The shellfish industry needs a kelping hand in fighting ocean acidification

Ocean acidification is a daunting problem for shellfish farmers. It turns out that when the water becomes more acidic, the organisms aren’t so good at building their shells or reproducing. Oyster farms off the coast of Washington have already started to see the detrimental effects of increasing acidity.

In response, Paul G. Allen awarded $1.5 million to the Puget Sound Restoration Fund to investigate how kelp could help. Kelp and other seaweeds are able to take up CO2 out of the water, and therefore would make a micro climate of less acidic water. The research being led by Dr. Jonathan Davis , is specifically aimed at how kelps could be used around shellfish farms to create a acid buffer.

Davis is so optimistic, he has already began researching how the seaweed can be used as an additional commercial product for shellfish farmers. He is actively exploring kelp uses from food to fuel.

This multi-culture approach is really good idea. First off, these seaweeds would contribute to carbon drawdown, aiding in the removal of CO2 in the oceans. Additional benefits are protecting a farmers shellfish product while also adding a new revenue stream by selling seaweed products.

You can read more about the project here

You can read an article about Dr. Davis here

How ocean acidification could restructure natural seaweed communities

Sean Connell, of the Environment Institute at the University of Adelaide, recently conducted a study on the effects of ocean acidification (OA) on seaweed communities.

The study was completed in New Zealand’s Bay of Plenty where volcanic vents raise CO2 and increase the water acidity. What the researchers found was that kelp domination was replaced by fast growing turf species. Not only did the volcanic vents increase the growth of turf species, but also inhibited the production of a primary grazer (urchins). These coupled effects allowed turf species to become the dominant in simulated future ocean conditions.

The upper graph showing the control plot where kelp becomes the dominant. The lower graph shows plots with elevated CO2 that become turf dominated.

Predictive studies are full of ambiguity, and fail to address longer term trends such as geographical shifts and adaptions, however, knowing these case studies allows us to be mindful of what we might expect along our own coast.

This study was published in Ecology and can be viewed here