Marine Climate Change

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What Is Climate Change?

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If no action is taken to lessen the exploitation of fossil fuel materials in favor of renewable energy, our landscapes will shift significantly within the next 50-100 years. Coastlines will erode further and further inland as sea levels rise. Ice caps will begin to melt contributing to rising sea levels as well as loss of habitat for many species. Agricultural land that was once fertile can turn to dusty arid landscapes, and extreme weather will become more and more prevalent. Biodiversity will become more and more scarce, with an estimated 550 species to go extinct if insufficient action is taken. Humans and animals will find it to become increasingly more difficult to secure adequate food and water, and poorer countries will face the brunt of this shortage as they lack the funds to build infrastructure to protect them from the early effects of climate change. Many of these adverse effects can be prevented at large and small scales through accountability for the government, corporations, businesses, and ourselves.

BBC. (2021, October 13). What is climate change? A really simple guide. BBC News. Retrieved

November 13, 2021, from https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-24021772.

Climate change is a shift in the average climates of regions around the world as a result of humans overusing oil, gas, and coal to sustain their lifestyles. This warming is caused by greenhouse gases such as methane and carbon dioxide (CO2) becoming trapped in the atmosphere and absorbing heat from the sun which causes the earth to accumulate heat. According to BBC, the amount of CO2 trapped in the atmosphere is now 50% higher than it was pre-industrial era, and the earth is now a whopping 1.2 degrees Celsius warmer than it was in the 19th century (BBC, 2021). This number may sound like a small shift, yet it has instigated significant threats to the biodiversity in our ecosystems and continues to pose risks to us and the environment if no action is taken.

Climate Change Causes

Life on Earth is constantly changing in natural ways as it has been for millions of years. The Earth’s climate has gone through many warming and cooling cycles throughout its existence due to factors such as volcanic eruptions, the intensity of the sun and naturally occurring greenhouse gases (Denchak & Turrentine, 2017). In the last century this has changed, and it is due to anthropogenic causes. Climate change is occurring because of the accumulation of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere that trap heat and cause rising temperatures. Greenhouse gases include carbon dioxide, methane, water vapor, and nitrous oxide (NASA 2018). Sources of greenhouse gas emissions include agriculture, industry, electricity production and consumption and transportation. In the United States transportation is the leading cause of greenhouse gas emissions (United States Environmental Protection Agency, 2018).

Effect on Wildlife / Ocean

The ocean is home to the most biodiversity on the planet, but the versatility and life is threatened by climate change. Marine life is at risk due to ocean warming, increased acidification, “dead zones” caused by lack of oxygen in the water, rising sea levels, and other problems that stem from climate change. These topics are harmful to marine ecosystems because the entire system of relationships is thrown off when one species is in danger. That being said, in order to survive, species are forced to change their lifestyles. One example is habitat shifting, which is when species will become displaced due to any of the previously mentioned problems. Habitat shifting commonly affects whales and sea turtles, so they are forced to travel far to reach a habitat with necessary resources and ideal temperatures. Marine ecosystems are diverse and interconnected, which is helpful to sustain life, but it also causes them to be extremely vulnerable to any changes caused by climate change.

Major Solutions

Images via Wix

Climate change ravages the marine ecosystems in every part of the world, climate change, global warming, and other factors of climate change affect the ocean directly as a result of causes of climate change. Things like fossil fuels, emissions, and the farm industry all cause climate change, and the solutions to marine climate change are mainly solutions to climate change as a whole. There are some things that incorporate the ocean as a solution though, that many around the world are attempting to implement.

One major solution, similar to car emissions, is that boats and other methods of transport across the ocean need to decrease by large margins, as according to Medium, “shipping containers produce more greenhouse gas emissions than some small countries.” Scientists measure that we can use the ocean as a good solution to what affects the oceans, seagrasses, salt marshes and mangroves are all contributing factors to the fight towards climate as they can “absorb” carbon dioxide from the atmosphere at rates up to four times higher than any forest can. Another huge thing that we know will work is using the ocean’s high winds for sustainable energy through wind energy, something that has not been completely implemented all over the world, but has been shown to be very effective.

As mentioned before, solutions to climate change are solutions to marine climate change as climate change directly affects the oceans, so some major solutions to climate change that the future holds is the switch to renewable energies, the slow reduction in fossil fuel burning, stopping deforestation, improve farming practices and promoting other non meat diets, and sustainable transportation. All these solutions target the decrease emission of greenhouse gases, or mainly combating the harmful effects of CO2 in the atmosphere which is the most abundant in the atmosphere that is a main source of marine depletion.

Sources:
NASA. (2021, August 23). Climate change adaptation and mitigation. NASA. Retrieved November 15, 2021, from https://climate.nasa.gov/solutions/adaptation-mitigation/.
The ocean as a solution for climate change: 5 opportunities for action. World Resources Institute. (n.d.). Retrieved November 15, 2021, from https://www.wri.org/events/2019/10/ocean-solution-climate-change-5-opportunities-action.
Searles Jones, J. (2019, September 19). To solve climate change, remember the Ocean. Nature News. Retrieved November 15, 2021, from https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-02832-w.