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Global warming effect great barrier reef
How can global warming affect the coral
Coral reef and global warming
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In the article called “Recent Ocean Heat Waves Have "Forever" Altered Great Barrier Reef” The author talks about how the heat wave’s changing corals reefs on great barrier in Australia. The article starts by talking about recently in great barrier corals reefs is changing so much then before due to high heat waves. In fact, not only reefs but they were major infect on corals then before. The scientist suggests between March and November most of the corals reefs died within eight month. Most of them causing by essential change that mix with hundreds of different reefs due to high heat waves. The authors indicated that almost every parts of reefs has deeply affected in great barriers. The article clearly states the facts that, the transformation are the result of a huge coral because of lightening event that transported by high …show more content…
In addition, corals have strong relationship with tiny algae but due to high temperature the tiny algae are turning into white colors. Usually corals doesn’t die but extend of too warm they die before getting change of regrow. In fact, heat waves and bleaching events are powerfully related to temperature transformation. The Great Barrier corals Reef is the only reef in the world that suffering from effect and it happing more often. The article goes to mention Australia is one of huge area of bleaching events that affect 70% of world’s reefs. The author’s points out by saying the Great Barrier Reef are the major warning for corals reefs of worldwide and suggesting keeping global warming by below two degree. Lastly, the author’s end the articles by indicating we should focus on protecting the one haven’t died
Coral reefs around the world are in danger. One of the causes is global warming, which has been increasing the temperature of the ocean water resulting in coral bleaching. This essay will focus on damage occurring to the Great Barrier Reef.
Earth, an endless source of wonder and beauty, produced the Great Barrier Reef. Hustling and bustling, the Reef thrives like a busy city, teeming with life. Sheltering thousands, corals, maintain the well-being of the Reef; however, the world threatens its nature and delicacy. Populations growing and technological advances increasing, the world becomes more and more disconnected with the natural world, posing an alarming risk for the planet we live on. Although many organizations try to keep the oceans clean, because of human interference and unnatural occurrences, the Great Barrier Reef needs scientific help to adapt corals to new conditions for means of survival, putting pressure on the Australian government to save their ocean environment.
This website gives a large historical overlook and possible conclusion to the issue of coral reef bleaching. Since the 1980’s episodes of coral reef bleaching and death have occurred almost every year in one or more of the world's tropical or subtropical seas. Bleaching happens in episodes, with the most severe typically accompanying coupled ocean–atmosphere phenomena. Bleaching episodes have resulted in loss of coral
Coral Reefs are said to be the “tropical rainforest” of the sea. They are home to over 25% of all marine life (http://coralreefalliance.org.stories/storyReader$77). Over the past few decades they have been subjected to destructive anthropogenic practices. Some of the major threats to coral reefs include sedimentation, water pollution, harmful recreational activities, and global warming. All of these things cause stress on corals and can potentially cause mortality. Corals are made up of two parts, a polyp and zooxanthellae. A polyp is a calcerous body that grows from a hard part of the ocean floor. Zooxanthellae is a photosynthetic algae which lives in the polyp and provide energy for themselves and the coral. In many cases, corals undergo “bleaching,” which is a process where corals lose the zooxantheallae or chlorophyll pigment, and turn white (Wilkinson et all). After bleaching corals can survive for several months. It is possible for corals to recover by hosting more zooxantheallae, but it can take between 5 and 50 years for them to recover completely (Wilkinson et all, 1999).
The Great Barrier Reef (GBR) is the world’s largest coral reef system, located along the northeast coast of Queensland in Australia. GBR stretches from the most northern part in the country – Torres Strait and all the way down to Fraser Island – the southeast part of Queensland. The distance from north to southeast is close to 2575 kilometres and the whole GBR area is covering around 344 400 square kilometres – which might be why you can see the reef all the way from space. GBR contains approximately 2900 individual reefs and not only is it the world’s largest reef but also the earth 's largest formation shaped by living organisms (Zimmermann, 2012).
Leading scientists advise climate change will cause increases to the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events. Rising sea levels pose a significant risk to coastal communities, while the world’s oceans could become too acidic to support coral reefs and other calcifying marine organisms. Coral reefs contain only six per cent of the area of the Great Barrier Reef, yet they provide critical habitat and food for numerous species in the ecosystem. However, climate change has already impacted coral reefs in the Great Barrier Reef as corals are very helpless against its potential impacts. Eight mass coral bleaching events has occurred since 1979, triggered by unusually high water temperatures. And because of this, zooxanthellae (photosynthetic algae) leave their tissues and corals will have no more colours hence ‘bleaching’. Without the zooxanthellae, the corals that remain gradually starve to death. Once the coral dies, fish and a multitude of other marine species are soon affected. Rising sea levels and more frequent and intense storm surges will see more erosion of Australia’s coastline, causing community and residential
One argument is that many different things are contributing to the destruction of coral rather than climate change including overfishing, marine pollution and cyclones/hurricanes (World Climate Report, 2010). Although this may be true, the main causes of coral reef destruction still relates back to global warming. From 1985 to 2012, coral populations in the Great Barrier Reef have decreased by 50.7 per cent, with 48 per cent due to tropical cyclones, 42 per cent because of crown of thorns starfish (COTS) and 10 per cent directly due to bleaching (De 'ath et al., 2012). It has been indicated that due to global warming, there has been an increase in the number of tropical cyclones (Knutson et al., 2010). However, it has also been found that there is a possibility of cyclones actually mitigating coral bleaching (Baker et al., 2008; Schultz, 2012). With even just a 2°C increase in temperature the probability of COTS survival escalates by 240 per cent under certain conditions (Australian Institute of Marine Science, 2015). However, repeated bleaching events result in higher mortality rates. The Caribbean has been experiences continuous declines of reef sites due to repeated bleaching events (Baker et al., 2008). There is no doubt that oceans surrounding Australia have drastically warmed since 1910 (Bureau of Meteorology, 2014), and this warming affects the
Coral reefs are systems of large, underwater structures that are composed of the mineralized bodies of corals. These corals are a class of marine invertebrates known as Anthozoans, and belong to the phylum Cnidaria, and are thus related to sea anemone and jellyfish. Each individual coral animal is only a few millimeters in diameter, and a few centimeters in length. Due to their sessile nature, and their ability to reproduce asexually, they are able to construct, over many generations, massive colonies of genetically identical individuals. Additionally, they secrete a hard exoskeleton of calcium carbonate to support and protect their bodies, and it is from this process that the colony constructs what is known as a single coral “head.”
All over the world coral reefs play an important part in our environment. Not only are the reefs colorful and beautiful to look at but the coral reefs house several different types of fish and other sea creatures. Coral reefs have started to decline over the years due to “climate change, El Nino events, overfishing, pollution and other pressures” (Newnham 1). A healthy coral reef can also collapse due to a natural disaster (Newnham 2). There can be several different reasons why a coral reef has started to decline or has been destroyed.
The whole documentary centered on the death of coral reefs due to the warm temperatures of the oceans brought about by climate change. One of the greatest factors of warm oceans is the greenhouse gases transferred in the ocean which includes carbon dioxide. Carbon dioxide, which humans emit in the atmosphere, has the capacity to trap heat and 93% of this goes to the oceans.
Oceans cover 71% of the earth’s surface. The talk of climate change can often seem to focus on what is happening in our atmosphere, but there is a lot of change going on in our oceans. The oceans have absorbed 90% of the excess heat and 28% of the carbon pollution generated by human consumption of fossil fuels (Nuccitelli 2015). The purpose of this paper is to show how the effects of climate change effect the coral reefs in our oceans, with a focus on the coral reef systems in the Caribbean and of the Great Barrier Reef. The Caribbean coral reefs are well known to have suffered more damage between the two reef systems. That’s not to say that the Great Barrier Reef has not suffered its own damage. It has and will continue to suffer in the future.
John Locke, an English philosopher, believed that an effective government would protect people’s natural rights; life, liberty, and property. Spain is a country in Southwestern Europe with a parliamentary constitutional monarchy. The leader of their government is the Prime Minister, Mariano Rajoy. It has a population of 48,958,159, the main language amongst them being Castilian Spanish. Following John Locke’s standard, Sapin is doing a good job at protecting citizens natural rights, although there are definitely areas that could be improved.
Climate change has been affecting coral reefs in a negative way. If the climate continues to get warmer more of our coral reef become bleached, the structure of the reefs will become weak, and algae that keeps coral healthy will die. In the essay, “A framework for understanding Climate change impacts on Coral Reefs” by Joshua Clinner (2016), he emphasizes our climate change has become one of the long-term threats to coral reef. The article “Climate change and human impacts are damaging the world’s coral reefs”, which didn’t include an author (2001), states that the sea temperatures throughout the tropics has increased dramatically leaving much of the coral unhealthy. Spencer Hall (2008), discussed in his article “Coral Reefs and Climate Change”, how the increase in climate change puts a lot of stress on coral reefs because they are very sensitive to the change of temperature. Rigel B (2003) states in his essay, “Climate Change and Coral Reefs”, that coral reef has already been negatively impacted by
Coral reefs are well known for their colorful array of marvelous sights including a parade of exotic flora and fauna. They are said to be the foundation for a quarter of marine species, and are a crucial support for human life as well. The coral reef ecosystem is a diverse collection of species (ranging from microscopic to larger-than-life in size) that interact with each other and their physical environment. If any piece of a coral reef is harmed or removed the entire community can be seriously affected, even to the point of collapse. Unfortunately, human impact has resulted in long-term stresses that, unlike the short-term stress of natural disasters, coral reefs are not as capable to recover from. “Approximately half of the world’s coral reef ecosystem resources are considered by scientists to be in 'poor' or 'fair' condition and have declined over time due to several anthropogenic threats” (“Status of Corals” par. 2). Through poorly administered commercial practices, carelessness and ignorance among the common people, and human aggravated natural processes coral reef destruction has become a serious issue afflicting the world’s biodiversity and it’s intricate biosphere mechanics (“Human Impact on the Great Barrier Reef” 1) (“What Are Coral Reefs?” 1).
In conclusion, I would like to say that before writing this paper, I had no idea how important coral reefs were to the earth. I have learned a lot and I think that if more people were informed about the positive capabilities of them, humans wouldn't be so careless about them.