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Op-Ed: Ocean oxygen levels — Grim forecasts

The new study by the American Geophysical Union is lying buried behind a paywall, but the facts it covers aren’t in dispute. Low oxygen areas in the deep ocean waters are spreading, and that low oxygen water is being cycled up to the surface.
According to a National Geographic article published earlier this year, the low oxygen regions have expanded by 1.7 million miles in the last 50 years. Progressive acidification, anoxia and water temperatures are combining to put pressure on marine ecosystems.
The anecdotal evidence isn’t looking good. Low oxygen areas restrict the ranges of oxygen breathing fish. The rise of the low oxygen water means they have to stay closer to the surface, where they’re vulnerable, and in different environments from their natural ranges. Predators are also being “compressed” into smaller ranges, adding competition and further population stress.
Heat also affects oxygen in the oceans. Warmer water, according to National Geographic, carries less oxygen. Photosynthesis by marine organisms provides oxygen in some areas, but not in others. A further complication arises from oxygen depletion from deep water organisms coming to the surface, aggravating oxygen consumption. The net effect is a “lens” of oxygenated water, deteriorating under stress.
Studies as far back as 2008 at least have pointed to an oxygen depletion process which is escalating. The logic is simple enough — this problem grows itself, and warmer waters are making the problem grow faster. The net result is something like desertification on land.
That’s not all. Anaerobic organisms are able to exploit low oxygen areas. In the dead zones off Japan, giant 200kg jellyfish have been swarming, able to avoid their oxygen-breathing predators. A few years ago, I reported on a swarm of Mediterranean jellyfish which destroyed a salmon farm off Scotland. The jellyfish were not natives of the Atlantic, and may have followed warmer currents north.
Later reports of jellyfish invasions worldwide indicate that these ancient organisms are becoming real problems. Jellyfish swarms can annihilate fish fry, cutting the food chain in breeding season. They can also destroy plankton, a core element of the marine food chain in all oceans.
Acidification is seriously damaging the coral reefs which support gigantic marine populations, adding further critical mass to a marine meltdown. According to current reports, the onset of widespread effects will occur in 2030.
Mismanagement is too good a word
I have to say this — as global mismanagement goes, even by current standards, the management of the oceans couldn’t possibly have been worse. It’s indescribable. Some efforts have achieved local successes, but on a global scale, as usual, there’s been no real action. The gigantic ocean garbage patches remain. Idiotic fishing practices, illegal or not, remain. Absolutely nothing has been done on a scale to make any difference.
It’s interesting, at a time when ultra-primitive thinking, political, religious, and economic, is at such a high point that the utter imbecility of a government system which does everything but focus on global disasters becomes obvious. Does anyone really expect this collection of corrupt, criminal, intellectual corporate fruit flies to do anything effective?
Big problems need big ideas, and the ideas coming from cloud cuckoo land are small minded to the point of total mediocrity. The scale of this issue couldn’t get bigger, and the minds supposed to manage it couldn’t get any smaller.
It may be theoretically possible to put the oceans on oxygen feeds (imagine the ocean in an oxygen mask) or create oxygen generating dynamics by seeding new populations of oxygen producing bacteria, etc. “Reclaiming the oceans” may literally mean rebuilding them, from the bottom of the food chain up.
Saving species, too, will require consideration, for very practical reasons. The world’s marine organisms could be their own saviours, offering undiscovered solutions or options for rebooting failing ecosystems. They’re the best source of information about survival choices and biological capabilities. Can you re-breed an entire species? We may have to find out.
One thing for sure — a collapse of the marine ecosystems will be catastrophic for humanity. The oceans provide a lot of food. That supply could be destroyed, virtually overnight. Doing nothing is not an option.

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Written By

Editor-at-Large based in Sydney, Australia.

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