factbat.com

An article on a website called wunderground.com -- a site which appears among the top five selections in a Google search for “acidic oceans” -- is the next “hit piece” for the debunking series the factbat site has chosen to undertake concerning the claims that CO2 is the big evil debasing the worlds oceans.

This article claims that it is well known that “burning of fossil fuels has increased CO2 in the atmosphere from about 275 ppm (.0275%) to 378 ppm (.0375%) since the Industrial Revolution began in the 1800s.” However there are no instruments in the world which can conclusively and scientifically deduce such a claim. To date, science can only proffer analysis and resulting theories based on those analogies.

The reason these claims are not fact is because this planet is a cyclic manifestation of the trillions upon trillions of meta and mega cycles which makeup this Universe, and this planet is not only constantly affected by these cycles, but in the entire history of this planet it has likely never completed even one revolution of the Great Cycle it follows through the entire Universe.

Therefore, to put it extremely simply, yesterday is not the conclusive map of tomorrow so many sensationalists attempt to insist it is.

Regardless of the analogies inferred by the scientific evidence mankind has discovered concerning relative cycles which present facts concerning the median global thermal fluctuations of the planet, these are only relative cycles in the microcosm modern science has been able to conclusively research. Variations in global atmosphere and surface temperatures -- to include weather patterns and geographical environments -- are controlled by nearly infinitesimal cosmic prerogatives which current science has not clearly mapped nor even truly attempted to proffer an arguable theory to explain.

The article also claims that carbonic acid, created by excess CO2 in the atmosphere, is reducing the amount of calcium carbonate in the oceans; a critical element needed by sea life to form hard shells. However, carbonic acid -- a compound -- is made up of calcium carbonate; a simple salt of this compound.

What is astonishing is that the person who authored the article never makes even the slightest mention of researching other ocean debasing causes that may correlate with the rise in CO2.

The fact is that as the Industrial Revolution increased, so did the dumping of toxins and organic chemicals into the various waterways of the world. Furthermore, there are many highly corrosive and debasing chemical elements which are pumped into the atmosphere at levels which rival those of CO2.

Merely the practice of dumping treated waste water into the oceans infiltrates their aquatic environments with ammonia, sulfur, pharmaceuticals, heavy metals and various types of chlorine compounds.

Significant concern must be afforded the fact that huge manufacturing corporations dumped billions of gallons of toxic renderings into the soil as well, and this soil could be slowly releasing much of these toxins into the water tables which can slightly affect oceanic PH levels.

The article mentions nothing about testing methods, nor does it consider relevant the fact that the tests are being performed in geographical areas which would be least affected by industrial generated CO2. But rather would be affected by volcanoes. The regions shown on the graphs in the article are Canary Islands, Hawaii and Bermuda.

Furthermore, it is well known to the EPA and United States federal agencies -- which have fined Hawaii billions of dollars -- that the south pacific is guilty of dumping inordinate levels of raw and partially treated sewage into their aquatic environments. Hawaii alone allows thousands of major spills per year through negligence, faulty engineering, and poor maintenance.

Hawaii’s brackish groundwater is extremely corrosive to the decades old cement pipes still used throughout much of the islands’ waste water infrastructures. As well, the sandy earth allows these pipes to erode, settle and crack causing seasonal rains to flood them, forcing raw sewage into the soil, springs, rivers, and ocean.

The article also references the very questionable IPCC data on the subject which claims to show “The Physical Basis for Climate Change.” An analogy of this report will be engaged later since the linked page would not load.

Remarkably the article states with an air of certainty that the oceans are paying a high price for, as the article alleges, “dissolving so much CO2 during the past 150 years that the acidity of the oceans’ surface waters has substantially increased.”

However, the planet’s oceans are “carbon sinks”, which by the terminology first and foremost apprises one of the fact that the CO2 which naturally comes into contact with the ocean, then quickly “sinks.” Thus, it is not likely that the surface water is what would be most affected if the cause were a gas such as carbon dioxide. What would affect the surface PH of the oceans are inorganic and organic chemical compounds which are not readily assimilated by the oceans.

Although it is the temperature of the ocean at various depths which enables carbon to be absorbed, any analogy which claims that this natural carbon cycle is not operating at optimum performance because of increased surface temps can be debunked with actual thermal readings which prove that the planet’s overall atmosphere has been cooling for more than a decade.

What would be refreshing is if those performing the tests on ocean acidity would mention if the tests were done near land masses, in the open ocean, or a random average of both. Essentially because another mitigating factor in the much derided CO2s favor is the fact that nearly all of the toxins that have been spilled in the oceans, and then found their way to land, have seeped into the gravels, sands and soils where they are slowly emitted relative to tide fluctuations.

Areas inundated by oil spills such as those perpetrated by the Exxon Valdes have shown that marine life is not rebounding as expected. When researches began to test the shores in proximity to the spills, they found them to still be significantly saturated with toxic sludge. The gravel layers allow the oil to seep just below them where it is shielded from solar radiation and proper levels of oxygen which would otherwise cause it to degrade. Tide fluctuations then carry this fetid pollution out to sea on a daily basis.

In Hawaii, in October of 2004, over 42 million gallons of raw and partially treated sewage was intentionally diverted into the Alawai Canal in order to save local businesses and hotels from flooded basements during a seasonal storm. Basements that ridiculously house most of Waikiki’s emergency generators. Truly, in a region such as the South Pacific one would expect engineers to have the wisdom to place such sensitive electrical equipment well above any possible water line.

unfortunately, the local officials who believed that the Alawai Canal would carry the irresponsibly dumped pollution out to the deep ocean, proved to be embarrassingly misguided as the sewage merey made a logic u-turn -- following natural currents and tides -- right onto Waikiki Beach and the surrounding areas. Although most of the public beaches had to be closed for months, and two injured people who fell into the Alawai Marina died from the diseases they contracted, Hawaiian officials never openly disclosed these concerns to tourists.

Moreover, Waikiki is a land reclamation project that was built with desert sands which, unlike natural ocean sands, possess significant levels of silt and minerals which absorbed much of the pollution. Therefore the effects have a logical half-life of approximately four decades, without significant intervention intended to mitigate the levels of toxic saturation.

Further research of the crisis exposes the fact that less than a year prior, Honolulu City officials were told by private contractors that the Waikiki force mains were in poor shape and that they could not handle the pressure of any significant amount of rainfall. Yet nothing was done to upgrade them. Except of course, bureaucrats raiding the city sewage fund of over $190 million to balance the city budget.

At least the wunderground.com article does go on to explain that there have been other erroneoys analogies proffered, and that the sensationalists were proven wrong about the claim that the Arctic ozone hole, which exposed phytoplankton in the Southern Hemisphere's oceans to increased levels of damaging ultraviolet light, would destroy enough phytoplankton to trigger a collapse of the food chain in the waters off of Antarctica. Furthermore, the author clearly makes the assumption that the ozone hole could not merely be the result of natural cyclic occurrences.

In the closing paragraph, however, the author cites a rather disturbing statement by The Royal Society -- those in close proximity to the Climate Gate scandal -- saying “We recommend that all possible approaches be considered of preventing CO2 reaching the atmosphere. No option that can make a significant contribution should be dismissed.”

To reiterate the obvious once again; CO2 is one of the major building blocks of life on this planet, but the wunderground.com website is suggesting that it must be prohibited in order to save the world.