On May 21, the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea, in Hamburg, Germany, ruled that greenhouse gases They are marine pollutants and nations must take measures to “reduce, control and prevent” their effects. The court, sometimes called the Ocean Court, was responding to a request from a consortium of small island nations disappearing under rising sea levels.
The United States is not one of the 169 parties to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, but respects its principles. And while the court's unanimous ruling is not legally binding, it will influence the national and global court cases currently being brought against the fossil fuel industry and its well-funded resistance to a carbon-free, renewable energy future.
Donald Trump offered that resistance in April when requested a donation of one billion dollars of oil executives by promising, if re-elected, to roll back President Biden's clean energy rules. Big Oil could certainly afford bribery. $1 billion represents about 1% of the profits made by ExxonMobil, Chevron, Shell and BP combined last year under Biden's moderate climate policies.
That's why the court's ruling may not be enough to stop or even slow the ocean's approach to a literal boiling point.
Climate impacts are outpacing all other marine environmental insults, including industrial overfishing and pollution from oil, chemicals and plastics. Compounding the danger, inadequate floodplain development is destroying coastal habitat in places like Jakarta, Indonesia; Lagos, Nigeria; Houston; and Florida, where Gov. Ron DeSantis recently signed legislation banning any reference to climate change by state agencies.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is Above normal hurricane activity warning. this year, predicting between 17 and 25 named storms (versus an average of 14), with four to seven major hurricanes. The cause is near-record high temperatures in the Atlantic, combined with a La Niña cooling phase in the Pacific. (Fun fact, according to NOAA, water temperatures in recent La Niña years have been higher than El Niño years in previous decades.) And of course, hurricane damage will only increase with sea level rise related to warming sea water (H2O expands when heated (boil a kettle if you don't believe me), plus melting ice marine and glaciers.
Scientific reviews have found that the duration of marine heat waves has increased more than 50% since 1925. In 2014, 50% of the ocean was affected, and last year, more than 90% of the ocean reached internal temperatures of heat waves, including one. day when the water temperature off the Florida Keys measured 101 degrees. Average global Ocean surface temperatures hit a record high of nearly 70 degrees Fahrenheit one day last year, the highest ever recorded, and a stark contrast to the average of 61 degrees throughout the 20th century.
This should not be surprising, given that 90% of the heat generated by burning fossil fuels (along with about a third of the carbon dioxide) has been absorbed by the ocean. Carbon dioxide, buffered in carbonic acid, increases the acidity of ocean water, which is bad news for corals, clams and other shell-forming creatures. Additionally, a warmer, more acidic ocean contains less dissolved oxygen, expanding hundreds of “dead zones” in coastal waters, as tracked by the United Nations.
Still not worried? In 1997-98 I reported on the first global coral bleaching event, caused by water that was too warm and affecting 16% of all coral reefs. In April, scientists reported the fourth and largest global bleaching event to date, now affecting more than 54% of the world's coral reefs. and growing 1% per week.
Coral bleaching is similar, but more extensive, to the extinction of kelp forests along the coasts of South Australia and California. Ninety-five percent of Northern California's kelp forest has been displaced by sea urchin “barrens” since the West Coast marine heat wave in 2014, 2015 and 2016, when water temperatures averaged 7 degrees above normal. A study by Oregon State University found that with the destruction of kelp forests, migrating gray whales are losing weight and energy because the kelp helps generate the phytoplankton that the whales feed on.
Even if most of the ocean's climate impacts remain out of sight and therefore out of mind, I have met too many people directly affected by these changes (fishermen, surfers, coastal homeowners, coastal town merchants ) not to wonder why the Sea Court ruling wasn't big news on our blue planet. Similarly, why is climate change, which is causing hotter, wetter and more extreme weather in nation after nation, not a major issue in the 2024 US elections?
Maybe it will be if this summer's hurricanes devastate Miami, Tampa, Charleston or Houston, or if shrimp start cooking at sea before being harvested. The court's ruling could cool the oceans, if only there were a way or the will to enforce it.
David Helvarg is executive director of Blue Frontier, an ocean conservation group, and co-host of “Rising Tide: The Ocean Podcast.”
