Bad Acid Trip Creeping Up West Coast
By Steve Casimiro on October 8th, 2012
As if the 800-pound gorilla of global warming isn’t enough giant metaphorical primate in one room, there’s ocean acidification — an environmental result of increased atmospheric carbon that’s every bit as threatening as climate change, only not as well understood or known by most people. It is, however, making itself felt with increasingly ominous effects on the West Coast of the United States. For example, in the last few years, 80 percent of oyster larvae at western hatcheries weren’t surviving. The culprit was thought to be bacteria, but turned out to be the larvae’s inability to form shells because of a lack of calcium carbonate caused more acidic oceans. The list of species that will be whacked by acidic water is long — including algae that turns toxic, contaminating the shellfish that eat it, and sickening or killing the people who eat the shellfish. FML, right? Well, there’s an election coming up. Might want to cast your vote for representatives who at least acknowledge climate change is real. Via LA Times.
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Tags: Green
If you’re schizophrenic, you can vote for a candidate that is for and against doing something about climate change (and just about every other policy).