[Coral-List] Corals make a more acid ocean

[John Ware]

Hi Steve and Coral List:

That coral reefs increase ocean acidity (decrease pH) is hardly breaking 
news. Back in 1992, a paper appeared in Coral Reefs (Coral Reefs: 
Sources or sinks of atmospheric CO2?, Ware, Smith, Reaka-Kudla, CR 11: 
127-130) that demonstrated what many had known for years: deposition of 
CaCO3 in salt water causes generation of CO2.

While the data in that paper are out of date (e.g. coral reef area used 
~ 6 x 10**11 sq m), even then the amount of CO2 generated by reefs was a 
small fraction of the CO2 of the human generated CO2. We estimated 0.4 5 
to 1.4%.

Estimates of coral reef area have gone down and the generation of 
anthropogenic CO2 have gone up considerably since then.

In any event, that Yeakel (2nd author on paper) and colleagues were 
"puzzled" is the real puzzle.

John Ware


-- 
     *************************************************************
     *                                                           *
     *                      John R. Ware, PhD                    *
     *                         President                         *
     *                      SeaServices, LLC                     *
     *                     302 N. Mule Deer Pt.                  *
     *                    Payson, AZ 85541, USA                  *
     *                       928 478-6358                        *
     *                      jware at erols.com                      *
     *                 http://www.seaservices.org                *
     *                                                           *
     *                Former Member of the Council:              *
     *            International Society for Reef Studies         *
     *                                          _                *
     *                                         |                 *
     *   ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~|~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ *
     *                                        _|_                *
     *                                       | _ |               *
     *        _______________________________|   |________       *
     *     |\/__       Untainted by Technology            \      *
     *     |/\____________________________________________/      *
     *************************************************************

If you are a coral-reef scientist and you are not a member
of the International Society for Reef Studies, then
shame on you.
Become a member of the International Society for Reef Studies
http://www.coralreefs.org