacity by 2020 from 257 million tonnes now. That would mean as many as 10,000 coal ships per year could make their way through the Great Barrier Reef area by 2020, up 480 percent from 1,722 ships in 2011, according to the group.

The Queensland and national governments, which jointly manage the reef, have launched a major review of managing the risks facing the UNESCO-listed reef and its surrounding marine area. The review will look at managing the threats from increased shipping to urban development.

Gunn said better management was all about buying time and improving the reef’s resilience to climate change. A key area was improving water quality from rivers flowing into the reef area, with studies suggesting fertiliser-rich waters help the crown-of-thorns starfish larvae rapidly multiply. (Editing by Jeremy Laurence).

Special thanks to Coral-list

http://www.samuseum.sa.gov.au/index.php?option=com_content&Itemid=172&catid=177&id=431&view=article

4 September 2012

South Australian Museum parasite expert Ian Whittington is one of several international scientists whose study in New Caledonia is today published in the journal Aquatic Biosystems.

New Caledonia is home to the biggest coral reef lagoon and the second biggest coral reef on the planet. Coral reefs, essential to the world’s ecosystems, are home to more than 25% of global marine biodiversity but comprise less than 0.1% of the Earth’s ocean surface. They are considered biological “hotspots” because they are especially rich in marine species. Parasites play a major role in species evolution and the maintenance of populations and ecosystems. However the role of parasites is little known or appreciated.

South Australian Museum Scientist, Associate Professor Ian Whittington, and Honorary Research Associate at the Museum, Professor Ian Beveridge (University of Melbourne) are among an international research team of eight scientists from Australia, Britain, Czech Republic, and France. Directed by Jean-Lou Justine at the National Museum of Natural History in Paris, the team are embarking on an eight year study investigating parasite biodiversity on fish living in New Caledonia’s tropical lagoon.

Their study found that the number of fish parasites is at least ten times the number of fish species in coral reefs (for fish of similar or greater size to the species in the four families studied). Therefore extinction of a fish species on this coral reef would very likely lead to the co-extinction at least ten parasite species associated with it. The disappearance of these parasites, although insignificant at first glance, would result in a biodiversity loss ten times higher. The consequences of such extinctions for the balance of coral reefs and species evolution in general are incalculable.

Associate Professor Ian Whittington and his team in New Caledonia. Photo by Jean-Lou Justine, National Museum of Natural History, Paris.

The Director of the South Australian Museum, Professor Suzanne Miller, says “the findings of this study provide a key insight into the aquatic biodiversity of the Pacific region. Associate Professor Whittington and his colleagues have effectively illustrated the complex relationships between marine organisms and their fragility in the face of climate change and other environmental disturbances.”

The team’s investigation primarily focused on traditional parasite morphology – with an emphasis on crustaceans, external and internal flukes, tapeworms and roundworms. The aim was to estimate the number of parasite species from reef fish and the number of host-parasite combinations possible, and give a clear picture of marine biodiversity in the region. The results of this study are published this week in the online open access journal Aquatic Biosystems.

Parasitic isopod (Anilocra gigantea), photographed alive on an ornate snapper (Pristipomoides argyrogrammicus). Jean-Lou Justine, National Museum of Natural History, Paris.

The parasite and certain fish material collected and studied is held in several natural history museums across the world including the South Australian Museum’s Australian Helminthological Collection in Adelaide. This collection is an internationally renowned collection of parasitic worms established with support from the Australian Society for Parasitology. The material is also held in the Czech Republic, France, UK and USA. All these collections are available to the scientific community for further studies. This emphasises the importance of preserving and increasing the collections of natural history museums. Scientists’ pioneering work in this area and the collections will serve as a reference for similar studies on other coral reefs.

The team:

Jean-Lou Justine, UMR 7138 Systematics, Adaptation, Evolution, Muséum National d’Histoire Naturelle, Paris, France
Ian Beveridge, Department of Veterinary Science, University of Melbourne, Australia
Geoffrey A. Boxshall, Department of Zoology, Natural History Museum, London, UK
Rod A. Bray, Department of Zoology, Natural History Museum, London, UK
Terrence L. Miller, Biodiversity Program, Queensland Museum, Queensland, Australia
František Moravec, Institute of Parasitology, Biology Centre, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, Branišovská, Czech Republic
John Paul Trilles, Team ecophysiological adaptations and Ontogeny, UMR 5119 (CNRS-IRD-UM1-UM2-IFREMER), Université Montpellier 2, France
Ian D. Whittington, Monogenean Research Laboratory, The South Australian Museum & Marine Parasitology Laboratory, & Australian Centre for Evolutionary Biology and Biodiversity, The University of Adelaide, Australia

Header image: Associate Professor Ian Whittington and his team studying specimens. Photo by Jean-Lou Justine, National Museum of Natural History, Paris.

03 September 2012

A 4-page summary of outcomes of the 12th International Coral Reef Symposium is now online at:
http://www.icrs2012.com/Downloads/ICRS2012_Outcomes_Report.PDF.

The Symposium website will remain operational indefinitely. Here are some useful direct links:

http://www.icrs2012.com/Proceedings.htm

http://www.icrs2012.com/Downloads/ICRS2012_Book_of_Abstracts.pdf, 1500 talk and poster abstracts

http://www.icrs2012.com/ePosters.htm, uploaded posters

http://www.icrs2012.com/Default.htm, videos of all the 12ICRS Plenary talks and the Darwin Medal address

http://www.icrs2012.com/Program/PhotographicCompetition.html, a collection of beautiful images

http://www.abc.net.au/news/abcnews24/programs/future-forum/, an hour-long panel discussion on the Future of Coral Reefs

http://www.icrs2012.com/Consensus_Statement.htm, where you can still join more than 3,100 coral reef scientists by endorsing the Consensus Statement on the future of coral reefs.

It has been a great privilege to host 12ICRS, and we hope everyone enjoyed contributing to it, either onsite in Cairns or online. A special thanks to Eliza Glasson, for an amazing job.

Cheers, Terry
————————
Prof. Terry Hughes FAA
Director, ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies
James Cook University
Townsville, QLD 4811, AUSTRALIA
Fax: 61 (0) 4781-6722
tel: 61 (0)7-4781-4000
http://www.coralcoe.org.au/

“Scientists can help by undertaking solution-focused research, by participating more vigorously in policy debates to improve coral reef legislation and implementation, and by sending the clear message that reefs can still be saved if we try harder.” Hughes et al. 2010. Trends in Ecology and Evolution 25: 619-680.

Special thanks to Terry Hughes via the Coral-list @noaa.gov

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/16/climate-change-coral-reefs_n_1888288.html?ncid=edlinkusaolp00000003

Reuters | Posted: 09/16/2012 1:00 pm Updated: 09/16/2012 8:34 pm

* 70 pct of corals will suffer degradation by 2030

* To protect half of reefs, temperature rise must be under 1.5C

By Nina Chestney

LONDON, Sept 16 (Reuters) – The chance to save the world’s coral reefs from damage caused by climate change is dwindling as man-made greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise, scientists said in a study released on Sunday.

Around 70 percent of corals are expected to suffer from long-term degradation by 2030, even if strict emission cuts are enforced, according to the study.

“The window of opportunity to preserve the majority of coral reefs, part of the world’s natural heritage, is small,” said Malte Meinshausen, co-author of the report published in the journal Nature Climate Change.

“We close this window if we follow another decade of ballooning global greenhouse-gas emissions.”

Coral reefs are home to almost a quarter of the world’s ocean species, they provide coastal protection and can support tourism and fishing industries for millions of people worldwide.

The rise of global average temperatures, warmer seas and the spread of ocean acidification due to greenhouse gas emissions, however, pose major threats to coral ecosystems.

The scientists from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, the University of British Columbia and the universities of Melbourne and Queensland in Australia used climate models to calculate the effects of different emissions levels on 2,160 reefs worldwide.

World carbon dioxide emissions increased by more than 3 percent last year and global average temperatures have risen by about 0.8 degrees Celsius over the past century.

Coral reefs face serious threats even if global warming is restricted to a 2 degrees Celsius limit, which is widely viewed as a safe threshold to avert the most devastating effects of climate change, such as drought, sea level rise or crop failure.

Warmer sea surface temperatures are likely to trigger more frequent and more intense mass coral bleaching, which is when reefs turn pale, the study said.

Although corals can survive bleaching, if the heat persists they can die. This happened in 1998 when 16 percent of corals were lost in a single, prolonged period of warmth worldwide.

Ocean acidification can put even more stress on corals.

As more and more carbon dioxide is absorbed from the atmosphere, sea water turns more acidic which can hinder calcification which is crucial for corals’ growth.

“Thus, the threshold to protect at least half of the coral reefs worldwide is estimated to be below 1.5 degrees Celsius mean temperature increase,” the study said.

A separate report last week said Caribbean corals were under immediate threat and urgent action was needed to limit pollution and aggressive fishing practices.

Average live coral cover on Caribbean reefs has declined to just 8 percent today compared to more than 50 percent in the 1970s, according to the report by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. (Editing by Rosalind Russell)

Special thanks to Desiree Barbazon