1400-Mile-Long Great Barrier Reef Has Lost the Battle to Global Warming
In the past decade or so, I’ve begun to read the “In Memoriam” sector of the alumni magazine of the college I attended in the 1970s, hoping that I don’t read about someone I know.
For all those who read the obituaries, here’s one about the Great Barrier Reef of Australia, which had been a key feature of this planet for the last 25 million years old. Almost a quarter of it is now dead, and 93% of it is damaged. According to the obit: Because of our relentless burning of fossil fuels, corals throughout the world are experiencing a deadly event called bleaching. Hot ocean water causes the coral to vomit out the algae which gives the coral its color and which provides its sustenance.
For its vast capacity to support aquatic life, it will be sorely missed.
I recall reading an opinion about Australian economics and land use. Perhaps it was from “Collapse” by Jarad Diamond, a book I would recommend. ( https://www.amazon.com/Collapse-Societies-Choose-Succeed-Revised/dp/0143117009/ )
In it there was a complaint that sheep farming was far less beneficial to Australia than tourism to the Great Barrier Reef. Sheep farming was ruining the land and creating run off that was destroying the Reef which would eventually cause more harm to the economy of Australia.
So perhaps there are multiple causes of this loss, but it all seems to come down to poor long term business choices that tend to ignore the environment.
Craig,
Of course an American, Jarad Diamond (and expert in the the function of salt in the gall bladder) feels free to pontificate about sheep farming in Australia and the Great Barrier Reef.
The fact that he has zero knowledge about either of these subjects, doesn’t phase ol’ Jarad from commenting sagely.
But hey, when you consider that Jarad also believes we should take hunter-gatherers as a model to deal with universal human problems in industrial societies, including economic and technology, you know we’re dealing with someone for whom facts and rationality are only of passing consequence.
The Great Barrier Reef is not dead, nor dying. Instead it would appear to be evolving to cope with changing circumstances as the reef has always has done.
This time it’s getting a little human help in the form of bio-genetic engineering.
A lot of people, including many scientists, have dedicated most of their lives to studying and protecting the reef. The Reef is very complex aspects of it’s history are only just beginning to be understood.
Even the Guardian, so beloved of the figure wagging green-left, admits reports of the ‘death of the reef’ are unscientific and exaggerated.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/oct/14/great-barrier-reef-severe-stress-not-dead-yet
I’m currently visiting New Zealand where some of the greatest scientific experts in coral reef experts live and work. Needles to say they for do not have a high opinion of ol’ Jarad pontifications.
When I Googled this just now to read a wider variety of positions, I learned that the the reef isn’t dead, but a) parts of it probably are and b) it’s under extreme stress that’s mounting each year. I have no doubt that establishing the death of the reef is an inexact science, but the fact that we’re having this conversation in the first place is a terrible shame.
Craig,
While it’s true that the Reef should be cared for and not abused, it’s also true that these giant geological features are not museum exhibits, frozen in time and never changing.
The reef has changed, adapted and evolved many thousands of times in it’s long existence. Sometimes human preservation efforts are more harmful than beneficial.
It’s important that we understand the true nature of what we’re trying to achieve and not try to apply inappropriate remedies driven by ideology, not science.