Isolated Weather Events are Not Evidence Against Global Warming March 10, 2009

An op-ed appearing in the Boston Globe on March 8, 2009, presented an anecdotal, base attack of global warming.  The author, Jeff Jacoby, pointed to the severe winter storms that have been slamming the East Coast recently and asked, essentially, that if there’s really global warming, why all this cold weather.  Unfortunately, Jacoby is not the only person to employ an argument against the existence of global warming based on isolated weather events.  In fact, the same sometimes snide argument was made by many following the recent protest of the Capitol Power Plant in Washington, D.C., which just so happened to have occurred during a snow storm.   (Examples here, here, here, and here.)

The problem with these criticisms is that they rely on a basic misunderstanding of what global warming is and how it is affecting the planet.  To be correct, the problem isn’t just global warming; it’s global climate change.  That’s why the world’s pre-eminent multi-national group attempting to tackle this problem is called the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).  The real danger of a warming planet is not just that the planet gets hotter.  In fact, we’re only talking about single degree increases in the planet’s surface temperature.  (According to the EPA, the earth’s surface temperature rose 0.6 degrees in the last century).   This is one of the reasons why pointing to anecdotes as a means of proving or disproving the existence of global warming is misplaced.  The real danger from global warming is its effects on climates around the world.  For example, the less than one degree increase in the earth’s surface temperature, necessarily felt in the ocean’s surface waters, combined with the increased acidity caused by more and more carbon dioxide absorbed by the oceans has had a significant negative impact on tropical reefs and other hard-shelled sea life around the globe.

Another problem with Jacoby’s argument, in particular, is that he presents evidence that the earth may actually be undergoing a cooling period, and implies that this cooling period will nullify the negative effects of global warming.  We just don’t know about that.  Even if cooling is occurring, how much is enough to stem the negative effects of global warming?  And, more importantly in my opinion, relying on a cooling period to counterbalance the effects of global warming allows us to simply ignore human contributions to climate change, which could just create more problems in the future, when the cooling period ends.  Even if we are experiencing a cooling period, we shouldn’t just ignore that humans are contributing to a significant rise in greenhouse gas emissions. 

I do agree with Jacoby in one respect, however.  He is right that we should not shut out legitimate scientific inquiry and he is right to criticize suggestions that isolated warm weather events are evidence of global warming.  However, we should also not rush to the conclusion that an isolated cold weather event is evidence against global warming. 

The Krill Are Back August 26, 2008

The San Francisco Chronicle is reporting that a tremendous increase in krill is occurring off of the California coast, after several years of stagnation. Krill is a food staple of many animals in the ocean ecosystem and its resurgence is certainly good news. Apparently, colder water in the California Current (the current that runs south from Alaska to Mexico along the California Coast) and strong winds are combining to create a good environment for the krill. Upwelling, which results when winds move the surface waters, allowing the colder, more nutrient-rich lower layer waters to flow upward, is a major reason for the amazing diversity of life in the oceans off of California’s coast. In the past few years, I definitely noticed a decrease in the amount of marine life when I visited local beaches in northern California. Hopefully, this year we will see a resurgence.

The Pacific Garbage Patch—Yet Another Reason to Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle August 24, 2008

In the Pacific Ocean between California and Hawaii is a monstrous garbage dump. True, it’s not like a landfill; people who have seen it describe it as more of a plastic soup, albeit a very large soup. It’s estimated at being close to one and a half times the size of the United States. Nightline recently aired a segment on the garbage patch (apparently a repeat from a March 2008 broadcast) and Discover has an article about it here. Alan Weisman discusses it in his book The World Without Us, highlighting the fact that plastic now permeates many layers of the ocean’s water column.

The existence of this mega dump should reinforce calls for a reduction in the amount of plastic and other materials in packaging as well as the need to recycle and reuse as much as possible. I think the more people become aware of their effects on the environment, the more they will be willing to change behavior to prevent harm.

Fertilizer Causing Dead Zones March 17, 2008

A new study published in Nature concludes that dead zones in streams and creeks across the United States are increasing as a result of fertilizer run-off.  Streams, creeks, and other similar waterways naturally filter nitrate, a component of fertilizer.  However, as the streams become overloaded, they filter less and less nitrate.  The nitrate that is not removed makes its way to the ocean, where it feeds algae and other organisms and contributes to dead zones in coastal areas. 

But, there is a way to combat the detrimental effects of nitrate in waterways.  The use of organic farming practices actually reduces nitrate leaching, leaving streams, rivers, creeks, and the like better able to filter the nitrate that runs off with the surface water.  This is another reason why organic farming is better for the environment than conventional practices and why organic farming should be widely promoted. 

Global Warming Possibly Contributing to the Expansion of Ocean Desert Zones March 5, 2008

A new study found that large areas of the world’s oceans devoid of life, called “desert” zones, are expanding, potentially as a result of global warming.  The study took place over a period of nine years and found that current desert zones are expanding as a result of warming ocean temperatures.  

The problem is created where increased variations in the temperature of ocean layers causes a barrier to cold, nutrient-rich water upwelling from the ocean depths.  Upwelling is the basic foundation that enables a huge variety of marine life to exist. 

I believe that our impact on the oceans is one of the most important environmental challenges we face, but also one of the least recognized.  Hopefully, studies like this will help us to understand how we affect the oceans. 

Bulldozing the Ocean Environment February 25, 2008

 

If you’ve never heard of trawling before, here’s an image for you. Imagine that a hunter blindfolds himself, climbs into a bulldozer, and drives around Yellowstone National Park destroying anything and everything he happens to drive over. At the end of the day, he takes off the blindfold to see what he’s caught. He takes anything he did not intend to catch, calls it “bycatch” (essentially garbage) and throws it out. Clearly, anyone should be able to see the enormous stupidity in this method of hunting. Yet, each year, trawlers drag large, metal baskets across the sea floor, destroying an area at the bottom of the ocean that is equivalent to twice the area of the continental United States, according to biologists’ estimates.

Trawlers destroy coral reefs, wreck ecosystems, and blindly kill anything in their path, whether or not that thing is the object of their hunt. If this type of commercial hunting were allowed on land, there would be outrage. However, trawler operators and their comrades rely on the fact that their destruction is hidden from view.

But with some newly released satellite images, we can see the destructive force of this type of fishing. Hopefully, these images will help bring a stop to the senseless practice of trawling.

Protecting Ocean Life off California’s Coast February 22, 2008

The Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary (MBNMS) provides a certain level of protection for marine wildlife off the coast of California ranging from Marin County to Cambria, about 100 miles south of Monterey Bay. While the “national marine sanctuary” designation provides increased protection to marine life, it does not prevent commercial fishing within its boundaries or other invasive human activities. The depletion of the world’s fisheries, and human effects on the seas in general, are serious problems for the future of the oceans (as excellently documented in the book The Empty Ocean by Richard Ellis).

To help relieve the stress on various wildlife populations (and the ecosystems in which they live), the federal government is considering creating Marine Protected Areas in federal waters within the MBNMS, which would provide additional levels of protection to marine populations to help them recover from adverse human impacts.

Recently, the sanctuaries superintendent issued a letter in which he announced the determination that marine protected areas are needed in federal waters in the MBNMS. So, the good news is the process is continuing to move forward and the federal government has officially recognized the need for an added level of protection. Moving forward, the federal government and various interested stakeholders will confer to determine where to locate the marine protected areas within the sanctuary’s waters.

Ocean News February 18, 2008

• In an impressive effort to protect marine habitats from the devastating effects of pollution and over-fishing, the nation of Kiribati announced the creation of the world’s largest marine protected area. Kiribati first announced the creation of a marine protected area in 2006, which was the world’s third largest and the only deep-sea protected area. Now, Kiribati is doubling the size of the protected area,the Phoenix Islands Protected Area, which will cover an ocean area about as large as California.

• Scientists complete the first ever map of human impacts on the world’s oceans. The map shows that there is no area of ocean that is unaffected by humans. This is seriously depressing, considering that the oceans account for about 70% of the Earth’s surface.
  

• You’ve heard of coral bleaching, the blanching and eventual death of marine corals in tropical areas. Well, it appears that sunscreen is a culprit.  Four chemicals contained in sunscreen cause a dormant virus to awaken and attack the algae on the corals. The algae burst, spewing the virus onto nearby corals, continuing the process and resulting in the bleaching and eventual death of corals.