Coast Guard members work to clean an oil spill impacting Delaware beaches. U.S. Coast Guard District 5
Environmental officials and members of the U.S. Coast Guard are racing to clean up a mysterious oil spill that has spread to 11 miles of Delaware coastline.
<p>When the spill was first discovered Monday, it covered only three-fourths of a mile along Broadkill Beach, <a href="https://eu.delmarvanow.com/story/news/2020/10/21/delaware-bay-oil-spill-affects-wider-area-day-three/6004537002/" target="_blank">Delaware Now reported</a>. However, the tides have extended the reach of the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/oil" target="_self">oil</a> every day, spreading it along seven miles of Delaware Bay coastline by Tuesday and 11 by Wednesday.</p><p>"We are focused on cleanup operations and getting the oil off our beaches and out of our coastal communities as quickly as possible," Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control (DNREC) Secretary Shawn Garvin said in a <a href="https://news.delaware.gov/2020/10/21/unified-command-incident-command-post-established-for-oil-cleanup-efforts-on-delaware-shore/" target="_blank">Wednesday press release</a>. "Expediency is key. We want to capture as much of the oil as we can before it disperses further and causes more environmental harm."</p>
<p>DNREC is working under unified command with the U.S. Coast Guard to clean the spill, which now extends from Fowler Beach, which borders the Prime Hook National Wildlife Refuge, to Cape Henlopen State Park. It was estimated initially that more than 215 gallons of oil had spilled, but the actual amount may be larger, <a href="https://philadelphia.cbslocal.com/2020/10/22/oil-spill-off-delaware-beach-appears-to-be-spreading/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">CBS Philly reported</a>.</p>
<div id="d251e" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="7e03c3596cb3f2b3cf90bb8da0df1a82"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1318672504018317314" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">The oil line from the spill now extends approximately 11 miles from Fowler Beach bordering Prime Hook National Wild… https://t.co/c4TfENSvGw</div> — DNREC (@DNREC)<a href="https://twitter.com/YourDNREC/statuses/1318672504018317314">1603230999.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p>As of Tuesday, recovery efforts had removed around two tons of oily sand and debris, according to DNREC. There are currently more than 75 contractors, DNREC workers and Coast Guard members responding to the spill.</p>
<div id="2bfe2" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="96675d12f78afda6e8606f0fb7d1fe93"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1319010494993358849" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">Approximately two tons of oily sand and debris was removed from the affected areas as of 7 p.m., Tuesday. https://t.co/bdCxr8ZNda</div> — DNREC (@DNREC)<a href="https://twitter.com/YourDNREC/statuses/1319010494993358849">1603311582.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p>The oil has already impacted some <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/wildlife" target="_self">wildlife</a>. <a href="https://tristatebird.org/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Tri-State Bird Rescue and Research</a> had responded to reports of 24 seagulls covered in oil as of Wednesday.<br></p><p>The spill has mostly taken the form of oil patties that range in size from a quarter to a manhole cover, the <a href="https://content.govdelivery.com/accounts/USDHSCG/bulletins/2a6cad4?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=twitter&utm_term=01335c08-da44-4982-a064-9551c1d7e263&utm_content=&utm_campaign=" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Coast Guard said Tuesday</a>.</p><p>Cape Henlopen park watch volunteer Julie McCall got a first-hand view of the strange black blobs when she was conducting a bird count on Beach Plum Island Monday.</p><p>"On the way back, after the tide had gone out quite a bit, I started seeing these bigger patches, and I thought, 'That looks like oil,'" McCall <a href="https://whyy.org/articles/seven-mile-oil-spill-fouls-delaware-coastline/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">told WHYY</a>. "Some were bigger than my foot."</p><p>The Coast Guard said it would use the blobs to try and determine the source of the spill.</p><p>"Working with our partners at DNREC and state agencies, we will continue to monitor the future potential to the Broadkill Beach area, continue cleanup operations and conduct an investigation to try and determine the source," Capt. Jonathan Theel, the commanding officer of Sector Delaware Bay, said in a press release.</p><p>However, officials think the oil is probably heavy fuel oil that leaked from a vessel, WHYY reported.</p><p>McCall said she was worried about how the oil would impact people and animals.</p><p>"It's very scary," she told WHYY. "Of course, we're always concerned about the marine animals, and any kind of toxic material in the water. I'm also concerned about <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/birds" target="_self">birds</a>, any kind of wildlife. A lot of people fish at Beach Plum Island and people walk their dogs and there are kids on the beach. So I'm concerned about exposure to people and animals."</p>
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A new study has revealed that Earth's biggest mass extinction was triggered by volcanic activity that led to ocean acidification. Illustration by Dawid Adam Iurino (PaleoFactory, Sapienza University of Rome) for Jurikova et al (2020)
The excess carbon dioxide emitted by human activity since the start of the industrial revolution has already raised the Earth's temperature by more than one degree Celsius, increased the risk of extreme hurricanes and wildfires and killed off more than half of the corals in the Great Barrier Reef. But geologic history shows that the impacts of greenhouse gases could be much worse.
<p>In fact, <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/scientists" target="_self">scientists</a> from <a href="https://news.st-andrews.ac.uk/archive/great-dying-what-caused-earths-biggest-mass-extinction/?utm_source=hootsuite&utm_medium=twitter&utm_term=univofstandrews&utm_content=research&utm_campaign=research" target="_blank">Scotland's University of Saint Andrews</a> and two major German research centers have for the first time determined a "conclusive picture" of the initial trigger and subsequent processes responsible for Earth's biggest mass <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/extinction" target="_self">extinction</a>. The answer? Massive amounts of carbon dioxide spewed into the atmosphere from a volcanic eruption.</p><p>"We are dealing with a cascading catastrophe in which the rise of CO2 in the atmosphere set off a chain of events that successively extinguished almost all life in the seas," study lead author Dr. Hana Jurikova told <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/mass-extinction-greenhouse-gas-triassic-carbon-dioxide-volcanoes-b1183299.html" target="_blank">The Independent</a>.</p>
<p>The study, published in <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41561-020-00646-4" target="_blank">Nature Geoscience</a> Monday, sought to understand the mechanisms behind an event known as the "Great Dying," the University of Saint Andrews explained in a press release. This was a period around 252 million years ago between the Permian and Triassic epochs in which 95 percent of marine species were wiped out within tens of thousands of years. It is the closest life on Earth has come to total extinction.</p><p>Scientists have advanced many theories for what caused this turn of events, including a release of methane from the seafloor and volcanic activity, but this is the first time a group has determined the exact cause, the GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel, one of the research centers involved in the new study, <a href="https://www.geomar.de/en/news/article/ausloeser-fuer-groesstes-massenaussterben-der-erdgeschichte-identifiziert" target="_blank">said</a>.</p>
<p>The extinction process went something like this, as Saint Andrews explained.</p><ol><li>A volcanic eruption in what is now Siberia sent 100,000 billion tonnes of carbon into the atmosphere.</li><li>This release led to <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/ocean-acidification" target="_self">ocean acidification</a> and warming, which was especially deadly to <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/marine-life" target="_self">marine life</a> that requires calcium carbonate for their shells and skeletons.</li><li>The atmospheric warming increased the rates of chemical weathering on land.</li><li>This caused more nutrients to run off into the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/ocean" target="_self">ocean</a>, depleting it of oxygen and perhaps also poisoning it with sulphide.</li></ol><p>"It took several hundreds of thousands to millions of years for the ecosystem to recover from the catastrophe, which profoundly altered the course of evolution of life on Earth," Jurikova said.</p>
<p>The researchers, who also included members of the Helmholtz Centre Potsdam GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences, were able to reach their conclusions by examining the shells of fossil brachiopods.</p><p>"These are clam-like organisms that have existed on Earth for more than 500 million years," Jurikova explained in the GEOMAR press release.</p><p>The researchers were able to assess the pH levels in the ocean based on the different isotopes of boron in the fossilized shells. Because oceanic pH levels are tightly linked to atmospheric carbon dioxide, the team could then create a model of the atmosphere at the time.</p><p>"With this technique, we can not only reconstruct the evolution of the atmospheric CO2 concentrations, but also clearly trace it back to volcanic activity," study coauthor Dr. Marcus Gutjahr of GEOMAR said in the press release.</p>
<p>The amount of carbon dioxide released by the Siberian volcano was more than 40 times all the carbon dioxide currently held in fossil fuel reserves, including everything that has been released since the start of the industrial revolution, according to Saint Andrews.</p><p>Still, the researchers told The Independent that the study offered "bleak lessons" for humanity as we face the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/sixth-mass-extinction-accelerating-land-animals-2646147181.html" target="_self">sixth mass extinction</a>.</p><p>"Ancient volcanic eruptions of this kind are not directly comparable to anthropogenic carbon emissions, and in fact all modern fossil fuel reserves are far too insufficient to release as much CO2 over hundreds of years, let alone thousands of years as was released 252 million years ago," Jurikova told The Independent. "But it is astonishing that humanity's CO2 emission rate is currently fourteen times higher than the annual emission rate at the time that marked the greatest biological catastrophe in Earth's history."</p>
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Marine scientists who study seagrasses have published a study describing how to reintroduce eelgrass into Virginia coastal bays. Flickr / CC by 2.0
By Robert J. Orth, Jonathan Lefcheck and Karen McGlathery
A century ago Virginia's coastal lagoons were a natural paradise. Fishing boats bobbed on the waves as geese flocked overhead. Beneath the surface, miles of seagrass gently swayed in the surf, making the seabed look like a vast underwater prairie.
<p>More than <a href="https://ocean.si.edu/ocean-life/plants-algae/seagrass-and-seagrass-beds" target="_blank">70 species</a> of seagrasses grow in shallow waters around the world, on every continent except Antarctica. In Virginia, beds of <a href="https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/feature-story/importance-eelgrass" target="_blank">eelgrass</a> (<em>Zostera marina</em>) provided habitat for bay scallops and food for birds, and kept barrier islands from washing away. Eelgrass was so common that people who lived near the shore packed and baled it to <a href="https://www.jlconline.com/how-to/insulation/a-history-of-eel-grass-insulation_o" target="_blank">use as insulation</a> for homes, schools and hospitals.</p><p>In the 1930s, however, pandemic plant disease and repeated hurricanes eliminated the eelgrass along Virginia's eastern shore. The once-vibrant seafloor became barren mud, leading to a loss of "wildfowl, the cream of salt-water fishing, most of the clams and crabs, and all of the bay scallops," sportsman and publisher <a href="https://cpl.org/the-derrydale-press/" target="_blank">Eugene V. Connett</a> <a href="https://www.jamescumminsbookseller.com/pages/books/239493/eugene-v-connett/duck-shooting-along-the-atlantic-tidewater-chapters-by-frederick-c-lincoln-lynn-bogue-hunt" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">wrote in 1947</a>.</p><p>We are marine scientists who study <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=bVEVdsEAAAAJ&hl=en" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">seagrasses</a>, <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=wTArpJgAAAAJ&hl=en" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">marine biodiversity</a> and <a href="https://scholar.google.es/citations?user=l6zTkPUAAAAJ&hl=en" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">coastal ecosystems</a>. In a newly published study, we describe the results of a 20-year mission to reintroduce eelgrass into Virginia coastal bays using a <a href="http://dx.doi.org/%2010.1126/sciadv.abc6434" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">novel seed-based approach</a>.</p><p>This project has now restored 9,600 acres of seagrasses across four bays – one of the most successful marine restoration efforts anywhere in the world. It has triggered large increases in fishes and invertebrates, made the water clearer and trapped large quantities of carbon in seafloor sediments, helping to slow climate change. We see this work as a blueprint for restoring and maintaining healthy ecosystems along coastlines around the world.</p>
<img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yNDU1MDYyNS9vcmlnaW4ucG5nIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY0MzUzNzgzOX0.WyJfNsDpYp00yz74eepABEzCb4P1eQXwUoBpgDzMHLM/img.png?width=980" id="72075" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="416dad1ab602263e29250f63872e4637" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" />
Seagrasses and other coastal habitats stabilize coastlines, store carbon and provide habitat for fish and shellfish. Hisham Ashkar/GRID-Arendal, CC BY-ND
Why Didn’t Seagrasses Recover Naturally?
<p>Development, nutrient runoff and other human impacts have damaged marshes, mangroves, coral reefs and seagrasses in many bays and estuaries worldwide. Loss or shrinkage of these key habitats has reduced commercial fisheries, increased erosion, made coastlines more vulnerable to floods and storms and harmed many types of aquatic life. Rapid climate change has compounded these effects through <a href="https://theconversation.com/ocean-warming-has-fisheries-on-the-move-helping-some-but-hurting-more-116248" target="_blank">rising global temperatures</a>, more <a href="https://theconversation.com/more-frequent-and-intense-tropical-storms-mean-less-recovery-time-for-the-worlds-coastlines-123335" target="_blank">frequent and severe storms</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/as-climate-change-alters-the-oceans-what-will-happen-to-dungeness-crabs-61501" target="_blank">ocean acidification</a>.</p><p>In the late 1990s, local residents told two of us who are longtime students of seagrasses (Robert "JJ" Orth and Karen McGlathery) that they had spotted small patches of eelgrass in shallow waters off Virginia's eastern shore. For years the conventional view had been that seagrasses in this area had not recovered from the events of the 1930s because human activities had <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.aquabot.2005.07.007" target="_blank">made the area inhospitable for them</a>.</p><p>But studies showed that water quality in these coastal bays was <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02782971" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">comparatively good</a>. This led us to explore a different explanation: Seeds from healthy seagrass populations elsewhere along the Atlantic coast simply weren't reaching these isolated bays. Seagrasses are underwater flowering plants, so seeds are among the main ways they reproduce and spread to new environments.</p><img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yNDU1MDYyNi9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY1NjQ4NTY3MH0.8jhLx4hCsj4dgEpA4GJ4JWUmutOPXcc4HAKEWy4kirI/img.jpg?width=980" id="364bd" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="e1062dc214c5b45717b0ff35328f0be5" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" />
Eelgrass beds were restored in four bays at the southern tip of Virginia's eastern shore on the Atlantic coast. David J. Wilcox/VIMS, CC BY-ND
Sowing a New Crop
<p>From our <a href="https://doi.org/10.2307/1941597" target="_blank">earlier research</a>, we knew that when eelgrass seeds fall from the parent plant, they sink to the sea bottom quickly and don't move far from where they land. We also knew that these seeds don't germinate until late fall or early winter. This meant that if we collected the seeds in spring, when eelgrass flowers, we could hold them until the fall, helping them survive over the months in between.</p><p>We decided to try reseeding eelgrass in the areas where they were missing. Starting in 1999, we collected seeds by hand from underwater meadows in nearby Chesapeake Bay – plucking the long reproductive shoots, bringing them back to our laboratory and holding them in large outdoor seawater tanks until they released their seeds naturally. After about 10 years we started gathering the grasses using a custom-built underwater "lawn mower" to collect many more of the reproductive shoots than we could by hand.</p><p>In 2001 we sowed our first round by simply tossing seeds from a boat. Our first test plots covered 28 acres of mud flats in waters 2 to 3 feet deep. Returning the following year, we saw new seedlings sprouting up.</p><p>Each year since then, the <a href="https://www.vims.edu/" target="_blank">Virginia Institute of Marine Science</a> and the <a href="https://www.nature.org/en-us/about-us/where-we-work/united-states/virginia/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Nature Conservancy's Virginia Coast Reserve</a>, along with staff and students from the <a href="https://www.vcrlter.virginia.edu/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">University of Virginia</a>, have led a team of scientists and citizens to collect and seed a combined 536 acres of bare bottom in several coastal bays.</p><p>These initial plots took off and rapidly expanded. By 2020 they covered 9,600 acres across four bays. Several factors helped them flourish. These bays are naturally flushed with cool, clean water from the Atlantic Ocean. And they lie off the tip of Virginia's eastern shore, where there is little coastal development.</p><span style="display:block;position:relative;padding-top:56.25%;" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="a482c2146febd6782c99960c2b55feb8"><iframe lazy-loadable="true" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/K9NyfPLINtk?rel=0" width="100%" height="auto" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" style="position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;"></iframe></span>
Sheltering Marine Life and Storing Carbon
<p>Since eelgrass disappeared from these bays in the 1930s, human understanding of seagrass ecosystems has evolved. Today people don't pack their walls full of seagrass insulation but instead value different services they provide, such as habitat for fish and shellfish – including many <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/conl.12645" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">commercially and recreationally important species</a>.</p><p>Scientists and government agencies also have recognized the importance of coastal systems in capturing and storing so-called "<a href="https://oceanservice.noaa.gov/facts/bluecarbon.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">blue carbon</a>." In fact, we now know that seagrasses constitute a globally significant <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/ngeo1477" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">carbon sink</a>. They are a key tool for reducing carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-64094-1" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">slowing climate change</a></p><p>We are working to understand the valuable services that our restored seagrass beds provide. To our surprise, fish and invertebrates returned within only a few years as the meadows expanded. These organisms have established extensive food webs that include species ranging from tiny seahorses to 6-foot-long sandbar sharks.<br></p><p>Other benefits were equally dramatic. Water in the bays become clearer as the seagrass canopy trapped floating particles and deposited them onto the bottom, burying significant stocks of carbon and nitrogen in sediments bound by the grasses' roots. Our research is the first to verify the overall net carbon captured by seagrass, and is now being used to issue carbon offset credits that in turn <a href="https://vaseagrant.org/eelgrass-carbon-credits/" target="_blank">create more funds for restoration</a>.</p><p>One big question was whether restoring seagrasses could make it possible to bring back bay scallops, which once generated millions of dollars for the local economy. Since bay scallops no longer existed in Virginia, we obtained broodstock from North Carolina, which we have <a href="https://chesapeakebaymagazine.com/return-of-the-bay-scallop/" target="_blank">reared and released annually</a> since 2013. Regular surveys now reveal a growing population of bay scallops in the restored eelgrass, although there is still some way to go before they reach levels seen in the 1930s.</p><img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yNDU1MDY1MC9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYxMzMxNzUzNH0.tII25nbyaHUi_ZR7shYI3A0gRKXqiMXfWiGo7NoQqAQ/img.jpg?width=980" id="45d22" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="b11b8921618fba089de4b72472cd8d91" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" />
Restored seagrass beds (dark areas) along Virginia's Atlantic coast, with sunlight reflecting from a small island. Jonathan Lefcheck, CC BY-ND
A Model for Coastal Restoration
<p>Repairing damaged ecosystems is such an urgent mission worldwide that the United Nations has designated 2021-2030 as the <a href="https://www.decadeonrestoration.org/" target="_blank">U.N. Decade on Ecosystem Restoration</a>. We see the success we have achieved with eelgrass restoration as a prime model for similar efforts in coastal areas around the world.</p><p>Our project focused not only on reviving this essential habitat, but also on charting how restoring seagrasses affected the ecosystem and on the co-restoration of bay scallops. It provides a road map for involving scholars, nonprofits organizations, citizens and government agencies in an ecological mission where they can see the results of their work.</p><p>Recent assessments show that the restored zone only covers about 30% of the total habitable bottom in our project area. With continued support, eelgrass – and the many benefits it provides – may continue to thrive and expand well into the 21st century.</p>
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Landmark legislation aims to address the ocean impacts of human-caused global heating and reform federal ocean management. ToryYu1989 / PxHere / CC0
By Jessica Corbett
Leaders of climate and conservation groups on Tuesday welcomed House Democrats' introduction of landmark legislation that aims to address the ocean impacts of human-caused global heating and reform federal ocean management—recognizing that, as Rep. Raúl M. Grijalva put it, "a healthy ocean is key to fighting the climate crisis."
<p><br/></p>
<p>The Arizona Democrat, who chairs the House Natural Resources Committee, unveiled the <a href="https://naturalresources.house.gov/imo/media/doc/OCSA20_001_xml.pdf" target="_blank">Ocean-Based Climate Solutions Act</a> during a <a href="https://naturalresources.house.gov/media/media-advisories/chair-grijalva-chair-castor-group-of-endorsers-will-unveil-ocean-based-climate-solutions-act-at-oct-20-press-conference" target="_blank">virtual press conference</a>. He was joined at the event by co-sponsors—including Rep. Kathy Castor (D-Fla.), chair of the House Select Committee on the Climate Crisis—and various backers of the legislation.</p><p>"This is the bill we have been waiting for," declared Oregon State University professor Jane Lubchenco, a supporter of the measure with a background in federal government. "It draws on the latest science to tap the treasure-trove of ocean solutions to accelerate progress on climate change. The outcome? People win, the economy wins, nature wins."</p><p>"The ocean feeds and sustains, it connects us. The ocean is our past and our future. The ocean has indeed been a victim of climate change, but it also holds powerful solutions," added Lubchenco, former administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and U.S. Science Envoy for the Ocean at the State Department. "This bill will tap those solutions, and everyone benefits."</p>
<div id="a858f" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="99d487bc34e6e570edd2a3089e616347"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1318606309256798208" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">🎥 We're live! @NRDems, @RepRaulGrijalva, and @USRepKCastor are unveiling #OceanClimateAction legislation. W… https://t.co/pPdylA6cKQ</div> — Select Committee on the Climate Crisis (@Select Committee on the Climate Crisis)<a href="https://twitter.com/ClimateCrisis/statuses/1318606309256798208">1603215217.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p>"This bill provides a roadmap for ocean and coastal climate resilience, and responsibly uses them to curb the pollution that is intensifying the climate crisis," Grijalva explained. "We must stop the ongoing damage to our oceans to protect the food, jobs, and coastlines that millions of Americans depend on. A healthy ocean is an environmental justice issue and we made sure to put protections for low income and communities of color at the front and center."</p><p>Specifically, as a statement from Grijalva's office outlined, the bill aims to:</p><ul><li>Reduce greenhouse gas emissions;</li><li>Increase carbon storage in blue carbon ecosystems;</li><li>Promote coastal resiliency and adaptation;</li><li>Improve ocean protection;</li><li>Support climate-ready fisheries</li><li>Tackle ocean health challenges; and</li><li>Restore U.S. leadership in international ocean governance.</li></ul>
<p>"By presenting smart, focused solutions to the climate crisis, this pioneering legislation propels the oceans into the heart of the climate debate in Congress," said Jacqueline Savitz, Oceana's chief policy officer for North America. "The oceans are bearing the brunt of global warming: rising ocean temperatures will decrease fish catch, endangering livelihoods and undermining food security. This bill shows us our oceans can be part of the answer."</p><p>Castor on Tuesday emphasized that "the ocean is a powerful ally in the climate fight, and unleashing its potential will help us reach our goal of net-zero emissions by 2050 or earlier." She noted the new bill incorporates recommendations from the Climate Crisis Action Plan that her committee <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/06/30/genocidal-negligence-new-democratic-climate-action-plan-criticized-woefully" target="_blank">released</a> in June, which she said "gives Congress a roadmap for creating a healthier, more resilient, and more just America."</p><p>Climate action advocacy groups said when the plan from Castor's committee came out that it "is more ambitious than what we've seen from Democratic leadership to date" but also <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/06/30/genocidal-negligence-new-democratic-climate-action-plan-criticized-woefully" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">criticized</a> lawmakers' proposed goals as "genocidal negligence" and "wholly inadequate to prevent the risk of catastrophic climate disruption," vowing to maintain pressure on Democrats to pursue bolder policies.</p><p>Amid that ongoing pressure from advocates comes the Ocean-Based Climate Solutions Act, which Castor said "will unleash the incredible power of the ocean and address the threat that offshore drilling poses to America's coastal communities, including my own community in the Tampa Bay."</p><p>Miyoko Sakashita, oceans program director at the Center for Biological Diversity, <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/newswire/2020/10/20/ocean-based-climate-solutions-act-would-end-offshore-oil-leasing-protect-marine" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">called</a> the bill "important" and praised particular elements of it. "As sea-level rises we have to end offshore oil drilling and help our coastal communities transition to the resilient, clean energy economy we all need," Sakashita said. "This bill also aims to protect marine mammals from ship strikes, noise pollution, and climate change."</p>
<div id="17f05" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="28d7040a5dd41c4d26fed8e93a225655"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1318614724842524674" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">.@RepRaulGrijalva’s climate bill will ignite #OceanClimateAction to help fight inequality by prioritizing funding f… https://t.co/oeH1W214em</div> — NRDC 🌎🏡 (@NRDC 🌎🏡)<a href="https://twitter.com/NRDC/statuses/1318614724842524674">1603217223.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p>The bill, which is co-sponsored by leaders of multiple relevant House committees, was also applauded by other advocacy organizations, including the Center for American Progress, Earthjustice, Environment America, Greenpeace USA, League of Conservation Voters, National Ocean Protection Coalition, National Resources Defense Council (NRDC), Ocean Conservancy, Surfrider Foundation, and Urban Ocean Lab.</p><p>"Resilient communities need resilient oceans, and the Ocean Climate Solutions Act pursues both," said Steve Mashuda, oceans managing attorney at Earthjustice. "Restoring and protecting our ocean ecosystems will protect the frontline communities who are most at risk from climate change, while increasing our capacity to secure a just, stable, and biodiverse future.</p><p>"Earthjustice thanks the House Natural Resources Committee for continuing to serve the American people by strengthening and stewarding our environment," added Mashuda, "and we look forward to turning these concepts into reality."</p><p>Greenpeace USA senior oceans campaigner Arlo Hemphill warned that "protecting 30% of our oceans by 2030 is critical if we hope to restore America's rich ocean ecosystems and mitigate the worst impacts of climate change."</p><p>"The Ocean-Based Climate Solutions Act outlines an innovative and ambitious plan to couple this ocean protection with a new generation of Blue Economy jobs and a renewed, climate-ready vision for our nation's fisheries," he said. "This is an inspiring piece of legislation, and exactly what America needs right now."</p>
<p><em>Reposted with permission from <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/10/20/advocates-welcome-inspiring-ocean-based-climate-solutions-act-exactly-what-america" target="_blank">Common Dreams</a>.</em></p>From Your Site Articles
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Fish exposed to endocrine-disrupting compounds, like this inland silverside fish, can pass on health problems to future generations. Bill Stagnaro / Wikimedia Commons / CC by 3.0
By Brian Bienkowski
Fish exposed to endocrine-disrupting compounds pass on health problems to future generations, including deformities, reduced survival, and reproductive problems, according to a new study.
<p>The study, published in<a href="https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.est.0c02892" target="_blank"> <em>Environmental Science and Technology</em></a>, is the first of its kind in a fish that can live in freshwater, brackish water or salt water, and suggests that compounds in pesticides and birth control that pollute waterways are not only harming fish living there now, but their offspring and the subsequent generation as well.</p><p>The results are troublesome as the negative effects seen in fish offspring—including reduced survival and reproduction problems—could lead to population level declines over time.</p><p>"These effects can carry over into indirectly exposed fish and those not exposed at all," Bethany DeCourten, lead author of the study and a postdoctoral consultant at the University of California Davis' Department of Anatomy, Physiology and Cell Biology, told EHN.</p><p>The research offers the latest evidence of the deeply embedded biological problems for humans and animals exposed to endocrine-disrupting chemicals—which mimic natural hormones—that are pervasive in our environment.</p><p>"These findings suggest that single-generation toxicity testing may not be adequate to determine the effects of these chemicals on long-term population viability," the authors wrote.</p>
Low Levels Lead to Generational Impacts
<p>Researchers exposed inland silverside fish to bifenthrin, levonorgestrel, ethinylestradiol, and trenbolone to levels currently found in waterways.</p><p>"Our concentrations were actually on the low end" of what is found in the wild, DeCourten said, adding that it was low amounts of chemicals in parts per trillion.</p><p>Bifenthrin is a pesticide; levonorgestrel and ethinylestradiol are synthetic hormones used in birth controls; and trenbolone is a synthetic steroid often given to cattle to bulk them up.</p><p>Such endocrine-disruptors have already been linked to a variety of health problems in directly exposed fish including altered growth, reduced survival, lowered egg production, skewed sex ratios, and negative impacts to immune systems. But what remains less clear is how the exposure may impact future generations.</p><p>For their study, DeCourten and colleagues started the exposure when the fish were embryos and continued it for 21 days.</p><p>They then tracked effects on the exposed fish, and the next two generations.</p><p>They found:</p><ul><li>The exposed fish had impacted gene expression and DNA methylation, increased deformities, and decreased egg production;</li><li>The first generation, which was indirectly exposed within their parents, had reduced hatching success, and deformities in developing larvae;</li><li>And the second generation, which had no exposure, had the largest decrease in survival rates, and altered DNA methylation.</li></ul><p>In looking at two subsequent generations, the study roughly corresponds to three years in the wild, DeCourten said. "We saw impacts on survival in the second generation," she said. "This definitely could impact populations as a whole. Right now, we just don't really have an idea of exactly what that could mean for wild populations."</p><p>Senior author of the study Susanne Brander said it's reasonable to think that other fish species would be similarly impacted, especially other estuary and marine fish, as the salt content in water can change the way fish respond to different stressors, including pollution.</p><p>Brander, an assistant professor at Oregon State University, has been working with inland silverside fish for a little more than a decade.</p><p>In addition to her work, the silverside has been used for decades in wastewater effluent testing across the country.<br></p><p>It's a "model organism for estuary and marine and coastal habitats," she told EHN.</p>
Inherited Problems
<p>DeCourten said the altered DNA methylation is one of the plausible ways that future generations would experience health impacts from previous generations' exposure. Hormone-disrupting compounds have been shown to impact DNA methylation, which is an important marker of how an organism will develop.</p><p>"Methyl groups are added to specific sites on the genome, [the exposure] is not changing the genome itself, but rather how the genome is expressed," she said. "And that can be inherited throughout generations."</p><p>In addition, Brander said there are essentially different "tags" that exist on DNA molecules, which tell genes how to turn on and off. She said the exposure to different compounds may be "influencing which methyl tags get taken on or off as you proceed through generations."</p><p>The researchers said the study should prompt future toxics testing to consider impacts on future generations.</p><p>"The results … throw a wrench in the current approach to regulating chemicals, where it's often short-term testing looking at simple things like growth, survival, and maybe gene expression," Brander said.</p><p>"These findings are telling us we really at least need to consider" the next two generations, she added.</p>From Your Site Articles
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Study Finds Synthetic Clothes Contributed 4,000 Metric Tons of Plastic Microfibers in California
19 October
Climate
These microfibers, smaller than five millimeters, are shed when synthetic clothes are washed. Cris Cantón / Getty Images
A new study from the University of California at Santa Barbara has found that synthetic clothes released about 4,000 metric tons of plastic microfibers into California's environment in 2019.
<p><br/></p>
<p>For context, that's about 80 million plastic rubber ducks in California, or 130,000 times as many stars as there are in the Milky Way galaxy, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/oct/16/plastic-waste-microfibers-california-study" target="_blank">The Guardian</a> reported. The Guardian received exclusive access to this study, although it has not been peer-reviewed or published.</p><p>These microfibers, smaller than five millimeters, are shed when synthetic clothes are washed, including "yoga pants, stretchy jeans and fleece jackets" the Guardian reported.</p><p>To determine how many microfibers are shed in a given year, researchers calculated how many synthetic materials consumers bought with how many loads of laundry people did. The data also calculated how many microfibers were released in each wash. Researchers combined those numbers with public data on sludge and wastewater management in California to reach 4,000 metric tons. These microfibers then make their way into the state's water and land, The Guardian reported.</p>
<p>Those numbers might alarm consumers. According to <a href="https://nypost.com/2020/10/17/study-finds-huge-pollution-from-microfibers-in-californias-oceans/amp/" target="_blank">The New York Post</a>, a recent study in <em><a href="https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0194970" target="_blank">PLoS One</a></em> found that the average person inadvertently consumes more than 5,800 microfiber particles — every year.</p><p>While wastewater plants have the ability to prevent microfibers from entering waterways, they are ultimately delaying the process. Wastewater treatment facilities tend to combine what they capture with treated sewage, which is eventually spread on agricultural fields. The microfibers then run off back into the waterways, The Guardian reported.</p><p>"So we're changing it from an ocean problem to a land problem," Roland Geyer, an industrial ecologist at UC Santa Barbara who collaborated on the report, told The Guardian. "Rather than removing the fibers, we've just moved their location."</p>
<p>Studies that quantify microplastics in the environment help play a vital role in regulating them. For example, <a href="https://www.politico.com/states/california/story/2020/06/16/california-becomes-first-state-to-define-microplastics-in-water-1293744" target="_blank">Politico</a> reported that California's State Water Resources Control Board recently approved a decision to make it the first state to define microplastics. The board will propose testing methods by July 2021; it will require water suppliers to report their microplastic levels for four years once a testing protocol is agreed upon.</p><p>Global production of synthetic fibers around the world is predicted to triple by 2050, The New York Post reported.</p>
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A man carries a plastic shopping plastic bag as he walks along Times Square in New York City on April 2, 2019. Eduardo MunozAlvarez / VIEWpress / Corbis via Getty Images
New York is finally bagging plastic bags.
The statewide ban on the highly polluting items actually went into effect March 1. But enforcement, which was supposed to start a month later, was delayed by the one-two punch of a lawsuit and the coronavirus pandemic, NY1 reported. Now, more than six months later, enforcement is set to begin Monday.
<p>"New York's bag ban has already improved New York's health by cutting down on <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/plastic-pollution" target="_self">plastic pollution</a>," <a href="https://eany.org/" target="_blank">Environmental Advocates NY</a> deputy director Kate Kurera told <a href="https://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/new-york-begins-enforcing-plastic-bag-ban-on-monday/2675687/" target="_blank">NBC4 New York</a>. "We look forward to the State beginning enforcement and stores complying with this important law."</p><p>The new law prohibits most stores from giving out thin <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/plastics" target="_self">plastic</a> shopping bags. They can dispense paper bags, for which counties have the option of charging a five cent fee. Any business caught handing out the banned plastic bags will face a fine, according to NY1.</p>
<p>The law offers exceptions for takeout orders and bags used to wrap meat or prepared food, according to NBC4 New York. Families who use food stamps will also not have to pay the fee for paper bags.</p><p>Enforcement of the ban was held back in part by the coronavirus pandemic, as several stores actually banned shoppers from bringing their own reusable bags when the spread of COVID-19 was at its height in the state.</p><p>But the new law has also faced fierce opposition from plastic bag makers and convenience store owners, who brought a lawsuit challenging it.</p>
<p>These groups have argued that the ban will bankrupt them. American Recyclable Plastic Bag Alliance director Zachary Taylor told <a href="https://apnews.com/article/d16e172627519780ced6767937ee0954" target="_blank">The Associated Press</a> that the law was "unworkable" and it would be harder for smaller stores to acquire paper bags during the pandemic.</p><p>However, a judge upheld most of the new regulation in August. The only part he struck down was a piece of the regulation allowing stores to provide customers reusable plastic bags if they were at least 10 millimeters thick, because he argued that exception was not part of the language of the original law as passed by the legislature. Some environmentalists had worried this part of the regulation would allow stores to get away with offering thicker bags.</p>
<p><br>"The Court's decision is a victory and a vindication of New York State's efforts to end the scourge of single-use plastic bags and a direct rebuke to the plastic bag manufacturers who tried to stop the law and DEC's regulations to implement it," Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) Commissioner Basil Seggos told <a href="https://abc7ny.com/plastic-bags-ny-ban-new-york-coronavirus-pandemic/7136479/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">ABC7</a>. "As we have for many months, DEC is encouraging New Yorkers to make the switch to reusable bags whenever and wherever they shop and to use common-sense precautions to keep reusable bags clean."</p><p>Some bag makers and store owners are still trying to delay the ban in court, but not all retailers are against the new law.</p><p>"Supporting the no plastic bag ban is one way for us to support a positive change in our world," Bronx Bodega owner Badr Alsaidi told NY1. "Plastic in general is one huge cause of <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/climate-change/" target="_self">climate change</a>. This is one way for us to step in with <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/recycling" target="_self">recycling</a>."</p><p>New Yorkers currently use around 23 billion plastic bags a year, but only use each bag for an average of 12 minutes, according to DEC figures reported by ABC7. Around 85 percent of those bags end up in landfills, recycling machines, streets or <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/rivers" target="_self">rivers</a> and <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/oceans" target="_self">oceans</a>.</p>
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A flooded shop is seen next to Rodanthe Sound as Hurricane Dorian hits Cape Hatteras in North Carolina on September 6, 2019. Jose Luis Magana / AFP / Getty Images
North Carolina's Outer Banks are dotted with vacation beaches and historic communities. But the sweeping water views do not only draw tourists. They give locals a front row seat to sea-level rise.
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<p>Many, like Jamie Anderson, face more frequent floods. Anderson is the owner of <a target="_blank" href="https://www.duckscottage.com/about-us">Downtown Books</a> on Roanoke Island. Since she opened the store there eight years ago, it's flooded six times, with anywhere from an inch to two feet of water.</p><p>Sometimes storms are the cause, and other times all it takes is wind and a high tide.</p><p>"No rain, no hurricane, but water's an inch deep in my store," Anderson says.</p><p>To protect her inventory, Anderson keeps books off the floor.</p>
<p>"We use lots of tables and don't do anything to the floor," she says. "We just kind of paint it with floor paint every couple of years because it's going to get wet, so there's no point having any carpet down there."</p><p>Before big storms, she has what she calls "moving parties" where volunteers help her put everything up higher than three feet. And she packs up valuable items so she can take them with her.</p><p>Despite the hassle, Anderson plans to stay put. She says she'd lose customers if she moved.</p><p>"We're going to tough it out and continue to be there," she says. "And it's just kind of part of our story."</p>
<p class=""><em>Reposted with permission from <a href="https://yaleclimateconnections.org/2020/10/what-its-like-to-own-a-small-business-on-front-line-of-sea-level-rise/" target="_blank">Yale Climate Connections</a>.</em></p>
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3 Major UK Retailers Are Banning Glitter This Christmas Over Environmental Concerns
16 October
Business
The UK retailer John Lewis store in Sloane Square, London during Christmas of 2009. William Hook / CC BY-SA 2.0
Glitter may add sparkle to the holiday season, but its afterlife is decidedly less shiny.
<p>The festive coating and arts-and-crafts staple is actually another type of <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/microplastics" target="_self">microplastic</a> — those pesky <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/plastics" target="_self">plastics</a> five millimeters or less in diameter that end up everywhere from <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/plastic-pollution-arctic-snow-ice-2639834233.html" target="_self">Arctic ice</a> to the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/shark-plastic-stomach-2646956951.html" target="_self">bellies of sharks</a>.</p><p>"Glitter might look lovely but, because it's plastic, it sticks around long after the sparkle has gone – often in the stomachs of fish and birds," campaigner David Innes told <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/mar/24/glitter-sales-ban-supermarkets-microplastics?CMP=fb_gu" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">The Guardian</a> in 2019.</p><p>That's why three major UK retailers have decided to eliminate glitter from their Christmas merchandise this year. Morrisons, Waitrose and John Lewis have all announced that their store brand holiday products will be glitter free for 2020, <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-54545428" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">BBC News reported</a>.</p>
<p>Morrisons <a href="https://www.morrisons-corporate.com/media-centre/corporate-news/morrisons-goes-completely-glitter-free/" target="_blank">said in a statement</a> it had gotten rid of glitter on all of its greeting cards, wrapping paper, florist items and all other seasonal products. The policy will remain in place through the new year for store brand cards and gift bags. In addition, the store also pledged to remove single-use plastic toys from its Christmas crackers and reduce plastic wrap on cards and other decorations.</p><p>"Every time a cracker is pulled, or a card is opened, plastics have been used ... but just the once. So, we've taken glitter and plastic out of our festive range this year – so that our customers can enjoy their festivities without worrying about the environmental impact," Morrisons home director Christine Bryce said in a statement. "This means that we're now 100 percent glitter free across all our own brand ranges which is an important step in the fight against <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/plastic-pollution" target="_self">plastic pollution</a>."</p>
<p>John Lewis and Waitrose are also excising glitter from their seasonal products.</p><p>"All own-brand cards, crackers, wrapping paper, gift bags are now 100% glitter-free," the stores said in a statement reported by BBC News.</p><p>The movement against glitter has been growing alongside awareness of the dangers of microplastics. Waitrose is <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/glitter-ban-2623422922.html" target="_self">following up on a pledge</a> it first made two years ago to phase out holiday glitter by 2020. At the time, it was the first major UK retailer to set this goal.</p><p>Other UK stores are working to reduce glitter and other plastics this holiday season, BBC News reported. The pharmacy chain Boots will stop wrapping Christmas presents in single-use plastic packaging; supermarket Tesco will only use edible glitter; and supermarket Sainsbury's is eliminating glitter from cards, wrapping paper and gift bags and reducing it for decorations, crackers and festive bouquets.</p>
<p>The retailers' moves follow public demand. Boots said searches for ecologically-friendly products on its website had increased by nearly a third in a year. And Innes was part of a group behind a March 2019 petition asking the UK government to ban glitter altogether, <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/glitter-waitrose-morrissons-john-lewis-christmas-b1041490.html" target="_blank">The Independent reported</a>.</p><p>The anti-glitter campaign has not caught on across the pond, however, according to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/15/business/glitter-ban-christmas.html" target="_blank">The New York Times</a>. Major U.S. companies like Walmart, Target, Walgreens, CVS and Costco did not return requests for comment on whether they were working to reduce the glitter on their holiday merchandise this year. The <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/epa" target="_self">U.S. Environmental Protection Agency</a> also did not respond to a request for comment on whether there was any momentum for a U.S. glitter ban or what impact such a ban would have.</p><p>Independent scientists said the answer was unclear. On the one hand, it is possible that glitter's sparkle comes from metal or other harmful additives above and beyond what is contained in the average microplastic, Robert C. Hale, a professor at the Virginia Institute of Marine Science at the College of William & Mary, told The New York Times. On the other hand, glitter accounts for much less than one percent of the microplastics in the environment, which usually slough off larger plastics or synthetic fabrics.</p>
<p>National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Marine Debris Division chief scientist Amy V. Uhrin said that glitter was only one of many microplastic pollutants, but did say that certain studies had found large concentrations of glitter in soils or in wastewater sludge.</p><p>"It is difficult to say what impact a glitter ban would have," she told The New York Times.</p><p>Back in the UK, environmentalists said the Christmas glitter bans were a step in the right direction, but that the UK government ultimately needed to eliminate single-use plastic altogether.</p>"[W]e must go much further to end the scourge of plastic pollution," <a href="https://friendsoftheearth.uk/" target="_blank">Friends of the Earth</a> campaigner Tony Bosworth told BBC News.
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A humpback whale is seen in the Santa Barbara Channel of California. Gregory "Slobirdr" Smith / Wikimedia Commons / CC by 2.0
By Tara Lohan
A blue whale can weigh as much as 200 tons and consume 12,000 pounds of krill in a single day. But even the largest animal on Earth doesn't stand a chance against a fast-moving cargo ship.
<p><br/></p>
<p>Collisions between whales and shipping vessels are especially prevalent in areas where whale habitat overlaps with busy port traffic, such as the Santa Barbara Channel. This 70-mile stretch of water between mainland California and the Northern Channel Islands is a thoroughfare for thousands of cargo ships going to and from the busy ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles. It's also a hotspot for endangered and threatened whales.</p><p>The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has instituted voluntary slow-speed zones, but whale-ship strikes have still been on the rise for the past few years.</p><p>To reverse that trend, a group of scientists from all over the country have collaborated on a new project spearheaded by U.C. Santa Barbara's Benioff Ocean Initiative. <a href="https://whalesafe.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Whale Safe</a>, a technology-based mapping and analysis tool, provides near real-time data on whale activity in the Santa Barbara Channel in the hope of reducing fatal whale-ship collisions.</p><p>We spoke to Morgan Visalli, the science lead at the Benioff Ocean Initiative, about how the technology works and what the public can do to help hold shipping companies accountable.</p>
<p><strong>Why is something like Whale Safe needed?</strong></p><p>Many whale species thankfully are recovering from the days of intensive whaling, when they were hunted to the brink of extinction. But now they're facing other threats from ship strikes and fishing gear entanglements.</p><p>The Santa Barbara Channel, where we've launched Whale Safe, is a really important feeding ground for blue, humpback and fin whales — all species that are either endangered or threatened. Those three species are the ones that we're focusing on with this first launch of the project.</p><p>The past two years were some of the worst on record for ship strikes off the West Coast of the United States. Even worse, the number that we actually see recorded in the data is likely a small percentage of the actual number of ship strikes that occurred.</p><p>Scientists estimate that only about 5% to 17% of whale carcasses are actually observed and recorded. So if we see 13 whale carcasses that wash up on the beach, as was the case last year on the West Coast of the United States, it's likely that that could actually be closer to 130 ship strikes that occurred.</p>
<p><strong>What's the best way to reduce or eliminate whale-ship collisions?</strong></p><p>One way to address this issue is to separate ships and whales. In some places it's possible to actually move shipping lanes away from areas of known whale concentrations, which can help reduce the risk of these strikes happening.</p><p>In the Santa Barbara Channel in 2013 they did move the shipping lanes one mile away from an area that is a known blue whale feeding hotspot. But unfortunately, the Santa Barbara Channel is a constrained waterway, and so there's really not too much more that can be moved. The next best option is slowing down.</p><p>Studies have shown that when ships slow down it reduces the probability of a strike happening by potentially giving the whale a bit more time to respond. And we've also found that slower speeds can reduce the lethality of the strikes.</p><p><strong>How does Whale Safe work to try and alert ship captains to whales in the area?</strong></p>
<img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yNDUxNzY5OS9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYwNDUxNzIyNX0.5lEEQXk8qwUwc4dQEm5FuGyx7OBOx4TBsEoEQxuDtT0/img.jpg?width=980" id="e6b74" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="48e171670d9ac552374520f0d37fcaec" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" />
1. Acoustic monitoring instruments identify whale vocalizations. 2. Observers record whale sightings with a mobile app. 3. Oceanographic data is used to predict where blue whales are likely to be. 4. The data streams are compiled and validated. 5. Whale information is disseminated to industry, managers and the public. Nicolle R. Fuller, Sayo Studio
<p><span style="background-color: initial;">There are three main components.</span><br></p><p>One is an acoustic listening station. Out in the Santa Barbara channel, our collaborators at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and Texas A&M University at Galveston deployed an acoustic buoy that has an underwater microphone near the seafloor. There's a small computer that processes any audio that the microphone picks up.</p><p>It is able to automatically detect the calls of blue, humpback and fin whales. Then there's a surface buoy with a satellite transmitter that sends that information back to shore. It's then validated by a scientist on shore before it's added to the database.</p><p>Then the second piece is a blue whale habitat model. We use oceanographic data like sea-surface temperature and current to predict where blue whales are likely to be on any given day. That was developed by our collaborators at U.C. Santa Cruz, the University of Washington and NOAA Southwest Fishery Science Center.</p><p>It's a dynamic model that's running every day in an automated fashion and producing maps that show us blue whale hotspots.</p><p>The third piece is data gathered by community scientists who are out on whale-watching and tourism boats nearly every day. They use mobile apps such as <a href="http://www.whalealert.org/" target="_blank">WhaleAlert</a> and <a href="http://whaleaware.org/index.php?page=download-spotter" target="_blank">Spotter Pro</a> to record whale sightings that are also added to the database.</p><p><strong></strong><strong>I know you've just launched this database, but what are you hearing from people in the shipping industry that may be using it or want to use it?</strong></p><p>We did some interviews as we were building the system to get information from industry in terms of what information would be most helpful, how frequently they would like to receive data and what pathway they would like to receive data through.</p><p>Now we're working on building those relationships, making sure everybody knows that this information is available and also getting more feedback so we can continue to improve the system and tailor the data feeds to fit the needs of different folks within the industry.</p><p>One kind of communication pathway that could be really exciting to implement is getting the whale information piped into the charting system on the ship through the automatic identification system (AIS). It's the navigation and collision avoidance system that all of these large ships have on board.</p>
<img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yNDUxNzcwNC9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY2MTg0OTM2OX0.V_zkkwXuavZrUX5cyT3Mih7BgqARMButjo0HpBcii_E/img.jpg?width=980" id="617aa" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="f30407783bbe5b3171e17e582e9223e7" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" />
Deploying the acoustic detection system in the Santa Barbara Channel near the shipping lanes in 2019. Benioff Ocean Initiative
<p>There are quite a few challenges, both on the technological side and just the bureaucratic side, of actually getting the data delivered that way. It's their main safety and navigation tool, so you don't want it to be crowded with too much data and information. That would need to be done really thoughtfully. But that's a communication pathway that could really help get this data more easily adopted.</p><p><strong></strong><strong>Right now there are voluntary slow-speed zones, but some ships aren't abiding by those recommendations. How likely do you think they'd be to adopt technology like Whale Safe?</strong></p><p>A few years ago there was actually a NOAA-led working group that brought together many stakeholders to try to develop solutions. One of the recommendations that came out of that process was actually a call for new technology and more real-time data on whale activity. And that was supported by many members of the shipping industry that were part of that working group.</p><p>That helped to inform the approach that we decided to take. Some of these companies expressed that time is money, and if they're going to slow down, they want to make sure that they're slowing down because there are actually whales in the area.</p><p>Our hope is that this data can really help to reinforce those slow-speed zones, especially when there's high whale activity in the channel.</p><p><strong></strong><strong>Whale Safe also provides data on how well companies are abiding by the slow-speed zones. But many of these shipping companies aren't consumer-facing, so how can this information be used by the public to pressure companies to make changes?</strong></p><p>Big companies like Walmart, Target and Home Depot import a lot of stuff and use these shipping companies quite often. We're starting to have conversations with some of those retailers that are more public facing to see if there's information about whale safety that could be helpful for them as they're doing their planning around their sustainability portfolios.</p><p>And from the public standpoint, the more general awareness there is about the problem of whale-ship collisions, the more it helps public-facing companies know that this is something that they should prioritize in their sustainability planning.</p><p>We want people to know that whales are really important for global biodiversity and also as ecosystem engineers that help stabilize the food web. Whales are also important for coastal economies through whale watching and other tourism businesses. And they can help mitigate climate change. <a href="https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/fandd/2019/12/natures-solution-to-climate-change-chami.htm" target="_blank">Studies have shown</a> that they can actually help to pull carbon out of the atmosphere.</p><p>Besides whales being incredible creatures deserving of protection in their own right, there are multiple benefits that we see from keeping these populations strong and healthy in our global ocean.</p>
<p><a href="https://therevelator.org/author/taralohan/" target="_blank"><em>Tara Lohan </em></a><em>is deputy editor of The Revelator and has worked for more than a decade as a digital editor and environmental journalist focused on the intersections of energy, water and climate. Her work has been published by The Nation, American Prospect, High Country News, Grist, Pacific Standard and others. She is the editor of two books on the global water crisis. </em></p><p><em>Reposted with permission from <a href="https://therevelator.org/whale-safe/" target="_blank">The Revelator.</a> </em></p>
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The Climate Crisis Has Already Cost the Great Barrier Reef More Than Half Its Corals
14 October
Oceans
The Great Barrier Reef has lost more than 50 percent of its coral in the last 25 years. Andreas Dietzel
The Great Barrier Reef has lost more than 50 percent of its coral in the last 25 years, and the climate crisis is to blame.
<p>Researchers from the <a href="https://www.coralcoe.org.au/" target="_blank">ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies</a> (CoralCoE) made an in-depth study of how coral communities and their colony sizes had changed between 1995 and 2017 along the entire length of the reef. The results, published in the <a href="https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rspb.2020.1432" target="_blank">Proceedings of the Royal Society B</a> Wednesday, sound an urgent call for climate action.</p><p>"There is no time to lose — we must sharply decrease greenhouse gas emissions ASAP," the researchers <a href="https://www.coralcoe.org.au/media-releases/the-great-barrier-reef-has-lost-half-its-corals" target="_blank">said in a CoralCoE press release</a>.</p>
<p>The researchers found a decline in every size and species of coral in both shallow and deep water. The corals were especially devastated by <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/great-barrier-reef-coral-bleaching-2353658528.html" target="_self">back-to-back bleaching events in 2016 and 2017</a>, study author and James Cook University professor Terry Hughes told <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/oct/14/great-barrier-reef-corals-have-more-than-halved-in-past-25-years-study-shows" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">The Guardian</a>.</p><p>While all the corals were impacted, these bleaching events took an especially heavy toll on branching and table-shaped corals, Hughes said in the press release. This is a big deal because these architectural corals provide habitats for <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/fish" target="_self">fish</a>. Without them, fisheries decline.</p><p>"The reef is flatter and less three dimensional now," Hughes told The Guardian.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/coral-bleaching" target="_self">Coral bleaching</a>, which <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/great-barrier-reef-ecological-memory-2623045702.html" target="_self">occurs</a> when hot water temperatures drive the algae that gives corals food and color from their homes, also struck the southern part of the reef at the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/coral-bleaching-great-barrier-reef-2645576557.html" target="_self">beginning of 2020</a>. This event was not included in the study, so the reef may be even more depleted than the researchers calculated.</p><p>The study's findings also have implications for the reef's ability to reproduce itself.</p><p>"A vibrant coral population has millions of small, baby corals, as well as many large ones — the big mamas who produce most of the larvae," lead author of CoralCoE Dr. Andy Dietzel said in the press release. "Our results show the ability of the Great Barrier Reef to recover — its resilience — is compromised compared to the past, because there are fewer babies, and fewer large breeding adults."</p>
<p>Bob Richmond, a research professor and director of the Kewalo Marine Laboratory at the University of Hawaii at Manoa who was not involved with the study, told <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2020/10/13/warming-has-killed-half-coral-great-barrier-reef-study-finds-it-might-never-recover/?utm_campaign=wp_main&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook&fbclid=IwAR2_x37PLr_SITwRm2VbrAgbOw3aqJPxPKbgnCZHX8kweHAe2g8Ngj6lw6Q" target="_blank">The Washington Post</a> he was impressed with the work and agreed the reef was in trouble.</p><p>"If I don't see one-year-old, two-year-old, three-year-old corals, I know that reef is dead," he said. "It just doesn't know it yet."</p><p>The Great Barrier Reef stretches almost 133,000 square miles, making it the largest <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/coral-reefs" target="_self">coral reef</a> in the world, <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/travel/article/great-barrier-reef-coral-loss-intl-scli-climate-scn/index.html" target="_blank">according to CNN</a>. It provides a habitat for more than 1,500 species of fish and 411 species of hard corals.</p><p>It is also hugely important for the economy of Australia, The Washington Post pointed out. It drew more than two million tourists every year before the pandemic. Despite this, Australia continues to be the world's top <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/coal" target="_self">coal</a> exporter.</p>
<p>Hughes explicitly called out Australia's pro-fossil fuel policies as a "profound policy-failure" for managing the reef on <a href="https://twitter.com/ProfTerryHughes/status/1316262459313803270" target="_blank">Twitter</a>. He said the only hope for the reef's survival was to limit global warming in line with the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/paris-agreement">Paris agreement</a>.</p><p>"There's not much time to lose," he told The Guardian. "I think if we can control warming somewhere between 1.5-2C [above pre-industrial levels], as per the Paris agreement, then we'll still have a reef. But if we get to 3-4C because of unrestrained emissions then we won't have a recognisable Great Barrier Reef."</p>
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'The Arctic Ocean Is Dying': Grim Conclusion as Biggest North Pole Mission Returns
12 October
Oceans
The Polarstern research vessel returns from a year-long drift across the Arctic on Oct. 12, 2020 in Bremerhaven, Germany. David Hecker / Getty Images
The largest Arctic research expedition in history returned to Germany Monday after 13 months in the Arctic, including several months with its ship deliberately trapped by sea ice, according to The New York Times.
<p>The mission aboard the German Alfred Wegener Institute's Polarstern ship spent the year gathering vital information that would give scientists a window into the future of the Arctic during the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/climate-crisis" target="_self">climate crisis</a>.</p><p>"We witnessed how the Arctic ocean is dying," said Markus Rex, the mission's leader, to <a href="https://www.france24.com/en/20201012-biggest-north-pole-mission-returns-from-dying-arctic" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Agence-France Presse</a> (AFP). "We saw this process right outside our windows, or when we walked on the brittle ice."</p><p>The team aboard the Polarstern comprised more than 300 hundred scientists from 20 countries, including the U.S., Britain, France, Russia and China. According to Rex, the dramatic consequences of a warming planet were evident in an area he described as "the epicenter of climate change," as AFP reported.</p>
<p>"We basically achieved everything we set out to do," Rex told <a href="https://apnews.com/article/virus-outbreak-climate-climate-change-bears-arctic-c992fcfc1468a570c93efebfafd2f4b7" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">The Associated Press</a> (AP) by satellite phone as the expedition left the polar circle last week. "We conducted measurements for a whole year with just a short break."</p><p>The trip to measure the ice and gauge conditions in one of the planet's harshest environments cost $177 million, according to the AP, and the mission almost had to be abandoned months early when the coronavirus was detected on the mission.</p><p>The researchers had to break away from the ice in May to get new supplies and to rotate team members in order to adhere to new coronavirus protocols, which upended the mission's carefully planned logistics.</p>
<p>"Who knew when we went up there that life was going to take such an astoundingly strange turn?" said <a href="https://www.whoi.edu/profile/cashjian/" target="_blank" title="">Carin Ashjian</a>, a biological oceanographer at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts, as The New York Times reported.</p><p>And yet, the expedition was able to stay the course and complete its research.</p><p>"We're bringing back a trove of data, along with countless samples of ice cores, snow and water," said Rex, an atmospheric scientist at Germany's Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Ocean Research, as the AP reported.</p>
<p>The observations of the crew reflect a grim future for the Arctic. Rex warned that if the current warming trend the planet is on continues, then soon the Arctic will see ice-free summer. He noted that in some areas that were once covered in ice, the crew was able to sail through open water stretching out as far as the eye could see, as AFP reported.</p><p>"At the North Pole itself, we found badly eroded, melted, thin and brittle ice," said Rex, according to AFP.</p><p>While the returning crew is optimistic that the trove of samples and data they brought home will paint a clearer picture of how the Arctic is changing, the results will take years, and maybe even decades, to sift through and analyze, according to Melinda Webster, a sea ice expert at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks, as the AP reported.</p><p>"We went above and beyond the data collection we set out to do," said Webster, according to the AP. The crew returned with 150 terabytes of data and more than 1,000 ice samples.</p><p>"This is an extremely exciting time to get into Arctic science because of the changes that are happening," Webster added. "We need to get all the help we can because it's important to understand what's going on and the more people help out, the better."</p><p>The scientists hope that the data will help them understand how floods, fires, storms and heatwaves will affect the Arctic over the next century, according to AFP. Rex said he hopes the data will be "a breakthrough in understanding the Arctic and climate system."</p>
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Rescuers assist beached long-fin pilot whales at Hamelin Bay, Australia on March 23, 2009. Tony Ashby / AFP / Getty Images
Alexander Freund
Pilot whales, sperm whales, beaked whales and deep-sea dolphins are the marine mammals most commonly involved in mass strandings. Baleen whales, on the other hand, a group to which all big whales except the sperm whale belong, strand very rarely.
<p>If these mammals become stranded, they can dry out, overheat, suffocate or suffer severe inner injuries because of their enormous dead weight.</p><p>Individual strandings have been observed at many locations, while most mass strandings have been registered in <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/australia-rescuers-save-100-whales-after-mass-stranding/a-55062181" target="_blank">Western Australia,</a> New Zealand (with up to 300 stranded whales annually), and on the east coast of North America and Patagonia (Chile). Occasionally, however, there are also mass strandings in the <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/iceland-tourists-find-50-pilot-whales-dead-on-beach/a-49662301" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">North Sea.</a></p>
How Do Whales and Dolphins Navigate?
<p>Like <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/the-science-of-migratory-birds/a-47812308" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">migratory birds,</a> some whale species travel great distances every year. In winter, whales migrate from the cold northern seas to warmer waters in the south, and whales from southern waters move to the north in the same season. Months later, they then begin to travel back home.</p><p>The smaller toothed whales, such as dolphins, have a powerful underwater sonar. They orient themselves on their journeys by emitting sound waves in the form of clicking noises. When these sound waves collide with an object, they are reflected back as echoes to the animals' ears, which in the case of whales are shielded from the skull in foam-filled chambers inside the body to enable spatial hearing. The faster the sound returns, the closer the prey, an obstacle or the coast.</p><p>However, in the case of the large baleen whales, which have horn plates (baleen) instead of teeth in their upper jaws for filtering krill, animal plankton and small fish from the water, this underwater sonar is not very highly developed.</p><p>This echolocation works very well as a rule. However, sound reflection does not function reliably in certain circumstances, particularly when there are shallow or semicircular bays, sandy underwater embankments or silt banks. These types of coasts and obstacles do not produce an unambiguous echo from any particular direction, so the warning system fails.</p>What Influence Does the Earth's Magnetic Field Have?
<p>Whales such as the pilot whale do not use just underwater sonar to orient themselves, but — again, like migratory birds — seem to rely on the lines of the earth's magnetic field, as their migration routes often run parallel to those lines. The slight fluctuations of the earth's magnetic field appear to function like a kind of map.</p><p>Magnetite crystals have been found in the skulls of these animals. The whales could be confused by disturbances of the geomagnetic field near the coast. Magnetic fields running perpendicular to the mainland are also thought to play a role in mass strandings of whales in certain coastal regions.</p><p>Every few years, solar storms and sunspots that occur amid heightened activity on the sun's surface also cause fairly large changes in the Earth's magnetic field. It is at such times that sperm whales, for example, which also use geomagnetism as a natural navigation system, get lost and become stranded in the North Sea.</p>Why Do Whales and Dolphins Become Stranded?
<p>Navigational errors are thus believed to be the main cause of whale strandings, but all the reasons have not yet been conclusively investigated.</p><p>One of them is certainly the social behavior of many whale species, which travel in groups, so-called pods, and are guided by a leader. For example, in the case of sperm whales, a male leads the way from the Arctic Ocean back into warmer waters. By contrast, when orcas are on their travels, a mother or grandmother leads the group.</p><p>If leaders lose their orientation, perhaps because they are confused or because parasites have attacked their ears, rendering them incapable of hearing the echoes of the clicking sounds that have been sent, the accompanying animals will follow them in the wrong direction. If a leader is stuck in shallow waters, the rest of the group stays with it, even if this means their certain doom.</p><p>Sometimes, as has been observed, for example, with orcas on the South African coast, this group cohesion can go so far that whales who have already been saved after a mass stranding return to the beach if another stranded whale calls for help.</p><p>But strandings can also have other natural causes. Sometimes, smaller dolphins become beached because they have taken refuge from orcas and other predators in shallower waters or because they have ventured too far into shallow areas when hunting shoals of fish.</p><p>Occasionally, individual animals are also washed ashore dead after being previously injured by collisions with ships, fishing nets or shark attacks or becoming ill from infections or parasite infestation. </p>Which Human Influences Exacerbate the Situation?
<p>In addition to natural factors, man-made underwater noise from ships, icebreakers, drilling platforms or military sonar equipment can also massively impair the orientation and communication of marine mammals. They flee the strong sound waves in a state of confusion. And since the density of water is much higher than that of air, sound propagates underwater about five times faster than in the air.</p><p>Military sonar operations employing very loud sounds have particularly drastic effects. After NATO maneuvers, for example, beaked whales have washed up dead on the coasts of Cyprus, the Canary Islands and the Bahamas. The sonars, which are louder than 200 decibels, triggered the formation of gas bubbles in the blood vessels and organs of marine mammals (as happens with diving sickness), obstructing the blood supply and leading to their death. </p>How Can You Help Stranded Whales and Dolphins?
<p>When a whale stranding is discovered, there is usually not much time left. Teams of helpers can do little more than try to cool the stranded animals, keep them moist and combine forces to get the heavy animals back into the sea as quickly and gently as possible.</p><p>In some countries, hotlines have been set up so that as many helpers as possible can be mobilized quickly. For many exhausted animals, however, even these immediate measures often come too late. </p>From Your Site Articles
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