Great Barrier Reef - Great Tragedy

Dr. Peter Carter, Paul Beckwith and Regina Valdez discuss the imminent loss of the Great Barrier Reef and other reefs. This video was partially motivated by a report from the Vibrant Oceans Initiative issued on April 14th, 2022 warning that greater than 90% of the world’s coral reefs would be severely degraded in the next three decades.

This video was recorded on April 20th, 2022, and published on May 14th, 2022, and represents the opinions of the discussion participants.

Some of the topics discussed:
- How reefs are living things with thousands of species in the oceans.
- In addition to warm water reefs there are also species that live in cold dark places.
- Reefs serve as a home to 25% of the ocean’s fish.
- In addition to the life in the reefs being symbiotic it can also be described with the term mutualism, where all of the organisms live together and give life to each other.
- Reefs are vulnerable to bleaching which depends on above-average temperatures, the duration of high water temperatures, the coral species in question and the environmental history of the reef where the corals are found.
- Bleaching leaves corals vulnerable to disease, stunts their growth, affects their reproduction, and can impact other species that depend on the coral communities. Severe bleaching kills them.
- How the first bleaching event happened in 1982 and was associated with an El Niño southern oscillation event.
- The need to look beyond what appears on our phone’s screen and awaken to what’s happening with our environment.
- and much more. . .

Links:
- Urgent action is required to protect world's coral reefs from disappearing within three decades, warn experts

- Coral Bleaching

- IPCC Special Report - Global Warming of 1.5 degrees

- Climate Change 2022: Impacts, Mitigation of Climate Change

- What are El Niño and La Niña?

Panelists:
Dr. Peter Carter - MD, Expert IPCC Reviewer and the director of the Climate Emergency Institute

Paul Beckwith - Climate Systems Scientist. Professor at the University of Ottawa in the Paleoclimatology Laboratory as well as at Carleton University

Regina Valdez - Program Director, Climate Reality Project, NYC. GreenFaith Fellow and LEED Green Associate

Video Production and Panelists:
Charles Gregoire - Electrical Engineer, Webmaster and IT prime for FacingFuture.Earth & the Climate Emergency Forum; Climate Reality Leader

Heidi Brault - Video production and website assistant, Organizer and convener, Metadata technician, COP26 team lead for FacingFuture.Earth and the Climate Emergency Forum; BA (Psychology); Climate Reality Leader

Our Website:

Attributions:
Background Music:
- Title: Through the City II
- Author: Crowander
- Source: Free Music Archive
- License: CC BY-NC 4.0

[perium]

Brilliant piece of work. Thank you, all.

[heyjude]

If you have been there you feel the grief of the reef 😪

[aprilblm]

I'm Australian, and I'm driven to despair by the lack of action on climate change, both in politics and at the individual level. People here are not taking the threat seriously. We are an apathetic bunch. That said, most (75%) of Australians want more action on climate change but our corrupt, extreme neo-conservative government does only the bidding of their corporate donors - the mines, the fossil fuel barons, banks, animal agriculture and multi-national corporations. They also own the media, that's how they've stayed in power for 9 years despite delivering nothing but heartache to everyday Australians by constantly cutting vital public services. We also have private billionaires that spend millions (60-80 mil from a single man last election) on massive smear campaigns against any politician or group that dares try to go up against the oligarchy. Last election the opposing Labor party leader ran on, among other things, strong climate action including a carbon pricing scheme. The oligarches launched a massive scare campaign against him and targeted specific electorates and managed to turn a critical group of voters against him. We have another federal election coming up this month. There's a lot of anger towards the ruling right wing party. They have dropped the ball in every way possible, but I'm still terrified the media will convince enough fools to vote to keep them in power.

[jankamalachovska]

I am doing a research on the GBR and this is one of the best videos on the whole internet, very good discussion, but kind of missing the conclusion that would relate more to the perservation of the coral reefs rather than THE PHONES ARE THE CAUSE.
However, still very educational and helpfull. Thank you for your amazing work

[slyborg]

Thank you for your honesty about the great tragedy that is happening to the Great Barrier Reef, as well as to all the beings of our earth. It is a great relief to hear about the tragic reality instead of useless falsehoods about what will be done, or the egregious denial of many. "It's just weather."

[leskuzyk]

At a UK conference well over a decade ago, discussion said at 1C all oceanic reefs are gone. 'Who needs reefs' was the sarcastic quip. Temperature rise of the ocean waters being the primary cause of coral polyps dying off.

[robertlussier]

I hit the like, to appease the algorithm, but there should be a 😢 on YouTube.

[h.e.hazelhorst]

As you point out, one of the big problems of this age is, that most people have no personal experience with nature, or a very limited one at the most. The majority just don’t know what’s being destroyed (or have totally other priorities, like people in Africa) while they actually are contributing to the destruction. And even then: if something is gone, the next generation has not even an opportunity to appreciate what once has been. This thought is both comforting and very disturbing at the same time.

[leskuzyk]

The second largest coral reef is in the Caribbean, off the coast of Belize. I swam there once, back in the early 80s. My daughter will never see the living beauty of a coral reef. As humans, we just don't give a rat's butt about our planet's future. Maladaptive, being a nice descriptor.

[mrrecluse]

It all boils down to values. If "civilized" "naked apes" had loved this planet, we would have saved it, well in time, somewhere between 2 and 3 billion, in population, when the science had already started to smack us in the face.
Despite depressing odds, we are all obligated to endure tremendous sacrifice to treat the natural world as no less sacred than we assume ourselves to be. It behooves me to be no less than completely honest, regarding such a pipe dream.
Let's face it. First, there can be no more wars, and no serious emotional boundaries between countries. Only unreserved cooperation, in putting "earth first." Did I say pipe dream?
Second, no more than 2, and preferably 1 child per couple, in developing and developed countries both. End of conversation. Agree. We blew past this human tipping point, called overshoot, 50 to 60 years ago. This sacred cow will never die.

[佳純石川-dc]

There is atm a whole mass extinction of all marine life caused by too high temps in some Seasons.
The most concern is Phytoplankton producing over 50% Oxygen of our Atmosphere and is the main food for marine life and needed for the right chemical compstion of Ocean water.

[robliptak]

A couple years ago (pre-covid) the Australian Government (climate deniers) was complaining about programs about the coral bleaching programs because it was affecting tourism. One ad was stating there are STILL good reefs to see, so come to Australia. Crazy!

[dennismitchell]

People just assume we have already lost the corral reefs. Just as we know we have lost the Amazon rainforest. Time to leave industrial civilization.

[martiansoon]

People keeps on living even when they know that bad things are happening because of them. I had to keep saying to people several years that having cottages with your actual appartment means they double the cost for natural degredation and fossil fuel emissions... And finally they started to realize that is the case. And hardly anyone is going to sell that second apartment.

Similar note during Ukraine war. Does even reasonable people know who is in Nato or in EU? When you hear suggestions like Russia and China, then something is very wrong. When talking about Nato even USA is not mentioned...

Same things happens in any real thing that is not in their actual daily life. They don't really know, They may care, but they have many excuses. Running anything, but just their daily life is too much for most. And that life excludes anything that makes them worrying something.

Understanding how nature works is beyond most. Including yourself to place where you may harm the nature by your actions or your daily routines is hard to come by. If you get sad by listening daily news, then when you stop listening?

There are just few people who are really changing things and who really can change them in a large picture. And when persons like Antonio Guterres is placed in a permanent hold, then it becomes extremely hard to change things. Keep pushing politicians and other leaders, they may eventually do something. But I'm really not relying on that.

Heard Ursula von der Leyen speaking the same that I had wrote was something, but yet still it seemed weird. Having Russian energy totally sanctioned and transfers ended is nice, but yet still it seems like many countries does not listen the base idea. We have to get rid off all burning, not just replace Russia's fossil fuels with LNG and other oil sources. But it seems like EU is going to rather replace fossil with fossil than do what is neccessary for energy independence and for environment. Having enough renewables is just a dream that none seems to care. (We may have to change some techniques, so we don't run out of minerals.) And more importantly in the pace that would really matter. Not even when it is proven that it is the cheapest option too. India is increasing coal burning, even after they had early extreme heat events and their monsoon is getting weirder and their cities are having so much smog... We are simply consuming too much as entire human race. And sadly for some that means we have too many people on Earth.

IPCC's predictions are stuck on 1, 5C idea that is false. WMO predicted that 1, 5C will be topped once in next 5 years (50% chance). And 2030 we are most likely permanently over 1, 5C. So I argue that 1, 5C paper was falseflag operation from IPCC, made just because governments wants to say that things are not as bad as they really are. Aerosols alone raises temperatures over 1, 5C limit, even if you take same baseline as IPCC does.

In my books warm water coral reefs are already extinct. (Likely those in the Red Sea too.) The actual date when this happens is still missing. Our actions will lead this planet to over 3, 0C warming and that's it for corals. Some even say that is enough to wipe out human race, but I don't think 3, 0C is enough. Yet still, we are going over that limit with high probability. And does the heating end to that point when we try?

Current situation with Russia has stopped scientific exchange, so we don't get data from Siberia or from any important access point that Russia has. This may make predictions even harder in the future. Satellites helps a bit, but yet still loads of data is not produced (ie. lack of funding) or is forbidden.

[h.e.hazelhorst]

Luckily, they recently got rid of Scott Morrison. At least one bright spot.

[charlessoukup]

Well we just call it a "tragedy" but Earth doesn't care, it is changing all the time, everything has its term, comes & goes. So REMEMBER, we only DECIDE what we call things good or bad, that's a human construct...to Earth, & Nature it's only constant change.

[EmeraldView]

It's sad. I'm sad. Humanity, at large, is horribly destructive. We will destroy the planet and ourselves. Maybe then the Earth will recover over millions of years.

[garrickmccaskill]

Unfortunately Aussie extraction industry provides far more lucrative careers than tourism. Engineers, geologist, plant operators and even basic labouring positions can earn 6 figures. So no economic incentive to protect Great Barrier Reef, quite the opposite in fact. I'm sure the Aussie media doesnt do much to bring attention to the destruction of the Great Barrier Reef. So no surprise Australian citizenry are inert - though I'm sure there are some grass roots organisations fighting the good fight.

[russtaylor]

Thanks guys, but you do appear to be stuck in the 'Bargaining' phase, stage three of grief. You must know that nothing much is changing and if it did, would still mean nothing. Decline is locked-in. Move on to Depression, then Acceptance. Enjoy the time you have left. Modern civilisation needs a hospice approach now, not 'hope'....