Ten Threats to ocean health

April 2012

TEN THREATS TO OCEAN HEALTH

GLOBAL CLIMATE CHANGE• Sea levels rise

• Temperature rises

• Storms, floods, weather

• Current patterns

• Coral bleaching

• Caused by increasing man-made carbon dioxide emissions

• Makes the ocean more acidic

• Changes the chemistry of the sea and is harmful for many forms of marine life

OCEAN ACIDIFICATION & CLIMATE CHANGE

• Swaths of ocean that don't support life due to a lack of oxygen

• Growing at an alarming rate

• Over 400 known to exist

• Thought to be caused by global climate change and fertilizer/pesticide runoff

DEAD ZONES

• Over 80% of marine pollution comes from land-based activities

• Oil Spills

• Production waste

• Marine Debris

• GPGP

• Shipping

POLLUTION

• When the amount of fish caught is more than the amount of fish needed to sustain fish stocks in a given region

• Disrupts the food chain

• Bycatch – unintentional captures

OVERFISHING

• Supposed to respond to overfishing

• Poorly managed operations

• Nutrient and chemical pollution released into environment

• Accidental release of farmed fish is also damaging

• Unregulated

IRRESPONSIBLE FISH FARMING

• From:

• Illegal Aquarium trade

• Irresponsible aquarium owners

• Release of foreign bait

• Traveling Ships

• Displace native species

• Diminishes biodiversity

INVASIVE SPECIES

• Offshore drilling

• Chemicals like mercury, arsenic, and lead also come up with the oil

• Seismic waves used harm marine life

• Infrastructure erodes coastline

• Mangrove destruction

• Habitat loss

• 25% of all species may be extinct by 2050

• Tourism

RESOURCE EXTRACTION & COASTAL DEVELOPMENT

• Affects everything

• 50-100 million killed each year

• Bycatch

• Hunted

• When finned sharks are thrown back still alive and bleed to death

• They reproduce too slowly for populations to recover

SHARK FINNING/WHALING

• Coal plants

• Ends up in the food we eat

• Already contaminated water in all 50 states

• Biomagnification

• Tuna

MERCURY POISONING