By Prarthana Mitra
In a huge blow to one of biospheres most unique ecosystems, the Great Barrier Reef, located off the Australian coast, has been declared as dying a fast death due to bleaching, traces of which were first detected in 2016.
According to a research published on Thursday in the journal Nature, global warming has claimed over half of the coral reefs, driving a massive dent in previous forecasts regarding the reefs long-term stability.
Heres what happened
The 1,400 miles-long Great Barrier Reef is the worlds longest, and largest coral reef, which was blanketed by dangerously hot water in the summer of 2016, causing an unprecedented bleaching event. This heat, most probably triggered by the severe El Nino, strangled and starved the once healthy and iridescent ecosystem, making the Pacific inhospitable to the growth of fragile tropical corals.
The recent paper attempted an autopsy of the debacle, revealing catastrophic results, and clear signs that the entire system was evolving to adapt to the rise in global temperature. Around 30% to 505 of the coral cover in the shallow waters of North Pacific Ocean, have suffered bleaching and subsequent death over a nine-month period.
“They died instantly, of heat stress, Terry Hughes, an author of the paper and the director of Australia’s federal research program dedicated to corals, ARC Center of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies, told the Atlantic. They cooked.
People often ask me, Will we have a Great Barrier Reef in 50 years, or 100 years? And my answer is, yes, I certainly hope sobut its completely contingent on the near-future trajectory of greenhouse-gas emissions, Hughes added.
The most likely scenario, is that coral reefs throughout the tropics will continue to degrade over the current century until climate change stabilizes, and allowing remnant populations to reorganize into novel, heat-tolerant reef assemblages,” the researchers wrote in the paper.
Why you should care
As global warming continues its ongoing onslaught on the Earth, more vegetation, and wildlife face extinction. These afflicted species are granted legal protection under the Endangered Species Act, and the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), has similarly begun to rank entire ecosystems.
However, an article in Futurism argues that classifying plants and animals this way does very little to mitigate the extinction of these ecosystems. The Paris summit for climate change may have been a grand affair, but the world is currently not on track to meet the goals set by the accord.
Environmentalists today seek legal recourse and for good reason. Conservation groups will have to up their efforts in securing legal protection for entire systems, which are not covered by international treaties, and which dont hold trespassers accountable for breaking a law.
The Great Barrier Reef is under serious threat due to climate change, and its time we recognise the threat. One of the greatest natural wonders of the world, the reefs coral cover, does not need to be doomed for good if we deal with greenhouse gas emissions quickly and responsibly. The new study shows that coral reefs around the world are shifting radically in response to unprecedented heatwaves, but, if the Paris agreement targets are met, the reef will survive as a mixture of heat-tolerant [corals], and the ones that can, will bounce back,” the Guardian reported.