Oceans face ‘increased extinctions and extinction risks caused by human factors’

Contact: Jenny Lappin, CoECRS, +61 417 741 638 Jan King, UQ Communications Manager, +61 (0)7 3365 1120 Professor John Pandolfi, CoECRS and UQ, +61 7 3365 3050 or (m) +61 400 982 301 Life in the world’s oceans faces far greater change and risk of large-scale extinctions than at any previous time in human history, […]

Australia coal boom threatens Great Barrier Reef

By Michael Slezak, Australasia reporter6 June 2012 A resources boom that has shielded Australia from the global economic meltdown is threatening the Great Barrier Reef and provoked an argument between the state and federal governments. The kerfuffle was sparked last week when the Queensland state government approved the development of one of the country’s largest […]

Nuclear fears over French Polynesia atoll collapse

10 August 2012 (ABC) – The Nuclear Association in French Polynesia has raised concerns that Murorua Atoll, the site of French nuclear testing in the Pacific, is in danger of collapsing. Murorua e Tatou says the issue was detailed in a leaked report from the Ministry of Defence to the French government dated March 2010. […]

The flames of ocean acidity

By Matthew Huelsenbeck20 July 2012 The age of fossil fuels has changed the oceans dramatically. What many might not know is that the oceans absorb about one-third of all human-caused carbon dioxide emissions. And while this has saved us from even more rapid climate change, few people realize the true effect this has had on […]

A world without coral reefs

By ROGER BRADBURY13 July 2012 It’s past time to tell the truth about the state of the world’s coral reefs, the nurseries of tropical coastal fish stocks. They have become zombie ecosystems, neither dead nor truly alive in any functional sense, and on a trajectory to collapse within a human generation. There will be remnants […]

Ancient climate change: ‘We were shocked to find 2,500 years of reef growth were missing’

By Miguel Llanos, msnbc.com5 July 2012 Coral reefs along Panama’s Pacific coast completely collapsed for 2,500 years due to natural climate cycles, researchers reported in a study Thursday, adding that there’s a lesson in the data for man-made climate change: ease up on greenhouse gasses and reefs will restore themselves. “We can prevent coral reefs […]

Sickness spreads in Great Barrier Reef wildlife – Pollution and freshwater outflows from record 2011 floods blamed

GLADSTONE, Australia, 2 June 2012 (The Economist) – SOME locals in the port town of Gladstone recall swimming and catching mud crabs off Curtis Island in the city’s harbour. The harbour is now undergoing the biggest dredging operation ever approved in Australia. From 2014, huge ships are due to load liquefied natural gas (LNG) from […]

Graph of the Day: Expansion and Impact of World Fishing Fleets, 1950 and 2006

The expansion and impact of world fishing fleets in a) 1950 and b) 2006. The maps show the geographical expansion of world fishing fleets from 1950 to 2006 (the latest available data). Since 1950, the area fished by global fishing fleets has increased ten-fold. By 2006 100 million km2, around 1/3 of the ocean surface, […]

Hawaii’s beaches are in retreat, and its way of life may follow – ‘This is a serious problem’

By CORNELIA DEAN14 May 2012 Little by little, Hawaii’s iconic beaches are disappearing. Most beaches on the state’s three largest islands are eroding, and the erosion is likely to accelerate as sea levels rise, the United States Geological Survey is reporting. Though average erosion rates are relatively low — perhaps a few inches per year […]

Video: Gulf still grapples with massive BP oil leak 2 years later

Watch Gulf Still Grapples With Massive BP Oil Leak 2 Years Later on PBS. See more from PBS NewsHour. [Sorry for the ad.] 20 April 2012 (PBS) – Two years after the largest oil leak in U.S. history, the Gulf of Mexico region still struggles with its impact. Jeffrey Brown, David Valentine of the University […]

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