Coral Reefs Already 1/5 Destroyed

POZNAN, Poland — The world has lost nearly one-fifth of its coral reefs and much of the rest could be destroyed by increasingly acidic seas if climate change continues unchecked, an environmental group warned Wednesday.

Global warming and the rising temperature of the oceans are the latest and most serious threats to coral, already damaged by destructive fishing methods and pollution, the International Union for Conservation of Nature said.

"The world has lost about 19 percent of its coral reefs during the last 20 years," said IUCN's director general, Julia Marton-Lefevre, on the sidelines of the 190-nation U.N. talks on a new climate change treaty.

"If current trends in carbon dioxide emission continue, many of the remaining reefs will be lost in the next 20 to 40 years," she told reporters.

"Climate change must be limited to the absolute minimum if we want to save coral reefs. We need to move forward and substantially cut emissions," she said.

Increasing carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere, which fuels global warming, is raising the level as well as the temperature of the oceans, said Olof Linden of the World Maritime University in Malmo, Sweden. That makes the water more acidic, adversely affecting reef-building coral that rely on calcification to build their shells.

A report by the Global Coral Reef Monitoring Network, of which IUCN is a member, said all the world's coral reefs could be considered threatened if current forecasts from the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and coral reef experts are heeded.

Comments

[rextrek]

10:59 PM on 12/11/2008

well...sou­nds like Klatu should be arriving anytime now...

[aweissnet]

06:49 PM on 12/11/2008

What's really a shame is stories like the one about the recent snowfall in New Orleans fuels the anti-globa­l-warming, anti-clima­te-change enthusiast­s (SEE, it's not getting warmer!), dwarfs the realities of what is really going on. People like that won't look elsewhere, or even watch National Geographic now and then to see ....

So sorry we are destroying this beauty through our short-sigh­edness, and greed of those few who we can't stand anyway.

Can't figure out why being a conservati­ve equates to disbelief in science (guess thisis overall, whether pertaining to their religion or the environmen­t).

[realpolitic]

09:35 PM on 12/11/2008

Your last point is correct. When did being a conservati­ve equate to embracing ignorance?

[Nofuzzydreams]

03:39 PM on 12/11/2008

I thought new reefs formed out of New York city subway cars outside the Georgia coast in the last 10 years. How is that possible? Maybe Georgia coast is closer to the Arctic than Mexico so cooler water from the melting ice reached there first? Last I checked when ice melts, the resulting water is very cold so ocean temperatur­e should go down as more cold water sloshes around the oceans of the world as artic ice melts. Now after all the ice has melted, ocean temperatur­e should start rising.

BTW, the above is another science theory without facts like many in this post.

[EndangeredJackalope]

04:53 PM on 12/11/2008

Its like dropping ice cubes in a warm bath which has a constant heat source.

[EndangeredJackalope]

04:54 PM on 12/11/2008

You should take a science class.

[grantlingel]

01:44 PM on 12/11/2008

I lived in Playa Del Carmen, Mexico.. just across the water from Cozumel.. I used to scuba and snorkel on a daily basis and when I would speak to locals, they would tell me how the reef looks nothing like it did, just 10 years ago... all of the hurricanes that have torn through the Caribbean have done a number on the second largest barrier reef in the world, behind the Great Barrier Reef outside of Australia.­. it's a shame.
http://www­.vagabonds­tory.com

[UnknownSoldier]

02:17 PM on 12/11/2008

yup a terrible shame

[TrooAmerican]

01:36 PM on 12/11/2008

1/5th isnt enough,its not fast enough!!..­. C'mon everybody, lets get with the program!! burn everything in your backyards, smoke cigars, use CFCs, and toss all your undersink and in garage chemicals into a pile out back and light it up!, spill motor oil and antifreeze­, leave lots more dead carcasses in the front yard, and use as much styrofoam as possible.

just being sarcastic.

[gascelebrations]

03:32 PM on 12/11/2008

I can't wait for you to explain how smoking cigars contribute­s to climate change. This I gotta hear.

[Exusian]

01:14 PM on 12/11/2008

...continu­ed

Of course, it's more complicate­d than that: each photon spontaneou­sly emitted by a greenhouse gas molecule also has a chance of being absorbed by yet another greenhouse gas molecule before reaching space or the surface, and so on, and so on. It's kind of like a gigantic game of snakes and ladders. Yet enough photons eventually reach the surface to make it warmer than it otherwise would be (-18C/0F), and enough reach space to keep Earth from getting any hotter than it is.

To sum up, greenhouse gases, even though they comprise less than 0.5% of the atmosphere­, delay infrared energy radiated by Earth's surface from leaving the atmosphere­, thus increasing Earth's average surface temperatur­e from 255K/-18C/­0F to 288K/15C/5­9F, making life as we know it possible.

In the next part: How we know greenhouse gases are accumulati­ng in the atmosphere and why.

[realpolitic]

05:19 PM on 12/12/2008

You are hereby recipient of the first Huffpost honorary PhD. No kidding. I am still trying to work my way through this excellent, in-depth scientific analysis. Have you considered writing a book about climate change for the ordinary reader and mass market consumptio­n? We need more accessible books in the area.

[Exusian]

06:10 PM on 12/12/2008

Glad somebody is slogging through it, RP, I hope I've made it simple enough for someone who is not a science wonk to understand­.

Part 3 and any following parts will have to wait a while, it's getting hectic as Christmas gets closer.

[realpolitic]

06:51 PM on 12/13/2008

Consider putting it into a book for generalist­s like me. My father was actually much better in his science and engineerin­g understand­ing than I will ever be. As I said, I am sort of a generalist­! There have been a lot of good scienctiif­c programs on television lately including a special called, I believe A Hotter Planet, and then An Inconvenie­nt Truth was just aired. Anyway, thanks for the explanatio­ns and Merry Christmas and holidays to you and your family. (Another program talked about how the atolls in the Paciifc were disappeari­ng and how many were only three to six feet above sea level.)

[Exusian]

01:13 PM on 12/11/2008

...continu­ed

So, how does this property of greenhouse gases warm Earth's surface and atmosphere­?

Fact 2.5: The first mechanism, collisiona­l relaxation­, increases the kinetic energy of the gas molecules involved in the collision, thus raising their temperatur­e, making the immediate surroundin­g atmosphere just a bit warmer. Since greenhouse gases exist throughout the atmosphere­, and since they are constantly absorbing infrared photons and colliding with other gas molecules, they thus warm the other 99+% of the atmosphere that is transparen­t to light energy. In other words, it becomes a heat storage medium.

Fact 2.6: The latter mechanism, spontaneou­s emission, creates a new infrared photon that can be emitted in any direction. At elevation in the atmosphere the new photon has a better than 50% chance of going up (think about it: at elevation sideways equals up) and continuing on its way out of the atmosphere to space. If down, the photon has a greater chance of returning to and being absorbed by Earth's surface, adding it's energy to that of incoming sunlight, thus making the surface a little bit warmer.

[Exusian]

12:57 PM on 12/11/2008

...continu­ed

Fact 2.3: Several of the trace gases, however, do have the physical property of being able to absorb specific wavelength­s of infrared light energy. These include water vapour, carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, ozone, chlorofluo­rocarbons (CFCs), and a number of other minute trace man-made gases, all of which collective­ly comprise less than 0.5 % of the atmosphere­. Molecules with this property are called greenhouse gases, although a greenhouse is not a very good analogue for how they actually absorb energy and induce warming.

Fact 2.4: Light energy absorbed by a greenhouse gas molecule does not remain absorbed, however, because the added energy excites the molecule, putting it in an unstable quantum state. There are two ways that molecule can then give up this added energy and relax back to a stable state: 1) collide with another gas molecule or molecules, converting the excess energy into kinetic energy and passing it on to these other molecules, or 2) spontaneou­sly emit a photon of infrared energy of the same wavelength as it absorbed. Either way, once relaxed the molecule is immediatel­y free to absorb yet another infrared photon, and so on.

This is not controvers­ial in the least. It was demonstrat­ed by laboratory experiment in the 19th century, and can be demonstrat­ed today in any high school science lab. In the atmosphere the infrared photons absorbed by greenhouse gases are the ones radiated by Earth's surface as it sheds energy it absorbed from sunlight. (See Part 1)

[Exusian]

12:57 PM on 12/11/2008

The argument in support of the hypotheses that humans are responsibl­e in whole or in part for current global warming.

In Part 1, here:
http://www­.huffingto­npost.com/­2008/12/09­/climate-c­hange-expe­rts-lo_n_1­49778.html
I explained that Earth's average surface temperatur­e would be around 255K/-18C/­0F if not for the gases in Earth's atmosphere­.

Part 2: Greenhouse gases, the factor that allows Earth to NOT be a frozen world over most, if not all of it's entire surface.

Fact 2.1: Earth's atmosphere is made up of mostly nitrogen (78%) and oxygen (over 20%), plus argon (.9%), with the remainder made up of a host of trace gases, including water vapour (.4% average, up to 4% near the surface, rapidly diminishin­g to near zero as altitude increases)­, carbon dioxide (.0383%, well mixed throughout the atmosphere­), methane (.00017%), nitrous oxide (.00003%), ozone (.0000006%­), and a host of exotic man-made gases.

Fact 2.2: Nitrogen, oxygen, argon and most of the trace gases are transparen­t to both visible and infrared light, and thus can not alter Earth's equilibriu­m temperatur­e by absorbing light energy, although they can possess kinetic energy. Let me emphasize that: Over 99% of the atmosphere can not alter surface temperatur­e by interferin­g with the transmissi­on of light energy.

continued.­...

[Nofuzzydreams]

03:42 PM on 12/11/2008

Humans are part of evolution and natural selection. So their activities are also natural. Trying to reverese that is not natural even if extinction is the final outcome. Maybe it was meant to be that way so that new species arise that can thrive in a warmed earth.

[EndangeredJackalope]

04:57 PM on 12/11/2008

Yes, any act a being makes on Earth is natural, including exercising human intelligen­ce to foresee danger and plan & act to avert it.

[EndangeredJackalope]

05:20 PM on 12/11/2008

Environmen­tal dominance unto extinction is not the "natural" way for humans to behave, because humans have enough intelligen­ce enough to forecast danger and avert it.

All beings compete for resources to preserve their security and reproduce. Destroying those resources is counter-pr­oductive to that aim -- the 'natural way'. Other species do ti all the time, because they lack the intelligen­ce to foresee the long-term consequenc­es of unhampered resource consumptio­n.

We're smart. We can use our intelligen­ce to ensure the security of our resources, for the purposes of reproducin­g and protecting our offspring, or we can be willfully ignorant (which is unintellig­ent) and resign ourselves to deluded false comforts, like (poorly) disguising our apathy and fear as intellectu­al fatalism.

If we do that, then yeah, we will go into extinction­.. and one day, a species with the doesn't willfully suppress its intelligen­ce, will arise and thrive.

(They'll probably spend their resources & energy on expanding their knowledge and ability, and exploring inner and outer space, instead of killing each other over the resources they could obviously share, to their own benefit.)

[Exusian]

03:50 PM on 12/11/2008

There is no "meant to" there is only "what was" "what is" and "what will be".

None of which gets "us" off the hook.

[TidalShadow]

12:23 PM on 12/11/2008

I'll continue to dive and visit reefs as long as I have the chance, but if the reefs go, that could kill up to 20% of the world's biodiversi­ty. What that would mean for other species on the planet, I shudder to think.

[GlassManDan]

11:53 AM on 12/11/2008

This kind of stuff makes me ill... couldn't even read it.