Antarctic Carbon Sink Discovered

A positive aspect to the melting of ice in the Polar regions has been discovered.  The loss of Antarctic ice has cleared the way for minute, water-based plants called phytoplankton to grow and act as a form of carbon sink – pulling in atmospheric CO2 at a rate of three-and-a-half million tons a year. 

Natural Carbon Sink

The bad news is that - according to the scientists responsible for a new report on this subject – this natural carbon sink won’t have a significant effect on climate change as a whole.  Still, the ice shelves that are disappearing are “...the size of an English county”, the British Antarctic Survey’s Professor Lloyd Peck – who headed the study – told the BBC, adding: “When they disappear, we are getting new pieces of sea.“

“The loss of glaciers and ice shelves is...thought of as a factor that will predominantly increase warming of the Earth because of changes in albedo [the amount of solar energy reflected back into the sky, compared to that absorbed by the earth] and heat take-up in newly uncovered ground and ocean”, the report states.

New Carbon Sink

However, it adds, the “opening up of new areas for biological productivity” is a positive result of the ice melt.  Contextualising the discovery, though, the reported lauds the fact that new carbon sinks have been identified, but adds that their impact on climate change is “miniscule.” 

While the new carbon sinks are encouraging marine life to flourish and bloom, and pulling multiple different sea creatures into the area, there is a caveat, the study asserts.

Antarctic Ocean Acidification

One ultimate consequence of higher levels of oceanic CO2 is Antarctic ocean acidification – a state that could impact badly on oceanic life forms – and this is an area that Professor Peck and his colleagues are now studying.  “Yes we have this new life, but a lot of animals that live in the Antarctic on the sea floor near the coastline are animals that use calcium carbonate a lot”, he stated, adding:  “If acidification happens, and it has the impact that we think it can, then it could be really bad for these types of animals.”