Marine life is being suffocated; excess sewerage and fertilizers killing life in seas
Gustavus Adolphus
in moving wastes to an offshore site. The first signs of widespread toxicity
is the absence of a variety of species, indeed as the following news article
shows, all species have been eradicated from sizable portions of the oceans.
This is not good news.
Possible solutions:
1. Progressives must push for initiation of a world wide concerted effort to
limit population growth. The planet can reasonably support (modest housing,
2,000 calories a day, medical care, electricity and transportation costs
being what they are) approximately two billion people with our present
state of knowledge and technology. Through global planning organizations
like the U. N. emergency care is available to sustain today's excess
population at a decent but substandard lifestyle if the political/economic
powers are willing to make the effort. Tough choices will have to be made on
who is shortchanged what necessity-however, no one would have to starve as
in today's anarchic state.
2. Organic alternatives to industrial farming methods (that rely on heavy
dosages of harmful chemicals to the soil and animals) are widely known and
should be implemented, we do not have the time to wait for 'voluntary
compliance' on this issue.
3. Treatment of human and industrial waste must be brought to the highest
and strictest standards of purity that is possible. Again, the methods are
widely known and implementation would require global planning and
assistance, especially in areas that are severely challenged by ongoing
political and economic struggles-just about the whole world, ironically.
4. The earth is our home, we have the knowledge, wisdom and means necessary
to lead a healthy, sustainable life style for all. Therefor emergency
planning is of the utmost importance, if indeed the time is not already too
late.
5. Total and complete disarmament is an absolute prerequisite to life in a
well ordered society. Weapons are used for only one thing-therefor it makes
sense that they belong in the hands of the police and free citizens, living
in well ordered states, not in the hands of angry mobs roaming anarchic
areas of the globe. The Bush Administration and the living members of past
regimes have much to answer to on this issue.
http://www.who.int/pcs/training_material/hazardous_chemicals/contents.htm
Hazardous chemicals not only have adverse effects on human health but
can also disrupt ecological systems that exist in rivers, lakes, oceans,
seas, estuaries, wetlands, forests and soils. The discoveries of a growing
hole in the stratospheric ozone layer, evidence of the enhanced greenhouse
effect, which causes an increase in global temperatures, and acid rain,
which damages lakes, streams and forests, have forced us to recognize that
chemical contamination and pollution is not just a regional problem but a
worldwide concern. Ecological systems across the globe can be affected.
5.1 Chemicals and the aquatic environment
The contaminants that pose the greatest threat to the aquatic
environment are sewage, excess nutrients, synthetic organic compounds,
litter, plastics, metals, oil/hydrocarbons and polycyclic aromatic
hydrocarbons (PAHs). Many of the polluting substances originating from
land-based sources, such as pesticides and metals, are of particular concern
to the marine environment since they exhibit both toxicity and persistence
and are known to bioaccumulate in the food chain.
Marine life is being suffocated, UN warns
John Vidal Tuesday March 30, 2004 The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/waste/story/0,12188,1180697,00.html
Last summer every sea creature across an area twice the size of Wales was
asphyxiated by severely depleted oxygen levels in the Gulf of Mexico. The
same phenomenon, the marine equivalent of the ozone hole, happened off South
America, China, Japan, south-east Australia, New Zealand, and up to 150
other places.
A United Nations agency warned yesterday that the number of these "dead
zones", caused mainly by the run-off of nitrogen fertilisers from intensive
farming and sewerage from large cities, had doubled in the past 15 years and
was increasing all over the world.
In a new report, the UN environment programme said that 150 sea areas were
now regularly starved of oxygen and were becoming major threats to already
declining fish stocks, including those in Europe, where areas of the Baltic
Sea were lifeless for several months, as were parts of the Irish Sea and the
Adriatic.
The Black Sea - the largest and oldest "dead zone" in the world - supported
only a few bacteria to a depth of 150 metres.
"Humankind is engaged in a gigantic, global, experiment as a result of the
inefficient and often over-use of fertilisers, the discharge of untreated
sewage and the ever rising emissions from vehicles and factories," said
Klaus Toepfer, the UN environment programme (UNEP) director. "The nitrogen
and phosphorous from these sources are being discharged into rivers and the
coastal environment or being deposited from the atmosphere, triggering these
alarming and sometimes irreversible effects."
Some of the dead zones are less than one square kilometre, whereas others
are up to 70,000 sq km. Many have been found near the outlets of big rivers
such as the Mississippi and the Yangtze, which drain huge industrial areas.
Most lie off countries which heavily subsidise their agriculture.
"What is clear is that unless urgent action is taken to tackle the sources
of the problem, it is likely to escalate rapidly," he said.
"Dead zones are especially dangerous to fisheries because they afflict
coastal areas where many fish spawn and spend most of their lives before
moving to deeper water", said UNEP officer Marion Cheatle. "It is getting
noticeably worse."
She advised countries, which often share water basins, to co-operate in
reducing nitrogen discharges by cutting fertiliser use or planting forests
along rivers to soak up excess nitrogen. The "creeping dead zones" have been
noted since the 1970s but the speed of their growth has surprised scientists
who are only now beginning to understand their mechanism.
Robert Diaz, professor of marine science at Maryland University and author
of the marine section of the report, said dead zones were fast becoming a
bigger threat to fish stocks than over-fishing.
He warned that global warming, with its likely increase in rainfall, was
likely to aggravate the problem, because it would increase significantly the
discharge of polluted water from rivers into oceans.
The report, launched in South Korea at a meeting of 150 of the world's
environment ministers, ranked dead zones as one of the top 20 threats to the
global environment. Others included dust and sand storms, more frequent
around the world as land is degraded, and impending global water shortages.
More than one in three of the world's population is likely to suffer chronic
water shortages in the next few decades, according to the report, while more
than 2.4 billion people lack access to basic sanitation.