Source: Albuquerque Journal
Author: Kevin Freking
WASHINGTON — Creating the Atlantic Ocean’s first marine national monument is a needed response to dangerous climate change, oceanic dead zones and unsustainable fishing practices, President Barack Obama said Thursday.
Continue reading Obama: Oceans key to protecting planet from climate change
Source: Yahoo! News
Author: Maria Gallucci
Ocean conservation efforts took a significant step forward on Friday when a measure to protect 30 percent of the world’s oceans by 2030 passed during a major meeting in Hawaii.
Continue reading Marine conservation efforts just took a major step forward
Source: New York Times
Author: Julie Hirschfield Davis
WASHINGTON — President Obama is set to vastly expand a marine sanctuary northwest of the main Hawaiian Islands, White House officials said Thursday, creating the world’s largest protected marine area as he seeks to cement his environmental legacy in his last months in office.
Continue reading Obama to Create World’s Largest Marine Reserve Off Hawaii
Speaking at the July 2016 annual meeting of the International Seabed Authority (ISA) in Kingston, Jamaica, the Deep Sea Conservation Coalition (DSCC) called on State parties to open closed doors and bring transparency to the heart of its work. The ISA this year will debate changes to the structure of the organization as it grapples with the development of exploitation regulations in light of increasing interest in commercial mining of the deep ocean.
Source: Oceans Inc
Responding to the final Agreement text announced at COP21 today, ocean groups were positive about a growing recognition for the importance of the ocean in climate change but disappointed by the lack of overall ambition in terms of reducing levels of dangerous CO2 in the atmosphere.
Continue reading Reaction to COP21: Gains for the Ocean but More is Needed
Source: CNN
Author: Lance Morgan
Almost daily we hear that the oceans are in trouble — overfishing, melting glaciers, rising seas, acidifying waters, expanding dead zones, escalating marine debris and starving seals to name a few. Seabirds around the world have declined by 70% since the 1950s, while current extinction rates are1,000 times normal background rates
During current negotiations at the UN Climate Conference (COP21) in Paris, citizens, politicians and NGOs are wondering whether the outcome of this conference will serve to better protect the oceans in order to mitigate the effects of climate change.
Continue reading Keeping A Healthy Deep Sea Helps Mitigate Climate Change
Civil society organisations from across the globe are highly critical of an international oceans conference being held in Singapore this week. Mis-named the Sustainable Ocean Summit, the conference is touted as providing a platform to advance industry-driven solutions to ocean sustainability challenges.
Continue reading SOS: The World’s Oceans Facing Emergency Singapore Summit Set To Worsen The Crisis
A statement by the deep-sea research community for consideration by UNFCCC
DEEP OCEAN MITIGATION AND RESPONSE TO CLIMATE CHANGE
The deep sea is an integral part of the earth system and plays a significant role in minimizing the impact of human released CO2 on the earth’s climate. The waters and seafloor below 200m are one of the largest sinks of excess carbon dioxide and heat and have already absorbed more than a quarter of anthropogenic atmospheric CO2. Ocean acidification, warming and deoxygenation resulting from human CO2 release has already been observed in deep waters and these impacts are projected to intensify in coming decades.
Continue reading A statement by the deep-sea research community for consideration by UNFCCC
Source: Nature Climate Change
It is often assumed that deep-sea ecosystems are shielded from the effects of climate change at the surface. On the contrary, such ecosystems are likely to be particularly sensitive to changing oceanic conditions. For one thing, many are energetically dependent on organically rich particles, which are produced in surface waters before sinking to the sea floor as ‘marine snow’.
