The Next Ocean

Biologists are discussing what the chemistry change will do to marine creatures: It looks like bad news for calcium users and a new dawn for slimy rocks. It could begin an age of simplification for ocean ecosystems. Either way, there’s a rising consensus that, by changing the oceans’ chemistry and biology, burning fossil fuels is essentially making new oceans.

Researchers say the oceans of today already register a chemical change, though it may sound deceptively small at first.
Still, describing the process as ocean acidification isn’t wrong. Seawater is acidifying in the sense of creeping toward the acid zone on the scale. Even if the ocean isn’t turning into lemon juice, biologists predict that smaller dips in pH could do big things to marine life. It’s a peril humans easily fail to appreciate. We can bathe in milk (pH 6.7) or chug orange juice (pH 3 or 4) and call ourselves refreshed. Thanks to fancy protective coatings, such as skin, and robust physiological mechanisms, a milk-soaked juice drinker’s blood still hovers around pH 7.35 to 7.45. But our bodies don’t have to build coral reefs..

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