Environment & Ecology Prelims Plus
UNESCO Releases State of the Ocean Report (2024)
The report, structured around the UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development (2021-2023), offers insights into ocean-related scientific activities describing the current and future state of the ocean.
Warming: Ocean is now warming at twice the rate it was twenty years ago. Ocean temperatures have increased by an average of 1.45°C, with hotspots above 2°C in the Mediterranean, Tropical Atlantic Ocean and Southern Oceans.
Rising Seal level rise: Mostly due to accelerated ice mass loss from the Greenland and West Antarctica ice sheets, and to a lesser degree from accelerated ocean warming.
Acidification: Ocean absorbs around 25% of annual anthropogenic CO2 . This process reduces seawater pH (ocean acidification). Ocean acidification would increase by more than 100% by the end of the century