Source:
Chile Desarrollo Sustentable
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Whales also contribute to combating climate change from the oceans around the globe |
As giants of the oceans, whales play an important ecological role in ecosystems. As some of the most massive mammals in the seas, they appear to contribute to maintaining the environmental balance even after death. Once their time on this earth is over, their corpses are gigantic carbon reservoirs.
A natural container
According to a new study, whales appear to be helping to slow climate change even after death, because when they die, their carcasses drop to the ocean floor. It could be that they are helping to regulate the planet's temperature, as the carbon stored inside them is transferred from the surface waters to the depths, where it remains for centuries.
However, their massive carcasses are not the only ones from which the planet benefits. In life, a common whale produces tons of excrement as part of its basic life functions. Even these have a positive impact on the seas.
It is a fact that these mammals feed at depth, then return to the surface to breathe and defecate. These feces are rich in iron, and create favorable conditions for the growth of phytoplankton. In turn, these microscopic creatures capture 40% of the planet's CO2, which corresponds to four times the amount processed by the Amazon jungle. However, this balance is in danger due to human action.
Whaling affects the ecological balance
As a result of the decline in whale populations, it is estimated that between 190,000 and 2 million tons of carbon per year were emitted, which could have sunk to the bottom of the ocean. This would be equivalent to about 400,000 cars on the road annually. Instead of completing the process of sedimentation on the sea floor, this carbon is released into the atmosphere when the carcasses are removed from the seabed.
For this reason, the indiscriminate fishing and hunting of whales around the world for commercial and industrial purposes, diminishes this benefit. Regarding this issue, Vicki James, policy manager at Whale and Dolphin Conservation (WDC), highlighted the following:
"WE NEED TO THINK OF WHALING AS A TRAGEDY THAT HAS REMOVED A HUGE ORGANIC CARBON BOMB FROM THE OCEAN, WHICH WOULD HAVE HAD A MUCH LARGER MULTIPLIER EFFECT ON PHYTOPLANKTON PRODUCTIVITY AND THE OCEAN'S ABILITY TO ABSORB CARBON."
This means that restoring whale populations to pre-hunting numbers could be a strategy to reduce the negative impact on the atmosphere caused by humans. Thought this way, whales could be a natural mesh to capture this harmful gas for the ozone layer, emitted by fossil fuels year after year.
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