Scientists call for ‘emergency’ measures to save sea life from El Niño — SkimNews
Get the Energy newsletter
Daily energy & climate — solar, EVs, oil, the policy fights and tech bets shaping the transition. Free.
- Michael Meredith of the British Antarctic Survey co-authored a PNAS journal article calling for "emergency" interventions to protect marine life from the strongest-ever El Niño, arguing ecosystems like coral reefs and Antarctic krill could collapse past tipping points.
- Sea surface temperatures could reach 4°C above average in the east-central Pacific—60% higher than the previous record—because the El Niño's heat is layered on 150 years of global warming.
- The article proposes "rescue missions" for endangered species, citing the 2023-2024 El Niño effort when scientists moved 25 rare Tasmanian red handfish into tanks and later returned them to the wild.
- Suggested interventions include geoengineering tests like spraying seawater particles to brighten clouds (already trialed on the Great Barrier Reef by Australian scientists) and artificial upwelling, where a wave-powered pump in the Gulf of Maine accelerated kelp growth.
- Additional proposals cover banning harvest of the sheephead wrasse to protect California kelp forests, shade structures over bleached Florida corals, and probiotic microbes that let corals keep photosynthesizing during a Red Sea heatwave.
- Daniela Schmidt at the University of Bristol countered that geoengineering tests could worsen El Niño damage and that short-term fixes can't replace cutting fossil fuel emissions and expanding marine protected areas.
- The paper is being sent to officials in the UK, US, and other governments, and Meredith—previously a critic of geoengineering as "environmentally dangerous"—now says record temperatures provide a "natural lab" for small-scale tests.
Why it matters: Past super El Niños already collapsed Peru's anchovy fishery, and scientists warn ecosystems like coral reefs and krill could shift permanently to a "new state." With ocean temperatures 60% above the prior record, governments in the UK, US, and beyond now face a concrete policy request—though one co-author warns geoengineering trials could backfire.
Ask SkimNews
