Climate Change - - The Oceans

The other carbon dioxide problem - - ocean acidification. The problem is a function of carbon dioxide reacting with seawater to form carbonic acid. As the oceans become more acidic, corals and animals such as clams and mussels have trouble building their skeleton and shells. A much more threatening problem is the impact raising acidity has on growth and reproduction.

As in most areas of the climate change debate, there are facts and fiction. In terms of ocean acidification the facts are clear - - as outlined in the August 2010 issue of Scientific American by authors Marah Hardt and Carl Safina:

The ocean's interaction with carbon dioxide mitigates some climate effects of the gas. The atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration is almost 390 parts per million (ppm), but if would be even higher if the oceans didn' soak up 30 million tons of the gas every day. The world's seas have absorbed roughly one third of all carbon dioxide released by human activities. This "sink" reduces global warming - - but at the expense of acidifying the sea. Robert H. Byrne of the University of South Florida has shown that in just the past 15 years , acidity has increased six percent in the upper 100 meters of the Pacific Ocean from Hawaii to Alaska. Across the planet, the average pH of the ocean's surface layer has declined 0.12 unit {scale is logarithmic}, to approximately 8.1, since the beginning of the industrial revolution.

The article is blunt in closing with -- "Only a dramatic reduction in fossil fuel use can prevent further carbon dioxide emissions from contaminating the seas."