Greece to Spend 780 Million Euros to Protect Marine Biodiversity
by 2030.The plan for a marine park in the Aegean Sea has irritated neighbouring Turkey, which said last week that it was not willing to accept a possible "fait accompli on geographical features whose status is disputed". In response, Greece accused Turkey of "politicising a purely environmental issue".NATO allies Greece and Turkey have long been at odds over a range of issues including maritime boundaries and claims over their continental shelves in the Mediterranean.Mitsotakis said other initiatives underway include campaigns to curb plastic pollution, constructing charging stations
Coral Reefs Suffer Fourth Global Bleaching Event
Along coastlines from Australia to Kenya to Mexico, many of the world's colorful coral reefs have turned a ghostly white in what scientists said on Monday amounted to the fourth global bleaching event in the last three decades.At least 54 countries and territories have experienced mass bleaching among their reefs since February 2023 as climate change warms the ocean's surface waters, according to the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) Coral Reef Watch, the world's top coral reef monitoring body.Bleaching is triggered by water temperature anomalies that cause
New Electrochemical Technology Could De-acidify the Oceans
deployment locations where OAE can be safely and effectively implemented.These considerations are being researched by various groups funded by the Carbon to Sea Initiative, but much more support is needed to rapidly vet and scale this technology.To overcome the technological challenges and environmental uncertainties, government, industrial, non-profit and venture capital support must be massively scaled and devoted to carefully and responsibly validating the large-scale implementation of OAE technologies around the world.The authorsCharles-Francois de Lannoy, Associate Professor, Chemical Engineerin
Rubymar Sinking Puts Coral Reefs At Risk
, it is not clear who has insured the Belize-registered Rubymar and would therefore pay for any remediation. It is not known how the fertiliser was stored and how secure it would be from reaching the water. And so far, any damage has yet to be reported.But the sinking has the potential to be the worst environmental catastrophe the region has experienced in more than a decade, Sawalmih said.An overload of fertilisers can stimulate excessive growth of algae, using up so much oxygen that regular marine life cannot survive. This creates dead zones where nothing lives.Fertilizers often also contain traces of
Officials Urge EPA to Remove Toxic 'Forever Chemicals' from the Hudson River
U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand earlier this month stood with local leaders and environmental advocates at Albany City Hall to demand that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) take additional action to clean up polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB) “forever chemicals” in the Hudson River.PCBs are toxic manmade chemicals that can linger in water and soil for decades. Exposure is associated with a variety of serious health conditions, including cancer.From 1947 to 1977, General Electric dumped 1.2 million pounds of PCBs into the Hudson River north of Albany. In 1984, the EPA designated a
Frozen Methane Under the Seabed is Thawing – And It's Worse Than We Thought
Buried beneath the oceans surrounding continents is a naturally occurring frozen form of methane and water. Sometimes dubbed “fire-ice” as you can literally set light to it, marine methane hydrate can melt as the climate warms, uncontrollably releasing methane – a potent greenhouse gas – into the ocean and possibly the atmosphere.Colleagues and I have just published research showing more of this methane hydrate is vulnerable to warming than previously thought. This is a worry as that hydrate contains about as much carbon as all of the remaining oil and gas on Earth.Releasing it
US Awards $6.7 Million for Sea Level Rise and Coastal Resilience Research
and intense storms,” said Rick Spinrad, Ph.D., NOAA Administrator. “These awards, including those funded through the Biden-Harris Administration's Inflation Reduction Act, are a key pillar of Bidenomics and will enhance NOAA’s efforts to help communities build economic and environmental resilience and develop solutions to a variety of coastal climate threats.”Eight new and seven continuing awards are funded under NCCOS’ Effects of Sea Level Rise (ESLR) Program. These projects will help facilitate informed adaptation planning and coastal management decisions that
USACE Working to Prevent Saltwater from Rising Up the Mississippi
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, New Orleans District is working to delay upriver progression of salt water from the Gulf of Mexico by augmenting the sill initially constructed in July 2023.Construction is underway to increase the existing underwater sill from a depth of -55 feet to a depth of -30 feet. A 620-foot-wide navigation lane will be kept to a depth of -55 feet to ensure deep-draft shipping continues along the nation’s busiest inland waterway.USACE initially constructed the underwater barrier sill in July 2023 to create an artificial basin to delay the ingress of salt water
NZ’s Vital Kelp Forests are in Peril from Ocean Warming
Years of almost non-stop marine heatwaves are stressing New Zealand’s kelp forests. But as we show in our new research, ongoing ocean warming is only one of several threats to these unique and important coastal seaweed ecosystems.Many seaweed species are sensitive to changes in the ocean’s acidity and coastal “darkening” – changes in colour and clarity – is forcing some to retreat to shallower waters. All these stress factors combined place these crucial habitats in peril, with consequences for all species that depend on them.New Zealand has the ninth longest
February 2024
