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Global ecosystems ‘face collapse’
BBC
Current global consumption levels could result in a large-scale ecosystem collapse by the middle of the century, environmental group WWF has warned.
The group’s biannual Living Planet Report said the natural world was being degraded “at a rate unprecedented in human history”.
[Populations of] terrestrial species had declined by 31% between 1970-2003, the findings showed.
It warned that if demand continued at the current rate, two planets would be needed to meet global demand by 2050.
…One of the report’s editors, Jonathan Loh from the Zoological Society of London, said: “[It] is a stark indication of the rapid and ongoing loss of biodiversity worldwide.
“Populations of species in terrestrial, marine and freshwater ecosystems have declined by more than 30% since 1970,” he added.
“In the tropics the declines are even more dramatic, as natural resources are being intensively exploited for human use.”
(24 Oct 2006)
I attempted to clarify the above sentence which might have implied that 31% of terrestrial species have become extinct, whereas in fact it is the overall populations which have declined. This ‘lesser’ fact is nevertheless in the ballpark of the apocalyptic. Full WWF report
-AF
Marine Life Stirs Ocean Enough To Affect Climate, Study Says
Science Daily
Oceanographers worldwide pay close attention to phytoplankton and with good reason. The microscopic plants that form the vast foundation of the marine food chain generate a staggering amount of power, and now a groundbreaking study led by Florida State University has calculated just how much —- about five times the annual total power consumption of the human world.
Physical and biological oceanographers led by FSU Professor William Dewar put the yearly amount of chemical power stored by phytoplankton in the form of new organic matter at roughly 63 terawatts, and that’s a lot of juice: Just one terawatt equals a trillion watts. In 2001, humans collectively consumed a comparatively measly 13.5 terawatts.
What’s more, their study found that the marine biosphere —- the chain of sea life anchored by phytoplankton —- invests around one percent (1 terawatt) of its chemical power fortune in mechanical energy, which is manifested in the swimming motions of hungry ocean swimmers ranging from whales and fish to shrimp and krill. Those swimming motions mix the water much as cream is stirred into coffee by swiping a spoon through it.
And the sum of all that phytoplankton-fueled stirring may equal climate control.
“By interpreting existing data in a different way, we have predicted theoretically that the amount of mixing caused by ocean swimmers is comparable to the deep ocean mixing caused by the wind blowing on the ocean surface and the effects of the tides,” Dewar said.
In fact, he explained, biosphere mixing appears to provide about one third the power required to bring the deep, cold waters of the world ocean to the surface, which in turn completes the ocean’s conveyor belt circulation critical to the global climate system.
…Dewar and his colleagues also suggest that human and environmental decimation of whale and big fish populations may have had a measurable impact on the total biomixing occurring in the world’s oceans
(16 Oct 2006)
U.N. Says Number of Ocean “Dead Zones” Rising Fast
Daniel Wallis, Reuters via Common Dreams
The number of “dead zones” in the world’s oceans may have increased by a third in just two years, threatening fish stocks and the people who depend on them, the U.N. Environment Program said on Thursday.
Fertilizers, sewage, fossil fuel burning and other pollutants have led to a doubling in the number of oxygen-deficient coastal areas every decade since the 1960s.
Now experts estimate there are 200 so-called ocean dead zones, compared with 150 two years ago.
(19 Oct 2006)
