Two significant studies illustrate how burning fossil fuels and discarding plastic garbage have resulted in unparalleled environmental catastrophes for marine life, as world leaders gather in France to debate ocean preservation.
Plastic pollution now affects almost every ocean-dwelling species, while sea surface temperatures that were previously deemed severe have now become the norm.
These are the conclusions of two separate studies released in February in advance of the ongoing One Ocean Summit, which is being hosted by French President Emmanuel Macron to safeguard marine life from overfishing, climate change, and pollution. The study articles, taken together, depict the narrative of an environment critical to human survival that is increasingly under threat.
The first study, published in the journal Plos Climate, found heat that used to be considered rare had become normal for most of the world’s oceans. “Extreme climate change is not a hypothetical future possibility,” the researchers wrote, “but a past historical event that has already occurred in the global ocean.”
