Our oceans are struggling. From bleaching in the coral reefs to increasing temperatures and rising sea levels, they’ve seen better days. To make matters worse, researchers now say our oceans may actually be a “ticking time bomb” due to ocean acidification.
Until recently, researchers have claimed that the acidity of the ocean had not crossed the “planetary boundary.” However, a new study published by researchers at the UK’s Plymouth Marine Laboratory (PML), the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and Oregon State University’s Co-operative Institute for Marine Resources Studies says that the boundary was reached five years ago.
The reason that researchers say that the ocean’s acidification is a ticking time bomb is because it will eventually cause irreparable damage to marine ecosystems and coastal economies. The study looked in-depth at data and determined that the deeper they looked into the ocean, the worse the findings were.
In fact, they found that in some cases, the average ocean condition was already very close to or even beyond the planetary boundary for acidification. At just 200 meters below the surface (roughly 656 feet), 60% of the global oceans had already breached what is considered the “safe” limit for acidification.
These findings are just the latest in a long list of growing signs that the oceans are struggling in our ongoing fight against climate change. Other research has found that 21% of the ocean is losing access to sunlight, and parts of the ocean are warming 400% faster than they should.
The only way to decrease the acidity in the ocean, the researchers claim, is to lower CO2 emissions. While many countries have been working on that, with Trump’s administration making massive changes to the EPA and how it views carbon emissions, it’s unlikely we’ll see any meaningful change any time soon.
Still, we can hold out hope that we’ll eventually get this under control. Or, at the least, we’ll finally figure out that trusting scientists is smarter than ignoring their warnings.
