‘Severe’ Stress On Oceans As Rate of Sea Level Rise Doubles In 10 Years, UN Warns

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: The world’s oceans are under “severe and accelerating” pressure from human activities, with the rate of sea-level rise double that of a decade ago, according to a damning assessment from the United Nations. The “intensifying” stressors, which include pollution and large-scale industrial fishing, are cumulative, said the report, resulting in widespread biodiversity loss and putting ocean systems under “severe strain.”

The UN’s third World Ocean Assessment, which reflects the work of nearly 600 scientists from 86 countries, looked at the oceans’ health from 2021-25. The previous report, that covered up to 2018, found persistent degradation of the marine environment. Five years on, scientists know more about the cumulative impacts of anthropogenic pressures on the ocean, and the latest report shows just how much of the damage has been done in the past few years. The scientists’ key findings include:

– Sea levels continue to rise at an increasing rate, from 2mm a year prior to 2015 to 4.3mm a year in 2023.

– 16% of the increase in global ocean heat since 1955 occurred after 2018.

– The greatest relative warming has been observed in the Atlantic Ocean and the southern parts of the Indian and Pacific Oceans.

– Large gaps in knowledge persist — with only 27% of the ocean floor mapped by 2025, deep-sea ecosystems remain poorly understood. Lukas Meus, Greenpeace’s global ocean campaigner, said: “We are calling on governments to create fully protected ocean sanctuaries that will close vast areas of the ocean off from extractive human activities. Governments have promised to protect 30% of the world’s ocean by 2030 — the minimum scientists say we need for the ocean to be able to recover.”