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Scots research finds Atlantic plankton all but wiped out

29 points by mealkh 4y ago

carapace 4y ago
The actual report is here (I think? It might be a preliminary report?) It seems the primary message is "CO2 reduction won’t even stop climate change ... we have not fixed the primary root cause – the destruction of nature by toxic chemicals, and substances such as plastic." https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4099018 https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4099018 > Pollution from the Congo, Gambia and Amazon from municipal waste, agricultural run-off and deforestation has caused an explosion in the growth of pelagic Sargassum seaweed. It is estimated that, each year, 20 million tonnes of this weed are growing in the Atlantic Ocean - that’s more weed than plastic by weight. > The smell of the ocean comes from coccolithophores, and they are in the air we breathe, our water and our food, but if their numbers are depleted, they will most likely be replaced by toxic dinoflagellates. Already we are seeing HABS, hazardous algae blooms around the world which are killing people living next to the ocean. This is coupled with increased levels of ciguatera disease caused by dinoflagellate contaminated fish. Health authorities are now recommended that any fish from tropical water over 3kg in size should not be consumed
ratboy666 4y ago
Oh, really - Phytoplankton bloom with 700000 cells per liter density is visible to the naked eye. This gives the colour (red, green, or brown) on the sea surface. This means that the satellite maps showing visible blooms may directly repudiate the article. Or not... Not my field of expertise.
mealkh 4y ago
I have to say, this is really concerning. I assumed it was bad, but this sounds really REALLY bad. How would we even go about attempting to coordinate a response to this? Strongarming polluting countries into enforcing compliance? Massive economic uplift projects / infrastructure investments for waste treatment and new materials? Ban of products, trying to catch the job loss somehow? I'm at my wit's end.
- superchroma 4y ago
  Yeah so this really took the shine off of my morning too, BUT apparently it's a crappy study without good backing for its claims. Some guy on reddit remarked that the plankton are still clearly visible from space in huge amounts. THAT SAID, we don't need to wait around for this headline except for real before we take action, and countries really need to get their stuff in gear. There's no good reason for plastic to be leaving waterways and entering the ocean, and farmers need to be strongly pushed and supported to look at ways to farm without leaching fertilizer. And yes, all your ideas are good ones. We need to try a bunch of these things.
  - YeGoblynQueenne 4y ago
    "Some guy on reddit"? That's enough to ignore the warning of a research team that spent "two years collecting water samples from the Atlantic" (per the article above)? Sorry but I don't think so. For example: how much of the plankton in the Atlanic is visible from space? 1%? 100%? Does "some guy on reddit" have any clue whether it's possible to estimate the quantity of plankton just from satellite images? I honestly don't.
  - alophawen 4y ago
    Seriously? You try to discredit a serious article about a subject you should be well aware is 100% true by now even if you were in fact living under a rock.-- by siding with random anon redditor that had a take more suitable for your world view. It is not surprising the least why we are in this rut.
    - brutusborn 4y ago
      Yes, a lot of people (including myself) like to be skeptical of extreme claims. Environmentalists making sensational claims from single studies tends to be counterproductive because if they are found to be wrong, they are used as ammo by climate skeptics. If they are right, then they will be backed up by other studies; so it is better to wait until certain before publishing things like "all but gone." I
alophawen 4y ago
Luckily we have all the plankton in the oceans making oxygen for us now that rain forest has been deforested for soy beans and cow farms. Oh wait.
AbrahamParangi 4y ago
This is absolute garbage. Saying the plankton are gone is incredibly unlikely and requires extraordinary evidence. We can see plankton from space https://eoimages.gsfc.nasa.gov/images/globalmaps/data/MY1DMM_CHLORA/MY1DMM_CHLORA_2002-07.JPEG https://eoimages.gsfc.nasa.gov/images/globalmaps/data/MY1DMM... and what we see in no way correlates with “the plankton is all gone”.
- YeGoblynQueenne 4y ago
  The article reports that 90% of plankton is gone, not "the plankton are gone". Additionally, it seems that this is a correction of an earlier estimate according to which 50% of the plankton should be gone by now: >> The landmark research blames chemical pollution from plastics, farm fertilisers and pharmaceuticals in the water. Previously, it was thought the amount of plankton had halved since the 1940s, but the evidence gathered by the Scots suggest 90% has now vanished. Even if this correction is an overestimate, and the old estimate was right, the quantities of plankton halving since 1940 is still a disturbingly high amount of reduction. As to seeing plankton from space that doesn't really say anything unless we know what proportion of the plankton that exists is visible from space. For instance, it might not be possible to estimate total plankton quantities just from looking at a picture with a particular "bloom" concentrated in an area. I'm surprised about these numbers also but I don't know how I could easily trash the research reported, just because I've seen pictures of plankton. I think that's just making an overgeneralisation.
- myshpa 4y ago
  Yes, the article is bad. But lets not discredit the findings. Even if it's 90% in 2045, and if 1% of plankton dies every year (https://www.goesfoundation.com/ https://www.goesfoundation.com/), it means we've lost so far 70% of plankton since 1940. It still seems like a reason to be worried, and not to say "it's absolute garbage => everything's ok, no reason to be concerned".
- fnordpiglet 4y ago
  You know that image was from 2002 right?
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
aaron695 4y ago

29 points by mealkh 4y ago

The actual report is here (I think? It might be a preliminary report?) It seems the primary message is "CO2 reduction won’t even stop climate change ... we have not fixed the primary root cause – the destruction of nature by toxic chemicals, and substances such as plastic." https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4099018 https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4099018 > Pollution from the Congo, Gambia and Amazon from municipal waste, agricultural run-off and deforestation has caused an explosion in the growth of pelagic Sargassum seaweed. It is estimated that, each year, 20 million tonnes of this weed are growing in the Atlantic Ocean - that’s more weed than plastic by weight. > The smell of the ocean comes from coccolithophores, and they are in the air we breathe, our water and our food, but if their numbers are depleted, they will most likely be replaced by toxic dinoflagellates. Already we are seeing HABS, hazardous algae blooms around the world which are killing people living next to the ocean. This is coupled with increased levels of ciguatera disease caused by dinoflagellate contaminated fish. Health authorities are now recommended that any fish from tropical water over 3kg in size should not be consumed

ratboy666 4y ago

Oh, really - Phytoplankton bloom with 700000 cells per liter density is visible to the naked eye. This gives the colour (red, green, or brown) on the sea surface. This means that the satellite maps showing visible blooms may directly repudiate the article. Or not... Not my field of expertise.

mealkh 4y ago

I have to say, this is really concerning. I assumed it was bad, but this sounds really REALLY bad. How would we even go about attempting to coordinate a response to this? Strongarming polluting countries into enforcing compliance? Massive economic uplift projects / infrastructure investments for waste treatment and new materials? Ban of products, trying to catch the job loss somehow? I'm at my wit's end.

superchroma 4y ago
Yeah so this really took the shine off of my morning too, BUT apparently it's a crappy study without good backing for its claims. Some guy on reddit remarked that the plankton are still clearly visible from space in huge amounts. THAT SAID, we don't need to wait around for this headline except for real before we take action, and countries really need to get their stuff in gear. There's no good reason for plastic to be leaving waterways and entering the ocean, and farmers need to be strongly pushed and supported to look at ways to farm without leaching fertilizer. And yes, all your ideas are good ones. We need to try a bunch of these things.
- YeGoblynQueenne 4y ago
  "Some guy on reddit"? That's enough to ignore the warning of a research team that spent "two years collecting water samples from the Atlantic" (per the article above)? Sorry but I don't think so. For example: how much of the plankton in the Atlanic is visible from space? 1%? 100%? Does "some guy on reddit" have any clue whether it's possible to estimate the quantity of plankton just from satellite images? I honestly don't.
- alophawen 4y ago
  Seriously? You try to discredit a serious article about a subject you should be well aware is 100% true by now even if you were in fact living under a rock.-- by siding with random anon redditor that had a take more suitable for your world view. It is not surprising the least why we are in this rut.
  - brutusborn 4y ago
    Yes, a lot of people (including myself) like to be skeptical of extreme claims. Environmentalists making sensational claims from single studies tends to be counterproductive because if they are found to be wrong, they are used as ammo by climate skeptics. If they are right, then they will be backed up by other studies; so it is better to wait until certain before publishing things like "all but gone." I

alophawen 4y ago

Luckily we have all the plankton in the oceans making oxygen for us now that rain forest has been deforested for soy beans and cow farms. Oh wait.

AbrahamParangi 4y ago

This is absolute garbage. Saying the plankton are gone is incredibly unlikely and requires extraordinary evidence. We can see plankton from space https://eoimages.gsfc.nasa.gov/images/globalmaps/data/MY1DMM_CHLORA/MY1DMM_CHLORA_2002-07.JPEG https://eoimages.gsfc.nasa.gov/images/globalmaps/data/MY1DMM... and what we see in no way correlates with “the plankton is all gone”.

YeGoblynQueenne 4y ago
The article reports that 90% of plankton is gone, not "the plankton are gone". Additionally, it seems that this is a correction of an earlier estimate according to which 50% of the plankton should be gone by now: >> The landmark research blames chemical pollution from plastics, farm fertilisers and pharmaceuticals in the water. Previously, it was thought the amount of plankton had halved since the 1940s, but the evidence gathered by the Scots suggest 90% has now vanished. Even if this correction is an overestimate, and the old estimate was right, the quantities of plankton halving since 1940 is still a disturbingly high amount of reduction. As to seeing plankton from space that doesn't really say anything unless we know what proportion of the plankton that exists is visible from space. For instance, it might not be possible to estimate total plankton quantities just from looking at a picture with a particular "bloom" concentrated in an area. I'm surprised about these numbers also but I don't know how I could easily trash the research reported, just because I've seen pictures of plankton. I think that's just making an overgeneralisation.
myshpa 4y ago
Yes, the article is bad. But lets not discredit the findings. Even if it's 90% in 2045, and if 1% of plankton dies every year (https://www.goesfoundation.com/ https://www.goesfoundation.com/), it means we've lost so far 70% of plankton since 1940. It still seems like a reason to be worried, and not to say "it's absolute garbage => everything's ok, no reason to be concerned".
fnordpiglet 4y ago
You know that image was from 2002 right?

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

aaron695 4y ago