Unless we halt completely the emission of carbon dioxide from the world’s energy systems, we risk an oceanic catastrophe worse than the one associated with the disappearance of the dinosaurs.That’s the message a chemical oceanographer and environmental scientist intends to deliver to a conference on the future of the world’s oceans today at the University of Victoria.
Ken Caldeira, who teaches out of the Carnegie Institution at Stanford University in California, says the level of acidification caused by dumping hundreds of billions of tonnes of carbon dioxide into the world’s oceans is so great it could cause a major disruption on par with, or worse than, the sudden dumping of sulphuric acid into the oceans 65 million years ago when an asteroid slammed into the Earth’s surface.
Vancouver Sun, 22 February 2007. Article.
