Global Warming

Ocean acidification threatens Monterey Bay - California

Ocean acidification has been called the "evil twin" of global warming because the same carbon dioxide emissions that cause climate change also dissolve into seawater, threatening the world's oceans. And the biologically rich Monterey Bay is more at risk than most bodies of water.

The reason is that the California Current, spanning the west coast of North America, is acidifying twice as fast as the rest of the world's oceans. Globally, the oceans are already 30 percent more acidic than they were 200 years ago. By the end of the century, scientists say, they are expected to be 150 percent more acidic. But experts predict that Monterey Bay might reach those levels much sooner -- in only 35 years.

Scientists and public officials say that human life depends on healthy oceans — which regulate climate, provide half of the world's oxygen and supply people with food, jobs and recreational activities. Entire economies are built around oceans, which create 2.9 million jobs in the United States -- a half-million of those in California.

Monterey Bay is particularly threatened from ocean acidification because of the natural process of upwelling -- which brings the cold, deep water from arctic currents to the surface. That cold water is naturally more acidic than the Pacific's surface waters.

Upwelling also churns up nutrients that draw in fish, whales and other marine life, feeding Monterey Bay's vibrant ecosystem. So, in a cruel irony, the same phenomenon that sustains the bay also makes it more vulnerable to ocean acidification.